Concluding Remarks

Abstract

With the end of the military, political and ideological division of Europe which has dominated East-West relations since the Russian Revolution and the Second World War, the continent stands on the threshold of an ear of great opportunity. The process of European integration is gathering pace; in the wake of the Single European Act, total economic and monetary union can, although some countries might have justifiable reservations about it, only be a matter of time. As tariffs and protectionism end with the creation of a unified market, the present array of national currencies of differing relative values, for example, will become an anachronism that can only complicate and obstruct the mechanics of free trade; the very logic of the situation points to their supersedence by a single currency of some kind, administered by a central bank. Indeed in October 1990 the vast majority of the EEC states declared this to be one of their goals. Similarly they speak and act increasingly as one in their relations with the rest of the world, and once their economic interests become completely interwoven, it would be surprising if this embryonic political cohesion did not take on a formal, institutionalised shape, such as a European confederation, which must at some point begin to concern itself with security matters.

‘There is no simple formula for peace, and no single act that will assure peace. Any who preach that are dangerously deluded. Only the combined result of many efforts at different levels, and at many places, will assure peace. In these efforts everyone has a part to play. The stakes are the greatest for which men have ever played.’

(John Foster Dulles)