The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development is an international association of a number of developed countries with the goal of reconstructing a pan-European policy under the auspices of the implementation of the so-called Marshall Plan. Consider in general terms its basic composition and activities.
Marshall Plan
So, the foundation was laid back in 1948 as part of the plan outlined a year earlier by US Secretary of State George Marshall. As you know, the result of World War II was a serious economic decline throughout Europe. And if the Soviet Union coped on its own, rallying the ranks with the iron hand of its dictator, then Europe lay in ruins, and at the same time was a rather fragmented structure.
By and large, the history of the Iron Curtain begins here. The International Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development was conceived in the United States as a panacea for the post-war troubles that have plagued Europe. In 1948, a meeting of representatives of 16 West European states was held in Paris. An interesting fact is that the leaders of Eastern European countries were invited to it. However, the Soviet government saw this as a threat to their own interests and did not allow them to attend this meeting.
Iron curtain
The first members of the organization for economic cooperation and development are, of course, the United States and several Western European countries, which were provided with financial assistance from the American side according to the Marshall Plan. These included Britain, France, Italy, West Germany and Holland. It was these countries that received the maximum cash infusion, and in order to reduce the amount of finance invested by the United States in them. However, the Americans set the main condition for the direction of cash flows to be the elimination of any communist movements in the party systems of these countries. Thus, the United States began to take over the politics of Western Europe. Another important fact is the intensification of the political confrontation of the countries of this bloc with respect to the Soviet Union and countries that fell as a result of the post-war division under the influence of the latter.
US benefit
Naturally, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) was a direct vested interest of the United States, because in this way they not only were able to competently invest a huge amount of money - more than ten billion dollars, but also profitably sell agricultural products that are vital to countries in ruins, especially in terms of food production. Consumer goods were sent to the alliance member countries to provide means of production, since during the war years the United States was able to create large amounts of surplus of such products. As a result, this assistance resulted in an even greater dependence of the countries of the organization of economic cooperation and development on the USA.
OECD development and composition
In the 60s, the composition of participants has expanded significantly and continues to increase to this day. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development currently has 34 members. The headquarters is located in Paris, and the governing body is the council of representatives of the participating countries. All actions of its members are coordinated, and the development of any decisions is carried out by consensus. We list the countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. In addition to the previously mentioned participants for 2015, the following are listed: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Hungary, Greece, Denmark, Israel, Ireland, Iceland, Spain, Canada, Luxembourg, Mexico, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Turkey, Finland, Czech Republic, Chile, Switzerland, Sweden, Estonia, South Korea and Japan.
Activities
The main activity of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development consists in coordination and analytical activities on the following issues: money laundering, or rather, the fight against this phenomenon, in addition, suppression of tax evasion, bribery, corruption and other problems of monetary relations of various social structures.
In fact, it is a platform for multilateral negotiations between the participating countries on the above issues. It develops recommendations for members of the organization in solving various economic problems that they face in the framework of economic activities on their territory.
Modern history
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is constantly considering accession proposals from various countries from around the planet. For example, in 1996 such applications were submitted by the Baltic countries and Russia, but all of them were rejected. And only in 2010 Estonia was allowed to join the coalition.
In 2005, China’s admission to the alliance was considered. It all started with the proposal of the OECD Secretary General, who said that at one time countries such as Portugal and Spain, in which their own dictatorships flourished, were accepted into the organization. In addition, political prerequisites should not interfere with economic issues. In his view, China is the world's most promising economy. It supplies the largest volumes of steel to the world market. And many more advantages were brought by the OECD Secretary General in support of his idea. However, the issue has not yet been resolved. Nevertheless, there is some progress with regard to the DPRK, since the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development was given the opportunity to check the state of the country. What is usually a harbinger of the state joining the OECD.
Russia and the OECD
Difficult relations connect our country and the OECD. The question was raised by Russia in 1996, as already mentioned. However, at first there was a firm rejection due to the reasons for the country's huge discrepancy with the standards of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. This does not prevent the leadership of the Russian Federation from continuing to lobby for this issue.
These actions led to the fact that in 2007 it was decided to start negotiations on membership by the OECD leadership. An important step in this direction was the entry of Russia into the World Trade Organization in 2012. The next milestone was the announcement of the head of the OECD that in 2015 Russia would accept membership of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, subject to all the necessary conditions. However, this did not happen. Not only that, it was recently announced that a decision on this issue was postponed indefinitely. So what are we waiting for, as representatives of culture, thirty years ago they denied any influence of the West on us.
