Biography delors european jacques leader perspective political

Book abstract:

If Jean Monnet laid the foundations for the European Union then Jacques Delors surely fixed the plumbing to make the structure work. His ten years as President of the European Commission represented an unprecedented form of European leadership and it has been argued that 'no politician since the war has made a greater impact on Europe'.

This detailed account, which is often biographical, examines the personal and political factors that made Delors into one of Europe's most famous statesman and looks at how Delors himself shaped the political leadership and institutions of the European Union.

Opting for a topical rather than chronological approach the book opens with Delors' heydays as President of the European Commission.

The factors that led him to this post are discussed in chapter two, which traces Delors' life as far back as his birth to a Catholic lower class middle family in Paris in 1925 but mainly focuses on his activities in trade unions from 1945 and his s