Toward the EMS. The Contribution of the Study Groups The decision by Andreotti’s centrist government to withdraw

the lira from the monetary Snake in February 1973 led to growing misunderstandings between Italy and its European partners, opening the

way for the practice of “competitive devaluations”, which was unpopular in Brussels� The commitment of the Europeanists, who, after Italy had left the Monetary Snake had doubled their efforts to gain the government’s support for the monetary issue, was in vain�¹

After the Paris Summit midway through the Seventies, the prospects for the direct election of the European Parliament appeared to make politically feasible an institutional development that would achieve and manage monetary unification, thereby guaranteeing the strengthening of the mechanisms of community solidarity needed to allow the weaker countries to abandon exchange rate maneuvers in an attempt to compete with stronger ones� It was a hectic moment that presaged important changes in Europe� In February 1976, the European Movement, under the presidency of Jean Rey, convened a “Congress of Europe” in Brussels, participating in which were the most renowned Europeanist figures, among whom Andreotti� During the Congress, Willy Brandt stated that the Parliament “should view itself as the permanent constituent assembly of Europe”�²

As often occurred during the European unification process, several forces in favor of re-launching European unification had for some time been preparing fertile ground for European initiatives regarding monetary unification through an effective action of ‘tillage’� Ties were established among the most important economists through their common participation on official committees; in addition, informal groups were created at the European level, thereby creating a continual flow of ideas and proposals and focusing the attention of the political authorities and public opinion on the topics of monetary integration�

Beginning at the end of the Fifties, one of the most influential forums for the economic-monetary debate was Jean Monnet’s Comité d’Action pour les États-Unis d’Europe,³ which included distinguished members

1 Among these efforts was the national convention organized by the Italian Committee of the European Movement in 1973, led by Petrilli Giuseppe� Cf� Orsello, Gian Piero, I movimenti per l’unità europea, in I movimenti per l’unità europea 1970-1986, edited by Ariane Landuyt and Daniela Preda, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2000, p� 1035-1051�

2 Willy Brandt’s speech to the Congress of Europe organized by the European Movement in Brussels on 5-7 February 1976, in L’Unità europea, III (1976), No� 25, p� 9-12�

3 On the activities of the Monnet Committee see Dumoulin, Michel, Robert Triffin, le CAEUE de Jean Monnet et les questions monétaires européennes (1969-1974).

Inventaire des papiers Triffin, Louvain-la Neuve,-Ciaco, 1988; Fontaine, Pascal, Le Comité d’Action pour les États-Unis d’Europe de Jean Monnet, Lausanne, Centre de Recherches européennes, 1974; Yondorf, Walter, “Monnet and the Action Committee� The Formative Period of the European Communities”, International

such as Triffin⁴, Uri, Delouvrier, Marjolin, Clappier and Carli� Another highly active, though less well-known network on monetary issues, in particular the topic of the “parallel currency”, was the Villa Pamphli group,⁵ created in 1976 through the efforts of Giovanni Magnifico�

The Group included Lord Cromer, Geoffrey Denton, Armin Gutowski, Norbert Kloten, Alexandre Lamfalussy, Andrei Shonfield, Pierre Uri, Robert Triffin, Conrad Oort⁶ and J� Van Ypersèle� In 1977, the European Commission brought together an independent group of economists, under the leadership of MacDougall, including among others Michael Emerson and Francesco Forte�⁷

These groups are already known to historiography�⁸ Other initiatives could be added in this regard in which the Italian presence is significantly scarce, in particular the group of young economists that gravitated

Organization, 19  (1965), p�  885-912; Meynaud, Jean, Sidianski, Dusan, “Le Comité d’Action pour les États-Unis d’Europe”, in Annuaire européen, 13 (1965), p�  3-27; Varsori, Antonio, “Jean Monnet e il Comitato d’Azione per gli Stati Uniti d’Europa dalle origini ai Trattati di Roma (1955-1957)”, in Ciampani, Andrea (ed�), L’altra via per l’Europa. Forze sociali e organizzazione degli interessi nell’ integrazione europea (1947-1957), Milan, FrancoAngeli, 1995, p�  139-170;

Id�, Jean Monnet e il Comitato d’Azione per gli Stati Uniti d’Europa tra MEC ed Euratom, in I movimenti per l’unità europea 1954-1969, edited by Sergio Pistone, Pavia, PIME, 1996, p� 349-371; Melchionni, Maria Grazia, “Le Comité d’Action pour les États-Unis d’Europe : un réseau au service de l’union européenne”, in Bossuat, Gérard et Wilkens, Andreas (dir�), Jean Monnet, l’Europe et les chemins de la paix, Paris, Publications de la Sorbonne, 1999, p� 221-251�

4 On Triffin see Koeune, Jean Claude, Lamfalussy, Alexandre (eds�), In search of a New World Monetary Order, Bruxelles, P�I�E� Peter Lang, 2012; Montani, Guido, “Robert Triffin and the Economic Problem of the 20^th century”, in Il Federalista, Vol� XXXI (1989), No� 3� See also the essay by Ivo Maes in this book�

5 In 1977 the Group published a Manifesto� Cf� Balossa, B�, “Riforme monetarie e Mercato Comune Europeo� Manifesto di Villa Pamphili”, in Moneta e Credito, No� 118, 1977, p� 131-148� See also Masini, Fabio, SMEmorie della lira. Gli economisti italiani e l’adesione al Sistema monetario europeo, Milan, FrancoAngeli 2004�

