Franco-British relations and Europe, from EEC membership to Brexit

Introduction

Olivier Sibre

Franco-British relations are centuries-old, part of a perpetual dialectic of conflict, alliance, and sometimes even disdain and attraction. Cliches surrounding the neighbour across the Channel are tenacious in France as in the United Kingdom, and are connected to an ever-expanding terminology, often driven by English humour.

With the Franco-British relation, we typically enter a historical constant, one that has lasted for almost a millennium. The two countries were the first to build a modern state in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, with the Hundred Years’ War being the reflection of this unique emergence right in the middle of the feudal period. Since then, a definitive union of the two states was almost concluded in June 1940, with Jean Monnet’s proposal for a French-British Union, which was submitted to Paul Reynaud and Winston Churchill in the context of the continental debacle. The fundamentals of the Franco-British relation, with the exception of the Vichy government, have essentially stopped shifting since at least 1904, with international crises on the continent almost always strengthening the strategic partnership between the two former European powers.

It is nevertheless true that the early 1970s were a much more important period that any other, with the UK’s entry in the EEC. This meant, at least for the Europeans, the docking of Britannia in a European port, in powerful and almost definitive fashion, or at least we believed. The debates at the time in the British Parliament nevertheless reveal a strategy marked more by a specific domestic and international context – in addition to economic opportunism – rather than wholly positive support for the European project. It was these opportunistic arguments that Edward Heath, who was personally convinced of the historical dimension of European integration, used to convince British MPs and citizens. As for Georges Pompidou, after the refusals by de Gaulle, he probably had less difficulty, despite the mixed results from the 1972 referendum, explaining to the French the opportunity presented by this change, namely the ‘natural’ enlargement of the EEC, within a booming economic context, to include one of Europe’s major economies. In both cases, it is certain that the crisis of Britain’s industry and economy, as well as French prosperity and the success of the Common Market, gave each government arguments to support rapprochement, beyond cultural, historical, geopolitical, and even identity-based considerations. On the geopolitical and international levels, Pompidou closely monitored Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik. On the other side of the Channel, they imagined leading Western Europe within the EEC, notably with France and the FRG. The American factor nevertheless remained important, with Washington pressuring the UK to join the Common Market, and France feeling it was drifting away from the American partner by anchoring itself within European projects.

For all that, despite Labour’s wishes, upon its return to power in February 1974, to renegotiate the accession conditions secured by Conservatives, and the uncompromising positions of Margaret Thatcher, Brexit was not so ‘foreseeable’ after 40 years of integration. It proved an arduous journey even for the negotiators from 2016 to 2020, including for Michel Barnier, who published a long account entitled My Secret Brexit Diary: A Glorious Illusion.

On 17 May 2024, the Institut Georges Pompidou organised its first conference abroad in the United Kingdom, in Oxford, with French and British academics. The IGP is using this book to explore the ‘Pompidou-Heath couple’, recent history, and key issues in Franco-British relations, all within a post-Brexit context that is not particularly favourable. This context changed entirely just a few weeks later with the British political pendulum swinging back during the July elections, which brought Labour back to power, and the government led by the new Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer. This publication is now situated amid a more ‘positive’ state of affairs for Franco-British rapprochement, bolstered by the state visit to the United Kingdom by French President Emmanuel Macron in July 2025.

The Institut Georges Pompidou does not pretend that this modest conference provided any inspiration for the two partners in recent months. At the very least, it is certain that the UK’s entry into the Common Market proves that at certain moments of history, Continental tropism – and French tropism in particular – can be as powerful if not more powerful than ‘Global Britain’.

As a leitmotif, as a continuous basis for history, the Franco-British relation represents an essential structural given in European history, as long as Europe remains a centre for the construction and evolution of history, and does not resign itself to becoming a periphery of the world, a simple peninsula of the Eurasian continent. This publication examines almost all sectors of Franco-British rapprochement within a European context since President Georges Pompidou and Prime Minister Edward Heath, including political, diplomatic, strategic, economic, and cultural aspects. It is based on recent research, as well as the opening of archives at the Archives nationales and the Bodleian Libraries, some of them recent. We hope it sustains the work of young researchers, and sparks an interest in revisiting history, with a view to reflecting on the contemporary relation between France and the UK, and the key issues it involves.

I would like to extend my warmest thanks to my French and British colleagues, the Maison Française d’Oxford, and the Embassy of France in London.

Preliminary Remarks

Guillaume Lacroix, First Counsellor of the French Embassy in London

Ladies and gentlemen,

It is an honour for me to say a few words on behalf of Ambassador Duchêne.

I would like to thank the Institut Georges Pompidou, which organised the conference; our host, the Maison Française d’Oxford; and all of the speakers and participants.

The Ambassador is proud to be associated with this event, which takes its place as part of the commemorations for the 120th anniversary of the Entente Cordiale, and just a few days ahead of the 80th anniversary of the Normandy Landings.

Times really have changed since the 1970s, as we will discuss today. But some factors of stability have proven unchanging in the Franco-British relationship: firstly our geography, which links us together; secondly security – both now and in the past, for we have been allies in protecting our borders and our values; and third, relations between our civil societies and our young people. All of these areas, which are central to our relationship, featured prominently on the agenda of the Franco-British summit of 10 March 2023, the first in five years.

I’d like to end on a personal note. I was born in 1971 when Georges Pompidou was president of France. Montboudif, Cajarc and Orvilliers are all familiar names to me. I can clearly picture them in my mind, even if the picture is in black and white. But when I think of President Pompidou, I also think of the speech he delivered on 28 February 1970 at Palmer House in Chicago, where I served before taking up my post in London. I encourage you to read, again and again, this tremendous, visionary speech about the environment and humankind’s relationship with nature.

Thank you for your invitation. I hope you have a successful conference.

The Anglo-French Sibling Rivalry: From a Family Affair to the Pompidou-Heath Cooperation

Beatrice Heuser

Relations between the British Isles and the European Continent go back thousands of years. A wide-spread megalith culture spanned Western Europe from Hispania in the South and Britannia and Hibernia in the West (to use their later Roman names) to Scandinavia, and included much of France, the Netherlands, and northwest Germany. Skeletal finds, such as the Amesbury Archer, suggest that people moved backwards and forwards from Britain to the Continent.

Then in the Iron Age, Celts from the Continent arrived in Britain and later Ireland. Again, both islands were part of a huge culture, one that spread horizontally across the entire Continent, from the Black Sea to the Atlantic1. The Roman conquest of Britain in the first century A.D. added another layer in Britain’s integration within a larger European whole, excluding only Ireland and northern Scotland2.