This book is a detailed and original look at the radical reorganisation of French heavy industry in the turbulent period between the establishment of the Vichy regime in 1940 and the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), the forerunner to the European Union, in 1952. By studying institutions ranging from Vichy's Organisation Committees to Jean Monnet's Commissariat Général du Plan (CGP), Luc-André Brunet challenges existing narratives and reveals significant continuities from Vichy to post-war initiatives such as the Monnet Plan and the ECSC. Based on extensive multi-archival research, this book sheds important new light on economic collaboration and resistance in Vichy, the post-war revival of the French economy, and the origins of European integration.
"The book has amply demonstrated the central thesis of Vichy's transitional influence, not out of ideological adherence but sheer necessity. This is a work that is worth reading." (Michael B. Miller, H-France Review, Vol. 19 (216), October, 2019)
"The author provides nuanced analysis and detailed coverage that will prove of considerable interest to scholars of France's wartime economic history. ... This work provides a valuable insight into the workings of a significant, and long neglected, aspect of France's wartime past." (Thomas Beaumont, French History, Vol. 33 (2), 2019)
"The author provides nuanced analysis and detailed coverage that will prove of considerable interest to scholars of France's wartime economic history. ... This work provides a valuable insight into the workings of a significant, and long neglected, aspect of France's wartime past." (Thomas Beaumont, French History, Vol. 33 (2), 2019)