This article examines the transformation of the European Economic Community (EEC)’s regional policy paradigms from the early 1970s, when negotiations for the creation of the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) began, until the approval of the Single European Act. The article identifies in this period the beginning of a deep transition from demand side “interventionist” and “neo-mercantilist” models, distinctive of a few regional policies used up to that time by Member States (primarily by Italy), towards more openly neoliberal models. The analysis of the strong conflicts within the Regional Policy Committee — the national technocracies’ representative body in charge of managing the ERDF — and
between it and the European Commission, allows the Author to point out that this outcome was not at all taken for granted. It was determined above all by the overload of objectives placed in charge of EEC regional policy in a context of scarce resources, and by the progressive lack of trust in the public intervention’s role.