European Economic Community

The European Economic Community (EEC) was an international organisation created by the Treaty of Rome of 1957. Its aim was to bring about economic integration, including a common market, among its six founding members: Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. The EEC was also known as the Common Market in the English-speaking world and sometimes referred to as the European Community even before it was officially renamed as such in 1993.

It gained a common set of institutions along with the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) and the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM) as one of the European Communities under the 1965 Merger Treaty (Treaty of Brussels).

Upon the entry into force of the Maastricht Treaty in 1993, the EEC was renamed the European Community (EC) to reflect that it covered a wider range of policy. This was also when the three European Communities, including the EC, were collectively made to constitute the first of the three pillars of the European Union (EU), which the treaty also founded. The EC existed in this form until it was abolished by the 2009 Treaty of Lisbon, which merged the EU's former pillars and provided that the EU would "replace and succeed the European Community." This article deals with the independent international organisation which existed prior to 1993.