Reinterpreting the Marshall Plan: the Impact of the European Recovery Programme in Britain, France, Western Germany and Italy (1947-1952)

The essay reinterprets the function of the Marshall Plan by suggesting that it was a comprehensive political-economic and security undertaking which had on the whole a crucial function in stabilising Western Europe. It cannot be judged only quantitatively as an economic aid program, as it gave more elbow room to national cabinets and affected durably the sovereignty of Western European postwar countries