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

106
Juhana Aunesluoma
Politically most sensitive issues about Britain's post-war economic reconstruction
emerged from the attempts by the British government to restore pre-war arrangements
that were based on bilateralism and the implicit assertion that Scandinavia should be
held as a special preserve for British traders. In the absence of Germany as an economic
counterweight, the situation could be seen as an attempt to include Scandinavia within
Britain's economic sphere of influence.
A key element in the future of the Anglo-Scandinavian economic relationship
when reconstruction reached its final phase in the early 1950s was to what direction
the traditional, in trade theoretical terms classical, complementary pattern of the
national economies would develop. Eventually, the failure of the British economy
to create a surplus of strategic raw materials such as coal and steel in the 1950s and
the simultaneous process of diversification of Scandinavian exports away from the
dependence on basic raw materials (iron ore, pulp, paper, timber, agricultural produce)
and semi-finished industrial goods towards more highly refined goods, decreased
the complementary nature of the British and Scandinavian economies. But
even with such structural changes and the relatively slow development of intra-industrial
trade within the region, the volume of Anglo-Scandinavian trade in the traditional
sectors remained high, and was eventually enhanced by EFTA, albeit its
growth potential was limited compared to emerging economic contacts and intra-industrial
trade between Britain and Western Europe.
Scandinavia as a Lead in Britain's European Policy 1949-50
The idea of a special institutional arrangement between Britain and Scandinavia
was a recurrent theme in British thinking of its European policy and external economic
relations. It was seen in various occasions in Anglo-Scandinavian economic
diplomacy from the end of the Second World War in 1945 to the British Free Trade
Area proposals in 1957. But until full restoration of currency convertibility and
multilateral trade was realised towards the end of the 1950s, not much of tangible
economic significance was achieved within the Anglo-Scandinavian framework.
Likewise, the plans for a Scandinavian Customs Union, which were discussed
intermittently between 1947-50 and in 1954-57 between Norway, Denmark and
Sweden, ended in failure and were eventually overtaken by the establishment of
EEC and EFTA, although other aspects of Nordic co-operation, such as the creation
of the Nordic Council in 1952 and a common labour market in 1954 proved to be
more successful aspects of regional economic integration. 9
9. V. SØRENSEN, Nordic cooperation – A Social Democratic Alternative to Europe?, in: T. B.
OLESEN (ed.), Interdependence Versus Integration. Denmark, Scandinavia and Western Europe,
1945-1960, Odense University Press, Odense, 1995, pp.40-61; I. SOGNER, The European Idea:
The Scandinavian Answer. Norwegian Attitudes Towards a Closer Scandinavian Economic Cooperation
1947-1959, in: SJH, 4/18(1993), pp.307-327.