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Book Reviews
German foreign policy in fact always had to mediate between the
USA and �rance, which often happened at the expense of Britain.
When it comes to assessing Adenauer’s apparently inexplicable and
supposedly sudden change of mind concerning British EEC membership
in 1962, Deighton resorts to Harold Macmillan’s speculations
in his autobiography about the motives of the German chancellor,
whom he absolutely despised—perhaps not the best support for an
insecure judgement. Unfortunately, the author also ignores alternative
explanations of Britain’s German and European policy.
The second chapter, on the period from 1973 to 1989, shows a much
better grasp of the domestic context for policy-making, not only in
Britain, but also in Germany. In particular, Julie Smith and Geoffrey
Edwards explain how the institutional tradition and political milieu of
German federalism as well as the ideological openness towards supranational
solutions of the Christian Democrats as the leading government
party until 1969 continued to influence the European policy
behaviour of the SPD-led governments in the 1970s. The authors deal
with the essential episodes, especially the budget issue, which led to
the characterization of Britain as an ‘awkward partner’ (Stephen
George) inside the enlarged EC. This new partner appeared unwilling
to enter into stable long-term relationships involving give and take in
European negotiations, stubbornly following an inflexible agenda determined
by domestic party politics and the fixations of a Prime Minister
with dictatorial inclinations. Smith and Edwards rightly emphasize
that the strong British support for the Internal Market Programme
in the 1980s signifies that British European and German policy did have
coherent aims and was in fact ‘constructive’. They also show, however,
that Margaret Thatcher treated the EC Council like her Cabinet and,
unlike the �oreign Office, did not grasp the need for long-term interest
mediation and issue linkages in the Community. Unfortunately, this
essay is also somewhat lop-sided in its more extensive treatment of
Britain and Europe.
The third essay, by Klaus Larres, is a very detailed account of
British policy towards the GDR. Its inclusion acknowledges the simple
fact that there were two Germanies until 1990, and allows an
account of British attitudes towards German unification and of the
changing policy of the governments in London towards the Hallstein
doctrine (named after the state secretary in the German �oreign
Office and then President of the EEC Commission) that the Bonn gov-
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