6 Oort, Conrad J�, Steps to International Monetary Order, Washington D�C�, Per Jacobsson Foundation, 1974�

7 The Group is also responsible for the famous Mac Dougall Report – The Role of Public Finance in European Integration – published in 1977� An advisor of Jenkins and of the Treasury, Mac Dougall was head economic advisor of the British industrial federation�

Members of the committee included professors Dieter Biehl, Arthur Brown, Francesco Forte, Yves Fréville, Martin O’Donoghue, Theo Peeters, and the collaborators Wallace Oates and Russell Mathews, in addition to several executives from the European Commission’s Directorate General of Economic and Financial Affairs, including the director, Paul Van den Bempt, and Michael Emerson, the division head�

8 See in particular Ludlow, Piers, The Making of the European Monetary System, London, Butterworth Scientific, 1982; Ludlow, Piers, Spaventa, Luigi, The Political and Diplomatic Origins of the European Monetary System: July 1977-March 1979, Florence, European University Institute, 1979�

toward the President of the Union européenne des fédéralistes (UEF),⁹ Mario Albertini:¹⁰ professors Guido Montani, Alberto Majocchi, Dario Velo, the director of planning and management control of Holding Fiat, Antonio Mosconi, the head of the research service of the Istituto Bancario San Paolo of Turin, Alfonso Jozzo, and Domenico Moro, an executive in the economic studies group of Fiat�

Already in 1969 federalists had raised the issue of how to respond to the crisis in the Bretton Woods system, organizing two conventions in Turin, where the proposal was made to create a European reserve system�¹¹ In December of 1976, the European Federalist Movement (EFM) organized a convention in Pavia¹² on the topic of “A currency for Europe”, in which supporters and detractors of the single currency participated, among whom the Director General of the Ministry of Finance in the Federal Republic of Germany, Manfred Lahnstein, who at that time was among the sceptics, and the economic advisor of the Bank of Italy, Giovanni Magnifico, who was among the supporters�¹³ Two other federalist conventions would follow: the first in Turin on March 24, 1977, and the second in Paris on March 26 of the same year� In Turin, the supporters of the single currency included, in addition to Magnifico, Robert Triffin, Cesare Romiti and the Treasury Minister, Gaetano Stammati� In Paris, Pierre Werner joined Magnifico and Triffin among the supporters�

The support of federalists for the EMS was based on the conviction that this represented a fundamental break with the disintegrative tendency exemplified by the dangerous rise of economic and monetary nationalism in Europe in the seventies� With the direct election of the

9 On the UEF see Pistone, Sergio, The Union of European Federalists: from the foundation to the decision on direct elections of the European Parliament (1946-1974), Milan, Giuffré, 2008�

10 See Albertini, Mario, Tutti gli scritti, edited by Nicoletta Mosconi, 9 volumes, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2006-2009; Terranova, Flavio, Il federalismo di Mario Albertini, Milan, Giuffré, 2003; Preda, Daniela, Per una biografia di Mario Albertini: la formazione, la scelta europea e l’autonomia federalista, Pavia, Jean Monnet Centre of Pavia, 2014�

11 See Montani, Guido, The action of the European federalist movement for the European currency, in this volume� Presented to the conferences was a document drafted by Alfonso Jozzo and Antonio Mosconi entitled “Pour un système européen de réserve”, subsequently published in Le Fédéraliste, 1969, No� 2, p� 71-78� Among those present at the second convention were Robert Triffin and Rinaldo Ossola�

12 The proceedings of the conference, which took place on December 10 and 11, 1976, were published in Thema – Quaderni di Economia e Finanza dell’Istituto bancario San Paolo di Torino, 1977, No� 1, under the title “L’unione monetaria europea nella prospettiva dell’elezione europea”�

13 Magnifico, Giovanni, L’Europe par la monnaie – Une nouvelle approche, preface by Guido Carli, Paris-Limoges, Lavanzelle, 1974�

European Parliament, the EMS could represent a solid foundation for the creation of true monetary unification�

Given the prospects that a relaunching of the European integration process could be favored by the monetary initiative, the President of the IRI (the Institute for Industrial Reconstruction), the Christian-Democrat Giuseppe Petrilli,¹⁴ in his role as President of the Italian Committee of the European Movement, organized a convention in Rome on June 17-18, 1977, with European repercussions� Among those participating at the convention were Giulio Andreotti, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing and Leo Tindemans� The topic was: “The economic union and the problem of the European currency”�¹⁵ Prepared by working groups of economists from the EFM and introduced by reports by Petrilli, Werner and Majocchi, the convention saw the participation of a founding father of Europe, Dirk P� Spierenburg, along with a numerous turnout of academics and politicians involved in European actions, such as the President of the European Parliament, Emilio Colombo, the Minister of the Treasury, Gaetano Stammati, the Hons� Luigi Granelli, Mario Ferrari Agradi, Silvio Leonardi, Luciano Barca, and three representatives from the Bank of Italy: the economic advisor Giovanni Magnifico, the head of the office of monetary and financial issues, Rainer Masera,¹⁶ and the vice-director of the research service, Ercole Tuccimei�

To underscore the harmony and common commitment to struggle of the Federalists, in November of 1977 the President of the European Commission, Roy Jenkins, gave a speech at the re-unified UEF Congress in Brussels�¹⁷