François-Xavier Ortoli : [Fonds], 1925-2007

Resource Information

The work François-Xavier Ortoli : [Fonds], 1925-2007 represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in European University Institute Library. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, http://bibfra.me/vocab/marc/Collection, Multimedia, Mixed Materials.

Label

François-Xavier Ortoli : [Fonds], 1925-2007

Title remainder

[Fonds]

Inclusive dates

1925-2007

Creator

• Ortoli, François-Xavier, 1925-2007

Subject

• Asia-Europe Meeting
• Europe -- Foreign relations -- Asia
• European Union -- History -- Sources
• European Union -- Political aspects -- Sources
• European federation -- History -- Sources
• Asia -- Foreign relations -- Europe
• Oil industries -- History -- Sources
• Photographs
• France -- Economic conditions -- 20th century -- Sources

Genre

• Sources
• Photographs

Language

• eng
• fre
• fre

Summary

The fonds illustrates the activities of François-Xavier Ortoli within the higher levels of the French administration (1966-1972) as commissaire général of the Plan and then as Minister for Economy and Finance as well as Minister for Industrial and Scientific Development. There is also material pertaining to his time as President (1973-1976) and subsequently as Vice-President of the Commission (1977-1984) with the portfolio of Economic and Financial Affairs. There are documents concerning his time as Director of the energy company Total (1984-1980) as well as his activities as consultant (such as Treno ad Alta Velocità) as well as his functions as Governor of the Asia-Europe Forum (ASEM). The fonds contains also some material related to the Yvonne Ortoli family, born Calbairac, dating back to 1785

Biographical or historical data

François-Xavier Ortoli was born on 16 February 1925 in Ajaccio. He spent his youth in the Far East and received his degree in law from the University of Hanoi. During spring 1945 he participated in the resistance to the Japanese invasion, and for this reason he was awarded the Médaille militaire, the Croix de guerre and the Médaille de la Résistance. In July 1946, he returned to France to join his fiancée Yvonne Calbairac, who he married one month later. In the autumn he began studying at the Ecole nationale d'administration, after which he joined the Finance Inspectorate (1948). In April 1951 he was recruited as a technical advisor in the cabinet of Robert Buron. In 1958, French Commissioner Robert Lemaignen appointed Ortoli as his Chef de Cabinet in the new Commission of the European Economic Community in Brussels. Some months later, he became head of the Commission of the EEC Directorate General for the Internal Market. On his return to Paris in 1961 he worked as Secretary General of the Comité interministériel pour les questions de coopération économique européenne under Prime Minister Michel Debré. From April 1962, he acted as counsellor for economic affairs to Debré's successor, Georges Pompidou. Ortoli went on to lead Pompidou's cabinet (end of 1962-1965) before being named general commissioner for planning (1966-1967). From April 1967 to May 1968 he was Minister of Infrastructure and Housing. The period of civil unrest in France during May 1968 prompted his reassignment to the Ministry for National Education (31 May to 10 July 1968), although he soon left to become Minister for Finance and the Economy in the government of Maurice Couve de Murville (July 1968 to June 1969), but not before being elected as the Union des Démocrates pour la République (UDR) Member of Parliament for the Nord département. After Georges Pompidou succeeded Charles de Gaulle as President of France, Ortoli was appointed Minister for Industrial and Scientific Development under Prime Minister Jacques Chaban-Delmas (June 1969 to July 1972). He returned to Brussels after being nominated as President of the European Commission (1973-1976). His Presidency was marked by the first expansion of the European Union and the 1973 oil crisis. In 1977 he was named Vice-President in charge of economic affairs and finance in the Commission of Roy Jenkins (1977-1980), and he was one of the principal authors of the European Monetary System, which came into being in March 1979. He continued in the same role in the Commission presided over by Gaston Thorn (1981-1984) before returning to France, where he was appointed president of the oil firm CFP-Total by the socialist government. At the end of his mandate, he assumed the role of honorary president of Total, and of president of the Conseil national du patronat français (now Mouvement des entreprises de France). He was also a board member of a number of companies, acted as a consultant and was named head of the French delegation to Europe Asia Forum (ASEM) by President Jacques Chirac. Ortoli died in Paris on 29 November 2007.

Cataloging source

FIE

Language note

Fonds in French and English. Inventory in French