Frances M.B. Lynch

The road to concorde: Franco-British relations and the supersonic project

In November 1962 the British and French governments signed an irreversible agreement to build together the Western worlds first civil supersonic aeroplane: Concorde. This article explores the background to the agreement, looking in particular at why Britain and France co-operated with each other rather than with the United States or West Germany, the other possible partners. The central argument is that the agreement was driven not by technological convergence in the aircraft industry but by a weakening of Britains position in 1961 caused by American unwillingness to partner Britain in the supersonic adventure and Britains decision to apply for membership of the Common Market. The French government was then able to exploit that weakness in order to acquire technological expertise particularly in the field of aircraft engine construction.

France and European Integration: From the Schuman Plan to Economic and Monetary Union

Craig Parsons, A Certain Idea of Europe (Ithaca, NY, and London: Cornell University Press, 2003), 255pp.,

The Powerlessness of Employees in France: The Spread of Income Taxation, 1945–1980

39.95 (hb), ISBN 0-8014-4086-6. David J. Howarth, The French Road to European Monetary Union (New York and London: Palgrave, 2001), 256pp., £42.50 (hb), ISBN 0-333-92096-1. Mairi MacLean, Economic Management and French Business from de Gaulle to Chirac (New York and London: Palgrave, 2001), 256pp., £42.50 (hb), ISBN 0-333-76148-0.

Alan S. Milward and contemporary European history : collected academic reviews

Income taxation was first introduced in France during the First World War, but it was not until after 1945 that it was gradually extended to cover a majority of households. Levied on the previous year’s declared income, or in the case of agriculture the estimated income, it raised less as a proportion of total tax revenue than in almost any other Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) member state. The purpose of this chapter is to explain why this was so. By using the official records of the Ministry of Finance as well as a database, EuroPTax, in which the effective rates of income tax levied in France and other European states are calculated, both the motives and outcomes of the major reforms of 1948 and 1959 are explained.

Building a European identity: France, the United States, and the oil shock, 1973–1974

1. Introduction Reading Contemporary European History: A Milwardian Perspective 2. Book reviews published by Alan S. Milward, 1965-2007 3. Notes on the Editors 4. Bibliography

L’eredità intellettuale di Alan S. Milward

during Soviet Union, Kyrgyz as the titular nationality were promoted over other ethnicities in various spheres, especially in regard to politics. After independence in 1991, the situation not only remained the same but also, some would argue, has worsened through increased nationalism among ethnic Kyrgyz. As Liu states ‘Uzbeks in Kyrgyzstan are disempowered because they live in a state that, since independence, has been nationalizing around ideas of Kyrgyz distinctiveness and the fact of Kyrgyz dominance in most positions of influence’ (p. 11). Ethnic Uzbeks in Osh felt overwhelmingly dominated by Kyrgyz, who not only exceeded Uzbeks in terms of numbers but also held political power. The identity of Uzbeks living in southern Kyrgyzstan, particularly in Osh, has always been of interest to me. It fascinated me how Osh Uzbeks, despite being citizens of Kyrgyzstan, felt more patriotic and closer to neighboring Uzbekistan rather than the place they grew up and called home. Of course, all the obvious reasons were there: ethnically they were all Uzbeks, traditionally and culturally Uzbeks were very different from Kyrgyz, and Uzbeks were more conservative when it came to Islam. The absence of civic nationalism was overwhelmingly present, although in a later stage it seemed to change mainly for economic reasons and Liu does a good job in illustrating that change. In the 1990s, Osh Uzbeks witnessed the glorification of Uzbekistan through Uzbek television and had a yearning for their ‘home land’. However, in the second decade of independence, Osh Uzbeks saw that living in Kyrgyzstan which was more democratic not only gave them more freedom but also created economic opportunities. Under Solomon’s Throne provides a thorough analysis of the sociopolitical contradictions of post-Soviet Central Asia through the prism of the ethnic Uzbeks in Osh. The author, through extensive fieldwork in Osh, Kyrgyzstan, explains how an ethnic community is dealing with the dilemmas they are faced with in independent Kyrgyzstan. Interestingly, the author uses the city and the urban landscape to describe how ethnic Uzbeks not only identify themselves but also use the city to understand how they fit in the broader context in relation to the world. Through interviews, observation, conversations with the locals, review of documents, publications from the Soviet times, the author brings us what we might call a treasure which provides an outsider with a rare glimpse into the complex world of post-Soviet Central Asia and helps us understand how Osh Uzbeks see themselves in comparison to Kyrgyz and the world.

The frontier of national sovereignty: history and theory, 1945-1992

Alan S. Milward was a contemporary historian who combined the political historian’s method of consulting the written record with the economic historian’s use of statistical data and the social scientist’s preference for general theory. On the strength of the resulting research methodology he produced a series of original histories of Nineteenth and Twentieth century Europe which tackled the big historical issues of his time: the nature of Nazism; of total war; of economic development in Nineteenth and Twentieth century Europe; and the reasons for the sustained economic boom in western Europe after 1945 and for the origins of European integration. In so far as his conclusions on each separate theme challenged the dominant theories, they stimulated considerable debate. Indeed, his implicit theories of historical change and European integration continue to resonate in the current political and economic crises facing Europe. Unlike neo-classical economists, European federalists and many integration theorists, Milward argued that economic and monetary union would not necessarily lead to a democratic political union in Europe and the end of nation-state. Indeed he predicted in 2000 that if the European Monetary Union was beset by asymmetric shocks, it would weaken progressively until its desired effect had been so reduced as to defeat the Union’s original purpose. As we live through such asymmetric shocks, Milward’s predictions seem to carry more force than any of teleological theories of European integration.