Edith Cresson

Edith Cresson , 1934-, French politician, b. Edith Campion. After studying at the École des Hautes Études Commerciales, she became a consultant in private industry. Active in the Socialist party, she became national secretary of the party (for youth) in 1974 and was elected to the European Assembly in 1979. She then held a series of ministerial appointments, including agriculture and forestry (1981-83), trade and tourism (1983-84), and industrial redeployment and foreign trade (1984-86). From 1986 until her resignation in 1990, she was a member of the national assembly. In May, 1991, President François Mitterrand recalled her to replace Michel Rocard as premier, but she resigned in Apr., 1992, and was replaced by Pierre Bérégovoy . In 1995, Cresson was appointed to the European Commission, the executive branch of the European Union (EU), but allegations of corruption led her and 19 other commission members to resign in 1999. She was charged in 2003 by Belgium with fraud relating to contracts prepared by her EU office in the late 1990s, but the charges were dropped in 2004. In 2006, however, the EU ruled that she had violated her official duties, but she was not penalized.

Cresson, Edith (b.27 Jan. 1934). French Prime Minister 1991–2 The daughter of a finance inspector and wife of a high-ranking executive, she was an organizer of the youth in the Socialist Party (1974–9) and a member of the Agricultural Commission of the European Parliament (1979–81), before joining all Socialist Cabinets of the 1980s, with responsibility for agriculture (1981–3), trade (1983–4), industry (1984–6), and European affairs (1988–90). Her appointment as the first woman Prime Minister of France was applauded as a radical step, but she soon became extremly unpopular, partly because of her stringent economic policies, and partly for her tactless outbursts, e.g. against the English (as singularly prone to homosexuality) and the Japanese (describing them as ‘ants’). In charge of the portfolio for Science, Research and Development in the European Union from 1995, she was one of the members of the European Commission accused of corruption and nepotism. She appointed personal friends to public positions, such as hiring her dentist as a co-ordinator of EU AIDS research programmes. This became a public scandal, and ultimately led to the resignation of the entire Santer Commission in 1999.