Postscript: The Intellectual Origins of European Integration

This chapter draws on the previous contributions in this volume to consider the intellectual origins of European integration. First, it analyses the many changes in, and responses to, the operation of “the state” wrought by the First World War and the calamities that followed. In this period, the classic questions surrounding the relationship between law, order and liberty took on new meaning and inspired new ideas. Some of the more ambitious—even radical—figures suggested rewriting entirely the so-called “rules of the game.” Others sought to re-establish the old order on a more philosophically robust and practically pragmatic footing. These new ideas both followed from, and fostered, new approaches, methods and academic collaborations across the traditional disciplinary, cultural and national borders. For many, these dynamics brought a heightened urgency and a new sense of possibility to the age-old dreams of a united Europe. The chapter closes by reflecting on the work undertaken—and the work left unfinished—by the architects of the post-war European project.