Party-based Euroscepticism in the Nordic region: Ever more 'reluctant Europeans'?

The Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Sweden and Norway) have a well-established ‘love–hate relationship’ with the European Union (EU). Even though they constituted ‘a linguistic, cultural, economic, social, and political-ideological area, of considerable homogeneity’ (Andrén 1967: 8–9), each of them changed its relations and relationships with the EU institutions at a different pace and level, often displaying high levels of public opposition. Miljan (1977) famously nicknamed the Nordic countries ‘reluctant Europeans’, a notion also used by Gstöhl (2002) in her study of Norway, Sweden and Switzerland's relationship with the EU.