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Softening but Persistent: Euroscepticism in the Nordic EU Countries

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Abstract

The Nordic region is known for its Euroscepticism. Norwegians have twice rejected European Union (EU) membership in a referendum, Denmark and Sweden have opted out of the single currency, leaving thus Finland as the only pro-integrationist Nordic EU country. However, while the levels of public Euroscepticism are relatively similar across the three Nordic EU countries, only the Danish and Swedish party systems display strong support for Eurosceptical parties. Focusing on government–opposition dynamics, this article explains variation in party-based Euroscepticism in the Nordic EU countries, and argues that we will continue to see strong — but nonetheless declining — partisan Euroscepticism in the Nordic region.

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Notes

  1. These ‘Edinburgh exemptions’ concern the security and defence policy, the single currency, EU citizenship and cooperation in judicial and police affairs.

  2. There is a rich literature on Nordic countries and European integration, in particular concerning their road to membership and the accompanying referenda. See for example Kite (1996), Miles (ed.) (1996), Lawler (1997), Ingebritsen (1998), Jenssen et al. (eds.) (1998), Archer (2000), Olesen (2000), Jungar (2002b) and Hansen and Wæver (eds.) (2002).

  3. Measured with the standard Eurobarometer question, ‘Generally speaking, do you think that (your country's) membership of the European Union is a good thing, bad thing or neither good nor bad?’

  4. This is very close to the four party goals identified by Harmel and Janda (1994) — vote maximization, office maximization, policy advocacy and intraparty democracy maximization.

  5. According to Sitter (2001, 2005), Euroscepticism in the Nordic region, and the variation between the countries, can be mainly explained by party strategy, in particular the government and opposition dynamics — with parties adjusting their European policies primarily in response to whether they are in the government or opposition. Sitter also argues that the choices made by the centrist catch-all parties provide incentives for the non-mainstream parties to adopt Eurosceptical positions.

  6. Included in Table 2 are only parties that reached the 4% electoral threshold.

  7. When Denmark was governed by centre-right coalitions in the 1980s and early 1990s, the main opposition parties (Social Democrats, Social Liberals and Socialist People's Party) formed an ‘alternative majority’ in several foreign policy issues. The Socialist People's Party believed that this opposition cooperation could be transformed into governmental coalition, but this proved not to be the case (Christensen, 1998, 57–58, 61–62).

  8. The Social Democrats are used to governing alone. They have been in government for most of the time after the Second World War, and only in 1951–1957 have they formed a coalition (with the Centre).

  9. Aylott and Bergman (2004) argue that, in line with Strøm's model about decentralized party organization facilitating policy-seeking behaviour, the leadership of the Green Party was severely constrained by its membership that was not ready to compromise the party's EU policy.

  10. The Left Party and the Green Party performed well in the 1995 and 1999 EP elections. In the 2004 elections, their vote share would undoubtedly have been higher without the arrival on the scene of the June List (the name of which was obviously inspired by its Danish counterpart), a cross-party Eurosceptic coalition formed in February 2004 that is in favour of Sweden's EU membership but is against further integration. Successfully appealing to primarily centrist Eurosceptical voters, the June List won 15% of the votes (Aylott and Blomgren, 2004).

  11. This constitutes ‘contract parliamentarism’, defined as ‘a case in which (a) the cabinet has an explicit written contract with one or more parties that remain outside the cabinet. This contract (b) has to commit the partners beyond a specific legislative deal or temporary commitment. In addition, we stress that (c) the ‘contract’ has to comprise a written agreement, however bare-bone, and that (d) this contract must be available to the public. In its fully developed form, (e) the opposition parties also appoint representatives to serve at high levels, but below cabinet level, in the government administration. This, we argue, takes the contract somewhere beyond our normal understanding of a legislative coalition, but leaves it short of an executive coalition’ (Aylott and Bergman, 2004, 3); see also Bale and Bergman, 2006, 424).

  12. These ‘support parties’ cannot realistically threaten to bring the government down, for the Social Democrats have traditionally controlled the median legislator and a coalition between the leftist parties and the centre-right parties is practically unthinkable, not least because of their radically different views over Europe (Bale and Bergman, 2006).

  13. ‘Legislative accommodations are pre-negotiated voting agreements made on behalf of two or more parties represented in a parliament, including at least one non-cabinet party, (a) that lead to the passing of one or more legislative acts concerned, to which (b) the parties jointly commit themselves to an informal decision-making procedure in a time span following the passing of the agreement’ (Christiansen, 2003, 7).

  14. In Denmark the Eurosceptical parties on the right and the left have consistently argued for a stronger parliamentary EU Committee, as this would improve their chances of influencing Danish EU policy (Damgaard and Jensen, 2005, 403).

  15. At least in Finland and in Sweden, EU matters have not been central themes in parliamentary elections. When the respondents were asked after the 2003 Eduskunta elections in Finland to indicate the importance of various issues when deciding how to vote, ‘EU integration/EU policy’ occupied the 17th position (Borg and Moring, 2005, 54). In a Swedish Television survey after the 1998 election, voters placed ‘EU/EMU’ 14th of 15 election issues in order of importance to them; after the 2002 election, it was 15th (Aylott, 2007).

  16. For example, until 1992 one-third of MPs (67/200) could postpone the final adoption of an ordinary law over the elections, with the proposal adopted if a majority in the new parliament supported it. This deferment rule contributed to the practice of inclusive, consensual decision-making that reduced the gap between the government and opposition (Mattila, 1997).

  17. A nice illustration of the impact of government formation was in December 2001 when the Centre Party adopted its new European programme. Vice-chair Anneli Jäätteenmäki explicitly stated that the party ‘must have such a EU policy that it can be either in the opposition or in the government’ (Ollikainen, 2001).

  18. Interestingly, according to an EU-wide comparative survey carried out right after the 2004 EP elections, Finland had one of the lowest levels of party–voter congruence on integration matters. The Finnish parties were (according to voters’ own perceptions) far more supportive of integration than their voters, and this opinion gap applied particularly to the leftist parties (Mattila and Raunio, 2006).

  19. In contrast to the other Nordic countries, in Finland there have been fewer issues around which to wage anti-EU campaigns (like the EMU question in Sweden and Denmark or fisheries policy in Norway). Hence, any potential Eurosceptic party finds it harder to campaign on a concrete issue that is salient to the voters.

  20. While the option of Nordic regional integration is no longer on the political agenda in the Nordic EU countries, it is interesting to note that every now and then the Eurosceptics toy with this idea, arguing that it would be preferable if the like-minded were to join forces as opposed to trying to create artificial unity among different European societies. Moreover, also pro-EU politicians repeatedly argue that the Nordics must stick together in the EU, especially when issues related to the welfare state are on the agenda in the EU's institutions.

  21. As Aylott (2007) points out, the EMU referendum in 2003 gave both parties a good opportunity to come to terms with the reality of EU membership. As the focus was now on rejecting the single currency, they could stop being against EU membership. In the EMU referendum, clear majorities of voters in the Left Party (88%), the Greens (84%) and the Centre (77%) were against joining the Eurozone. The Social Democrats were evenly divided, with 49% voting against the single currency (Aylott, 2005, 549).

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Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the editors of this Special Issue, and the participants in a seminar at the University of Umeå in June 2005, particularly Nick Aylott and Magnus Blomgren, for their comments.

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  1. Department of Political Science and International Relations, University of Tampere, 33014, Finland

    Tapio Raunio

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Raunio, T. Softening but Persistent: Euroscepticism in the Nordic EU Countries. Acta Polit 42, 191–210 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.ap.5500183

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