OECD
intergovernmental economic organization
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; French: Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques, OCDE) is an intergovernmental organisation with 38 member countries. It was founded in 1961 to stimulate economic progress and world trade. The OECD is a forum whose member countries describe themselves as committed to democracy and the market economy, providing a platform for collective problem-solving, analysis, and coordination.
In 2026, their collective population was 1.38 billion people with high levels of human development. As of 2026, OECD member countries collectively comprised 58.4% of global nominal GDP and 38.9% of global GDP at purchasing power parity. The OECD is an official United Nations observer. Member states have strong social security systems. The OECD is headquartered at the Château de la Muette in Paris, France. The OECD is funded by contributions from member countries and publishes annual reports on economic data as well as a variety of evaluations and rankings.
History
Organisation for European Economic Co-operation
The OECD is the successor organisation to the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC), established in April 1948 among the European recipients of Marshall Plan aid for the reconstruction of Europe after World War II. Only Western European states were members of the OEEC, whose primary function was the allocation of American aid.
“OECD” enters the record as intergovernmental economic organization. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what OECD, intergovernmental and economic can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“OECD” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, OECD, intergovernmental and economic provides the most credible route into that argument.
The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q41550. VIAF identifies the subject as 131524099. The Library of Congress control number is n79045354. Authority coordinates are 48.862, 2.269. 4 of 6 selected statements include explicit references; 3 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1961, 2026 and 1948.
Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “OECD”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow OECD primary sources, OECD archive and OECD research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “OECD”?
- What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
- Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “OECD” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.