journal of european integration history revue d'histoire de l ...

102
Hans-Otto Frøland
Concluding Remarks
The Norwegian authorities' assessments of pros and cons of EEC membership
developed from the dual character of the political economy. As the political economy
sought to maintain national sovereignty for the primary sector, EFTA came to
represent the most adequate international solution for Norway. Staying outside the
Community was decreasingly perceived as a problem because EFTA was regarded
as a good solution for the country's traditional domestic-market industry and List G
turned out to represent a lesser threat to traditional export industry than originally
assumed. Following British applications for EEC membership was motivated by
the fear of losing EFTA preferences in Britain and Denmark. As the applications on
all three occasions contained unconditional demands to maintain national regulations
in the primary economy, a policy of bargaining was established in order to
maintain national regulations under the concept of regional policy. Had this policy
been successful in 1971-72, it would have allowed Norway to keep up the peripheral
image it had exploited since the Marshall Plan.
The non-Socialist coalition disintegrated when negotiations started, and the Labour
government subsequently conceded on agriculture as well as fishery. Milk production
was the only agricultural sector that was allowed to sustain national subsidies. Preference
for Norwegian fishing within the twelve-mile zone was only secured until 1982.
As compared with the Labour government's policy objectives before negotiations, the
accession treaty was a failure. Containing no permanent guarantee to the maintenance
of national fishery regulations, the minister of Fishery immediately resigned. The treaty
allowed the mobilisation of the centre-periphery cleavage to vote it down.
Having been defeated in the negotiations, why did Labour so vigorously defend
a treaty that would shove the domestic political economy? As argued in this paper,
foreign policy did not matter in Norway's policy towards membership in the Community.
Nevertheless, as stated in the opening, the Community occupied an expanding
position in Norway's political orientation through the 1960s. While in the
1950s Labour leaders saw Nordic co-operation as a Social Democratic alternative
to Europe, progressively they came to regard the Community as a promising arena
for European Social Democracy. 85 There is yet no convincing historical analysis of
this change in attitude. The most important factor seems to have been Willy Brandt
taking office as Außenminister and later Bundeskanzler in the Federal Republic of
Germany. This helped to remove the profound scepticism Norwegian politicians
85. H.-O. FRØLAND, DNA og Vest-Europa 1945-1995: Kontakter, samarbeid og utsyn [The Norwegian
Labour Party and Western Europe 1945-1995: Contacts, co-operation, and views], in: K. HEI-
DAR and L. SVÅSAND (eds.), Partier uten grenser? [Parties without borders?], Oslo, 1997,
pp.169-201. The concept of a “Social Democratic alternative to Europe”, as applied to Nordic
co-operation, comes from V. SØRENSEN, Nordic Cooperation, op.cit. For Labour's European
policy in the 1950's, cf. H. PHARO, The Norwegian Labour Party, in: R.T. GRIFFITHS (ed.), Socialist
Parties and the Question of Europe in the 1950'S, Leiden/New York/Köln, 1993,
pp.201-220.