Organization for European Economic Cooperation

Abstract

In July 1949, negotiations for a European payments agreement to finance international trade, which had been delayed by a dispute between the United Kingdom and the United States over currency convertibility, were blocked by a difference between the Swiss and the United States governments regarding the terms of Switzerland's participation. The Swiss government had refused to sign the bilateral agreement with the United States which all other members of the Organization for European Economic Cooperation receiving dollar aid had done, on the ground that it needed no dollar aid for itself and that the bilateral agreement would give the United States a right to check on the Swiss economy. The payments committee of the OEEC Council had attempted to bring Switzerland into the payments plan to widen the area of more liberal trade, urged by the United States. The committee's proposal that half of Switzerland's trade surplus be financed by a grant of dollars and half by trade credits on the terms of the Economic Cooperation Administration as advanced by Switzerland to her debtors was submitted to the Swiss Federal Council. Following the statement by the Economic Cooperation Administration that dollars could not be had without signature by Switzerland of a bilateral accord with the United States, the Swiss Federal Council refused to sign the accord.