The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) (in French: Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques, OCDE) is an international organisation of thirty countries that accept the principles of representative democracy and free-market economy. It originated in 1948 as the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC), led by Robert Marjolin of France, to help administer the Marshall Plan for the reconstruction of Europe after World War II. Later, its membership was extended to non-European states. In 1961, it was reformed into the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development by the Convention on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

The OECD's headquarters are at the Château de la Muette in Paris.

Objectives and action

The OECD provides a setting in which governments can compare policy experiences, seek answers to common problems, identify good practices, and co-ordinate domestic and international policies. The mandate of the OECD is broad, covering economic, environmental, and social issues. It is a forum where peer pressure can act as a powerful incentive to improve policy and implement "soft law" — non-binding instruments that can occasionally lead to binding treaties.

Exchanges between OECD governments flow from information and analysis provided by a secretariat in Paris. The secretariat collects data, monitors trends, and analyses and forecasts economic developments. It also researches social changes or evolving patterns in trade, environment, agriculture, technology, taxation and other areas. The OECD is also known as a premium statistical agency, as it publishes highly-comparable statistics on a very wide number of subjects.

Over the past several decades, the OECD has tackled a range of economic, social, and environmental issues while further deepening its engagement with business, trade unions and other representatives of civil society. Collaboration at the OECD regarding taxation, for example, have fostered the growth of a global web of bilateral tax treaties.

OECD meetings

Every year, more than 40,000 delegates visit the OECD to attend committees' and other meetings, principally organized by the OECD Secretariat. Former Deputy-Secretary General Pierre Vinde estimated in 1997 that the cost born by the member countries, such as sending their officials to OECD meetings and maintaining permanent delegations, is equivalent to the cost of running the secretariat. This ratio is unique among inter-governmental organizations. In other words, the OECD is more a persistent forum or network of officials and experts than an administration.