This finance ministry would be only one element of the European future institutional framework. Exactly how these new institutions would eventually evolve one cannot say. As Jean Monnet once wrote: « Personne ne peut encore dire aujourd’hui la forme qu’aura l’Europe que nous vivrons demain, car le changement qui naîtra du changement est imprévisible ».
1 We have several federal or confederal institutional frameworks in today’s world. To name only a few, the United States of America, the Federal Republic of Germany and the Swiss Confederation. The European Union is unique in its past history, in its present nature, in its future ambition. It will have to invent its own concept.