Miriam Camps and European Integration: Blurring the Boundaries between Scholarship and Diplomacy

Abstract

AbstractMiriam Camps (1916–1994) was a US diplomat, journalist, economist, and scholar. Involved in the design of early postwar European integration organizations at the State Department in the 1940s, she remained at the center of US foreign policy formulation toward Europe until the late 1960s. Her practical experience as a formal and informal diplomat—from the late 1950s, Camps was affiliated with elite foreign policy think tanks—informed her output as a scholar. Like other female international thinkers and experts, she was well known in her time, but her contribution to both US foreign policy and scholarship on European integration has since been largely overlooked by historians of European integration and international relations scholars. This article explores Camps’ scholarship and her contribution to the field of European Studies. It asks why we know so little about Camps and advocates revisiting early European integration research and integrate individuals with more variegated careers into the founding history of the discipline.