Background
Robert Majolin was born on July 27, 1911 in Paris, France. Son of Ernest Octave and Elise (Vacher) Marjolin.
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Robert Majolin was born on July 27, 1911 in Paris, France. Son of Ernest Octave and Elise (Vacher) Marjolin.
Marjolin left school at the age of 14 to begin work but took evening and correspondence courses at the Sorbonne. He received scholarship from the Rockefeller Foundation in 1931 which enabled him to study sociology and economics at Yale University. He graduated from Yale University in 1934. Marjolin attended Sorbonne and received Licence en Philosophic in 1933 and Agregation in economics in 1945. He also received a postgraduate doctorate in jurisprudence in 1936.
Marjolin was assistant to the president of the Scientific Institute of Social and Economic Research, Paris, France, from 1934 to 1937, became chief assistant from 1938 to 1939. In 1941 he joined Charles de Gaulle’s Free French forces, London, United Kingdom. In 1943 he represented the Government-in-exile in Washington as director of French Supply Mission, organizing flow of food and raw materials to France. After the war Marjolin became the first director of the foreign trade department in the French Ministry of Economic Affairs and then junior minister for the reconstruction of France. In this role he initiated the economic development of France for the following decades.
Due to his ministerial responsibilities, Marjolin was particularly involved with the Marshall Plan for assistance to Europe. In August 1947 he published a memorandum which helped persuade the United States Congress to support the plan. In 1948 Marjolin was appointed the first Secretary-General of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC) which was established to implement the Marshall Plan.
Towards the end of 1954, Marjolin surprisingly resigned from his OEEC position stating that he wished to become "an international civil servant". In 1955 he led the French delegation in negotiations on the formation of the European Economic Community (EEC).
Robert attached particular importance to setting a common economic policy, a financial and monetary policy and as a result got the support of the German delegation leader Alfred Mueller Armack as well as its deputy Hans von der Groeben. In 1958 he was appointed one of the two French European Commissioners on the first European Commission, the Hallstein Commission with responsibility for the economics and finance portfolios. In January 1962 he was re-appointed to the second Hallstein Commission.
Robert Marjolin died in 1986, aged 74.
Robert received Rockefeller Foundation fellowship in 1932-1933. Among his numerous awards are Medal of Freedom (USA) in 1947, King’s Medal in 1947, Grand-Croix de l’Ordre d’Orange-Nassau (Holland), Cavaliere di Gran Croce nell’Ordine al Merito della Repubblica (Italy), Grand-Croix du Merite de la Republique Federale d’Allemagne, Grand-Croix de l’Ordre Royal du Phoenix (Greece) in 1955.
For a short time he was a member of the staff of the socialist minister of foreign affaires Christian Pineau.
Besides, Marjolin unsuccessfully stood as a candidate for the French socialists in the French parliamentary election, November 1962. A victory would have meant his leaving the commission but instead he served his full term which expired in January 1967.
Robert was a member of Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques. He was also an honorary member of American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1963.
Robert married Dorothy Thayer Smith in 1944 (she died in 1971). The had 2 children: Elise, Robert.
