The New Customs Unions

In 1957 the signing of the Treaty of Rome by six European nations1 was probably the most important single economic event in the period spanned by this book. It marked a new stage in international co-operation. It redistributed economic power and influence, giving to the group a total industrial output matching that of the United States and exceeding that of the Soviet Union, and a foreign trade with other countries greater than any other power. It gave potential for growth to an area already registering at that time, in its constituent countries, the fastest economic growth in the world. It held remote but exciting promise of a single European super-power which would replace the national mercantilism of four centuries.