About Jean Monnet

Jean Monnet – a father of modern Europe
1888-1979

Regarded as one of the most important figures in the formation of the modern day European Union Jean Monnet was born in Cognac, France in 1888. He would subsequently grow to adulthood in the period covering Europe’s darkest years when twice the continent was riven with sickening wars and vast levels of destruction.

Monnet forged a career during World War 1 as a civil servant co-ordinating co-operation between the allies. A major figure in international co-operation he become Secretary of the League of Nations in 1919. He resigned from this post in 1923 and went on in the interwar years to work in International Finance, garnering experience in Britain and the United States, as well as working with impoverished states in Eastern Europe.

He helped co-ordinate British-French co-operation after the start of World War 2 and stayed with the Free French Forces after the fall of France. During the war he found a place urging American support for the allied war effort and assisting the American supply of the British Isles.

As early as 1943 it was clear Monnet saw the future for Europe as best realised through co-operation rather than rivalry between its states. In August he addressed the French National Liberation committee with the fateful words

“The countries of Europe are not strong enough individually to be able to guarantee prosperity and social development for their peoples. The States of Europe must therefore form a federation or a European entity that would make them into a common economic unit.”

After the war his first tasks were those of attempting to rebuild the shattered French economy. However in 1950 Monnet was key author of the plan for the formation of the European Coal and Steel Community, the forerunner to the European Union. His shrewd awareness of the potential for European rivalry to be sparked by economic competition between Germany and France in the steel industry, and the strategic importance of coal to the European economy, sparked him to action. His plan for the Community was an inspired and creative piece of policymaking. In 1952 Monnet was appointed to head this new body.

In 1955 Monnet drove the process of European consolidation even further, with the formation of the Action Committee for the United States of Europe. This group, comprising European political parties and trade unions, continued to lobby for, and develop policy for, European integration. It played a major role in the formation of the Common Market, the European Monetary System and the eventual European Union itself.

The European Council in Luxembourg on 2 April 1976 proclaimed Jean Monnet an “Honorary Citizen of Europe”.

In acknowledgement of the vast contribution Jean Monnet made to the European Union the European Commission makes available a wide number of grants to celebrate his life and enable scholars around the world to conduct work on the topic of European integration and European studies. Information about these awards is to be found at the European Commission’s Jean Monnet Action site.