This module identifies and explores the key influences on the making of British foreign policy after World War Two, and aims to examine and explain Britain’s relationship with Western Europe during the period under review in the light of this analysis.

On completion of the module a student will be able to:

• Demonstrate a detailed knowledge and understanding of the key principles underpinning the conduct of Britain’s external relations between 1951 and 1963;
• identify the shifting balance between Europe, the British Commonwealth and the Atlantic area in British national strategy;
• demonstrate an understanding of how Britain’s changing international position influenced domestic political debates about both foreign policy and domestic modernization;
• analyse the themes mentioned above in the light of those ideas and debates;
• demonstrate an in-depth and critical understanding of (a) key concepts and debates governing the formulation of British national strategy within the appropriate secondary literature and (b) key primary sources on British politics, economic affairs and foreign policy for the period under review.

The module will be taught and students will learn through a mixture of:

• formal lectures to introduce students to the main factual and conceptual issues to be discussed and analysed during the course;
• seminars in which key texts are analysed will enable students to further develop analytic skills;
• document workshops in which primary sources are analysed will enable students to develop discipline specific methods of approaching and analysing primary historical sources;
• presentations through which students will develop their presentation and team work skills and understanding of specific topics.

Upon the completion of the option, the typical student will be able to:

Academic:

• identify problems, assess evidence, and reach conclusions consistent with them;
• demonstrate and ability to assess both primary and secondary sources;
• devise and sustain arguments about the previously mentioned topics using ideas or techniques developed during the course;
• present their arguments accurately, succinctly and lucidly, and in written or oral form, in accordance with appropriate scholarly conventions.

 Subject-specific:

• identify the nature and scope of the issues raised concerning British policy towards European integration from 1951-75;
• explain and analyse the influence of economics on the formulation of a modern nation-state’s international strategy;
• summarise and appraise with reference to the primary and secondary material topics such as the role of domestic politics and economic policy on Britain’s external relations during this period, the conflicting ideas about European unity within the Western Alliance, Britain’s increasing prioritization of Western Europe over the Commonwealth, and the changing position of ‘Europeanism’ in the philosophies of the two major parties.

 Generic:

•  communicate ideas and arguments effectively, whether in speech or in writing in an accurate, succinct and lucid manner;
• formulate and justify their own arguments and conclusions about a range of issues;
• demonstrate an ability to modify as well as to defend their own position;
• posses a range of information technology resources to assist  with information retrieval;
• organise their own study methods and workload;
• work as part of a team in seminar or tutorial discussions;
• independently organise their own study methods and workload. 

The module will be assessed through a 3,000 - 4,000 word assessed essay (100%), allowing students to conduct in-depth historiographical research on a major theme.

Topics covered:

  1. Introduction – Britain and Europe: the long view

  2. The rise and fall of European Defence Community (EDC)

  3. Britain, Europe, sterling and ‘one world’, 1951-55

  4. Messina: the 'relaunching of Europe'

  5. Britain and the European customs union

  6. The Treaty of Rome and the free trade area

  7. 1956-58: a great reappraisal?

  8. The conversion of the establishment

  9. Macmillan, Conservative modernization and the EEC

10. The first application, the Nassau conference and de Gaulle's veto.

Oliver Daddow, Britain and European Integration since 1945: historiographical perspectives on integration (2004)

Martin Dedman, The Origins and Development of the European Union, 1945-2008 (2010)

Alan S. Milward, The European Rescue of the Nation-State (2000)

John W. Young, Britain and European Unity 1945-1999 (2000)