Association Management Part 2 – The 1960s: The Boom Period

Welcome to the blog celebrating the 60th anniversary of Lejeune. In the lead-up to the anniversary conference on Thursday, October 31, we will present a series of blog posts over the coming months, highlighting the six decades of Lejeune Association Management. For each decade, we will discuss the context: world history, economic, social, and administrative developments, and how our company has continually evolved in response.

Part 2 – The 1960s: The Boom Period

Increasing European Orientation

In the previous blog, we discussed the post-war reconstruction. After the destruction and trauma of World War II, it was necessary to rebuild national societies from the ground up and revive the institutions and structures that had been halted by the occupiers. In the 1960s, the focus shifted towards European cooperation. The 'optimistic' 1960s in Western Europe was a period of strong economic growth and industrialization, large-scale spatial planning and innovation, increasing social awareness and emancipation, but also tensions between East and West and the Cold War. The growing awareness of a common European perspective above national interests was reflected at the industry level.

Image created with Dall-E.

Years of Increasing Confidence and Optimism…

Continuous reconstruction led to the modernization of economies. Despite strong post-war population growth, several countries found it necessary to attract workers from abroad to meet demand. Supported by this favorable economic climate and resulting optimism, Western European countries increasingly looked beyond their borders.

The Benelux countries had already implemented their pre-war plan to establish a customs union. The European Communities, initiated in the late 1950s (the EEC, the ECSC, and Euratom), worked towards further integration and would completely merge into 'The European Communities' in 1965. Besides coal, steel, and nuclear energy, European agricultural policy was also added to the European crown jewels.

....With Ups and Downs

However, there was disagreement among the 6 EEC member states (West Germany, France, Italy, and the Benelux countries) and the 7 countries that joined the European Free Trade Association, EFTA. (United Kingdom, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, Switzerland, and Portugal) over the scope and pace of European integration. While the EEC pushed for further integration of political and socio-economic structures and the free movement of persons, goods, and services, the EFTA did not want to go beyond free trade between member states. This threatened the formation of two diverging economic blocs. At the EEC level, the European Commission (the European 'Board of Directors'), the European Council of Ministers (the European equivalent of the Supervisory Board), and the European Parliament (as the 'General Meeting of Shareholders') were established.

…And in the Context of Social and Political Changes

The prosperous 1960s were the era in which the first post-war generation came of age. Their parents had grown up in a different, pre-war era than their often higher-educated children, for whom a larger, modernized world unfolded through television, pop music, and social change. This culminated in student protests in various countries in 1968, as a sign of resistance against the established order and for social change and democratization.

All this took place against the backdrop of the Cold War, which raged intensely in the early 1960s with the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961, the Cuban Missile Crisis a year later, the Iron Curtain within Europe, and the Vietnam War outside Europe throughout the decade. By the end of the decade, the signing of the 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons was a hopeful sign of 'détente'.

The Role of Industry Associations

The developments outlined above significantly influenced the development of (European) cooperation at the sector level. Nationally, industry associations became increasingly involved in shaping government policy in areas such as labor, environment, and consumer protection. They invested in expanding capacity to represent their members' collective interests and submit policy proposals. Additionally, the increasing social awareness and changing role of trade unions meant that industry associations also had to adapt their social role and position.

Increasing European integration also led to the growth of European cooperation at the industry level. To achieve the EEC's goal of a common internal market, harmonizing legislation among member states was not enough. In the rapidly industrializing post-war society, the playing field at the sector level also had to be leveled. Besides acting as lobbying organizations at the national level, many national industry associations sought cooperation with counterpart organizations on a European scale, with the primary goals of forming European networks, sharing knowledge and information, and working together on common standards at the sector level. This required not only bridging national borders but also overcoming cultural and language barriers. The Benelux countries, with their relatively neutral position between former adversaries and their multilingualism, had a good starting position.

"Giving the Sector an Identity" 

A good example from Lejeune's practice at that time is the founding of FINAT, the European association for self-adhesive label producers. In the book 'United in Labels', published on the association's 50th anniversary in 2008, founder and first chairman André Strauss, a Frenchman, reflects on the early years. The book quotes Mr. Strauss: "My intention was to create a broader exchange of opinions and viewpoints and to see if it would be possible to find a structure that would enable this new industry to be given an identity." One thing led to another, and 20 founding members established FINAT (which now has over 600 members). Shortly after its founding, a Technical Committee

was established to introduce technical standards in this new industry segment and facilitate knowledge exchange.

A Personal Story 

As mentioned in the previous blog, Mans Lejeune started as a personal assistant to the Catholic People’s Party (KVP) politician Pieter Blaisse in The Hague after graduating from University in 1958. In that role, he wrote a weekly column in the Catholic opinion weekly De Linie (later renamed De Nieuwe Linie) on European affairs. Some of these columns have been preserved and provide a good picture of the dynamics of European integration at that time and the apparent contradictions between strategic autonomy and national interest, between free trade and socio-economic integration, and between national sovereignty and European unity. Read more about this in the summary of Mans' vision.

The 1960s were also the period when the four children of the Lejeune family were born in The Hague. Having given birth to her first child Jules in August 1961, maternity visitors at the clinic witnessed the beginning of the Berlin Wall on television,, the youngest son Mans was born amidst the tumult surrounding the student protests in Paris and Bonn in 1968. In between, the sisters Lisanne (the year John F. Kennedy was assassinated) and Astrid (when fans of the Rolling Stones demolished the Kurhaus in The Hague) were born, and the growing family moved from the three-room flat in the Hague's newly built Mariahoeve to a single-family home in another new construction district, the suburb Leidschendam’s 'Vogelwijk'. 

"They Must Organize Themselves" 

Mother Tonny and her children closely witnessed how the young entrepreneur Mans started and expanded 'Bureau Le Jeune', office for business cooperation', from 1964 onwards. When the 'European project' gained momentum in the early 1960s, Mans experienced firsthand how national industries took action to bring their interests and proposals to the attention of European politics. His then-boss Pieter Blaisse, as a member of the Dutch parliament, was a prominent member of the European Parliament, serving as vice-chairman and chairman of the Committee for the Internal Market. "Let them please organize themselves as a sector," sighed Mr. Blaisse during one of the weekly work meetings after the same issue had been raised multiple times. The young Mans took this to heart. His first client was Benalfo (Benelux Aluminium Foil), a small Benelux organization. Soon, several organizations from the packaging sector followed.

The rest is history, but more about that in the following blogs.

(To be continued)

Jules Lejeune