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Sliding Towards EC Membership: Norway in Scandinavian Perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Lars Svåsand  and
Ulf Lindström
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Extract

THIS ARTICLE ADDRESSES THE PROBLEM OF NORWEGIAN membership in the EC. Why is it so difficult for Norway to follow in the tracks of Sweden and Finland, and for that matter the rest of Western Europe?

The changes on the European continent since the collapse of the East-West divide have also altered the political agenda in the Scandinavian countries. The ambitions of the EC-internal market as well as the Single European Act speeded up a discussion of how Finland, Norway and Sweden should position themselves in order not to lose out economically and become marginalized politically. In Norway, the traumatic EC debate in 1972 had split the country, and the parties, into two camps, resulting in the rejection of EC membership by 53 per cent of the electorate. Since then, the issue has been absent from political debate. In Finland and Sweden the official rationale for not discussing the issue disappeared simultaneously with the regimes in Eastern Europe, suddenly pushing the topic onto the political agenda, causing an abrupt change in Swedish EC policy.

Type
Articles
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 27 , Issue 3 , 01 July 1992 , pp. 330 - 344
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1992

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References

1 See for instance the interview with President Koivisto in Information, 31 March 1990.

2 Attempts in the late 1940s to build a Scandinavian defence cooperation failed on the question or its ‘Western’ orientation.

3 In the early 1970s attempts were made to create a tighter economic union between the countries. One of the reasons why they failed was the question or agricultural exports from Denmark and Sweden to Norway.

4 Sbragia, Alberta M., Introduction, in A. M. Sbragia (ed.), Euro‐Politics, Washington, D.C., Brooking Institution, 1992.Google Scholar

5 During the last parliamentary period Finnish politics was rather unorthodox in terms or Cabinet formations, introducing the red‐blue concept with the Social Democratic‐Conservative Cabinet (see S. Berglund, ‘The 1987 Eduskunta Election in Finland’, Scandinavian Political Studies, NS, Vol. 11, No. 1, 1988).

6 Rokkan, S., Citizens, Elections. Parties, Oslo, Universitetsforlaget, 1970.Google Scholar

7 The Norwegian Constitution does not require—or prevent—referenda. For referenda to be held Parliament must pass special legislation in each case. The outcome or referenda cannot be made binding for Parliament, but is only advisory; but in reality it is politically impossible to go against a popularly endorsed verdict. Since 1905 five referenda have been held, two in 1905, on the dissolution or the union with Sweden and on adopting the monarchy, in 1919 and 1926, the introduction and the repeal of the abolition period, and in 1972 on EC membership.

8 The far right Progress Party, which eagerly promotes the idea or referendum as a constitutional measure, also wants a referendum on whether to apply for membership or not.

9 Nytt fra Norge, 5 Nov. 1991

10 Birkelund, G., ‘Norge og EF’, thesis, Dept of Comparative Politics, University of Bergen, 1989, p. 138.Google Scholar

11 ibid.

12 Lindahl, R. and NordlÖf, T., ‘EG‐frågan i svensk opinion’, in Hohmberg, S. and Weibull, L. (eds), åttiotal GÖrrborg, Statsvetenskapliga inst., GÖteborgs universitet, 1989 Google Scholar

13 The establishment of a joint EC‐EFTA court to rule in trade disputes.

14 Hardly any voters, whether they are for or against Norwegian EC membership believe that the EES treaty will be anything else than a temporary step towards full membership, see NSD Brukermelding, 1, 1991.

15 J. Ryssevik, ‘De nordiske velgeres forhold til EF’, paper, Dept of Comparative Politics, University or Bergen, 1990.

16 Economists are also divided on the issue.

17 Responding to the question of what Norway should do if the previous Warsaw pact countries also sought membership in the EC, the leader or the Centre Party responded that this was highly unlikely: ‘why should they seek membership when they at last are free from Soviet domination?’.

18 A prominent leader of the fundamentalist Lutheran laymen's movement recently claimed that the EC was the fulfilment of the prophecy in the Book of Relevation: the Roman Empire will re‐emerge as a multi‐headed beast, the Anti‐Christ (see article by Tony Samstag in The Spectator, 1 Feb. 1992).

19 The negotiated EES treaty is being opposed by the same parties that oppose EC membership, fearing that the government has given away too much in the negotiations.