Journal of European Integration History – Revue d'histoire de l'

16Wolfram KaiserOne motive for the creation of EFTA that united all member states was thedesire to prove that it was possible to create in steps and administer a liberal industrialfree trade regime within an intergovernmental institutional framework. However,the expectations varied considerably among the outer Seven as to how muchtheir industries would profit from the creation of EFTA. The Swedes arguably hadthe greatest economic stake in EFTA, which for them provided a substitute for aNordic customs union. This project had first been proposed in 1947, but talksamong Sweden, Norway and Denmark during 1957-8 showed that it was difficultto negotiate not least because of Norwegian and Danish anxieties that such a customsunion would be dominated economically and politically by Sweden. TheEFTA option guaranteed that Sweden could profit from the indirect creation of aNordic common market for industrial products, albeit in the form of a free tradearea, which was politically more acceptable to its Scandinavian partners due toBritish political leadership within the organisation. 39EFTA promised fewer extra economic opportunities for the two other mainindustrial export nations, Britain and Switzerland, not least due to the lack of geographicalcoherence of the free trade area. In Denmark the governing Social Democratsand Radicals saw EFTA as an opportunity for the gradual modernisation ofDanish industry and for export driven growth and as a means to facilitate tariffreform, which came in 1960 and essentially substituted the traditional quota protectionwith increased tariffs. 40 However, Danish farmers and the Liberal VenstreParty – with increasing support from the Conservatives – demanded that Denmarkjoin the EEC, essentially to safeguard its agricultural exports. The Danish governmentcould only override these domestic interests politically when it had extractedthe agricultural concessions from its EFTA partners and concluded a bilateral agriculturalagreement with the Federal Republic which secured Danish access to theGerman market until the creation of the CAP.One other motive behind the creation of EFTA was to strengthen the negotiatingposition of the non-Six OEEC states vis-à-vis the EEC. Only if Britain led an institutionalisedperipheral counter-alliance in Western Europe did it seem possible topreserve a more or less stable front vis-à-vis the EEC. Otherwise, the Britishbelieved, other OEEC states would eventually conclude bilateral association agreementswith the Six or even join the EEC. If one domino in the row fell, the otherswould most likely follow suit. In this European version of the domino theory, Macmillanfeared that “if we cannot organise the opposition group (...) then we shall39. On the Nordic customs union plan see also M. af MALMBORG, “Scandinavian Responses to theProposed First Enlargement of the EEC”, in: A. DEIGHTON and A.S. MILWARD (eds.), Acceleration,Deepening, Enlarging: The European Economic Community 1957-1963, Baden-Baden(forthcoming). On Nordic cooperation in general see J. LAURSEN, Blueprints of Nordic Integration.Dynamics and Institutions in Nordic Cooperation, 1945-72, EUI Working Paper RSC No. 94/20, Florence 1994.40. For an excellent overview of Danish European policy after 1945 see Vibeke SØRENSEN, “BetweenInterdependence and Integration: Denmark's Shifting Strategies”, in: A.S. MILWARD et al., TheFrontier of National Sovereignty. History and Theory 1945-1992, London 1993, pp.88-116.