Lomé et la coopération industrielle CEE-ACP en 1975: entre Nouvel ordre économique international et poursuite des intérêts industriels européens

Abstract

In 1975, the Lomé Convention, which manages relations between the EEC and the countries of the ACP (Africa Caribbean Pacific) group, introduces a chapter on "industrial cooperation". This new policy aims to develop production sectors (industry, agriculture, mining and tourism) in the ACP countries, and embodies the egalitarian partnership discourse specific to the New International Economic Order. Using unpublished archives from the European Commission, the ACP Secretariat, the Centre for Industrial Development and interviews with the administrators in charge in the 1970s, we study the complexity of the networks of internal and external actors at DG- VIII responsible for setting up EEC-ACP industrial cooperation in Brussels. In doing so, we show that industrial cooperation is created out of the political will to rethink relations between European countries and previous African colonies in the framework of the NIEO; we also show the persistence of interests from private European economic circles, which remain close to the European Commission.