Crisis and continuity: Robert Marjolin, transnational policy-making and neoliberalism, 1930s–70s

Indicative Planning and France's Backstage Contribution to Eurozone Governance

“…Central to this is Robert Marjolin, who attended the Colloquium and was a key post‐war practitioner of planning both in France and transnationally. For Schulz‐Forberg, Marjolin's trajectory reveals important connections between social democracy, transnational policy‐making, and complex diversity of the ‘neoliberal thought collective’ (Schulz‐Forberg 2019).…”

“…As a translation of French indicative planning, the Memorandum stressed that European programming ‘would by no means imply an arbitrary plan, imposed on particular firms, and interfering with the freedom of the market’ (European Commission 1962). Instead, European indicative planning involved ‘modifying the market without direct intervention in the economic life of businesses’ (Schulz‐Forberg 2019, p. 687). In a 1962 speech, Marjolin argued that ‘it is not an authoritarian Plan.…”

“…A number of historical researchers have recently resurrected Robert Marjolin as an important, yet overlooked, figure of European integration (Seidel 2016;Schulz-Forberg 2019;Warlouzet 2019;Caldari 2020;Canihac 2021). For many of these scholars, while Marjolin's ideas ran aground at the time in the face of resistance from Member States protective of their sovereignty, his committee played an important pre-figurative role in the future of the Eurozone.…”

“…Specifically, indicative planning has always been understood as governing with markets, rather than against them as the notion of dirigisme implies. Some scholars have interpreted this fact to mean indicative planning should be understood as closer to a neoliberal tradition than often appreciated (Schulz‐Forberg 2019). In contrast, I argue it is more conceptually illuminating to trace indicative planning as a distinctive lineage.…”