But the promotion of exports; the redirection of resources from old industries to new ones; the encouragement of favored sectors like agriculture or transport: all these required cross-border cooperation. None of the West European economies was self-sufficient. This trend towards mutually advantageous coordination was thus driven by national self-interest, not the objectives of Schuman’s Coal and Steel Authority, which was irrelevant to economic policy making in these years. The same concern to protect and nourish local interests that had turned Europe’s states inwards before 1939 now brought
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