In the referendum on 28 November 1994, the Norwegian people turned down accession to the European Union for the second time. Taking the country as a whole, 52.2% of the voters said No' and 47.8% said Yes'. Of the 3.3 million with the right to vote, 89% used their right. The No' and Yes' votes were not evenly distributed around the country. In the three northernmost counties more than {1}0% said No'. In the four counties north of Trondheim there was not a majority of Yes' votes in one single municipality; many of these municipalities had more than 80% No' votes. Only in five counties in the central areas around the capital Oslo and around the Oslofjord did a majority of the voters say Yes'. In Oslo and the two largest neighbouring municipalities more than 65% of the voters said Yes'. There was also a clear but not very large majority of Yes' votes in the larger cities in the southern part of the country. Therefore, a clear urban/rural pattern can be found in the distribution of votes ­ with few exceptions, the rural areas voted No' and the urban areas said Yes'.

This general picture of a centre/periphery clash in the distribution of No' and Yes' votes was the same in the referendum in Finland and Sweden. It was the urban areas mainly concentrated around the capitals and the majorcities that voted Yes', and the rest voted No'. The only difference was that in the two other Nordic countries the majority of the voters said Yes'.

It is not known for certain yet which social groups voted Yes' and which voted No'. From the many polls that were published before the referendum and the distribution of votes among municipalities classified according to their industrial structure it is clear that a majority of the people working in the primary industries voted No'. In the fishery communities along the coast there were more than 80% No' votes. There was also a large majority of No' votes in the typical farming communities all around the country, with a few exceptions in the central areas around the capital. However this does not explain why the Norwegians voted No' because, out of the total economical active population, less than 6% is to be found in the primary sector, that is fishing, farming and forestry.

The same polls indicated that it was a clear but small majority of the men who voted Yes' and a clear majority among the women who voted No'.

So far no definite analysis have been made of why the Norwegian people as a whole said No', while their Swedish and Finnish brothers and sisters said Yes'. Therefore, attention will only be drawn to three points that might shed some light on this question.

The first point is that a very strong national feeling exists among Norwegians. Norway, as a modern independent nation, is very young; it dates from 1905 when it broke from the union with Sweden, a union which was forced upon it in 1814 as a consequence of the peace after the Napoleonic wars. Before the union with Sweden, Norway had been part of the Kingdom of Denmark-Norway for about 400 years. Modern historical research has shown that Norway was not a repressed partner in the Kingdom of Denmark-Norway but, at the end of the last century, politicians talked about the four-hundred-year night' in their effort to create a national and nationalistic feeling among Norwegians. In the union with Sweden, Norway had its own parliament and its own constitution. In the campaign before the referendum some zealous campaigners effectively exploited what they called our bad experience with three unions; the union with Denmark, the union with Sweden, and the union with Nazi-Germany during the occupation ­ unions from which Norway had to struggle to free itself. Therefore, playing on national feelings, why should Norway voluntarily join a fourth union, giving up its sovereignty and democracy, and leave itself open to a new bad experience. The fear that important decisions would be taken in Brussels and not at the national and local level was of importance to many people in their considerations before they cast their votes. The national, some will say nationalistic, feeling among Norwegians was also boosted by the successful organization of the Lillehammer Winter Olympics. It convinced many people that, despite being a small nation, Norway could accomplish anything and could do it on its own.

The second point to which attention should be drawn is the open hostility towards a market economy which can be found among people belonging to a ide range of socio-economic groups. The open declarations in favour of a market economy in the Treaty of Rome was a red flag for many people. Contrary to their Social-Democratic sister organizations in other Nordic countries, the Labour movement in Norway has had a revolutionary history dating back to the 1920s. It therefore took a long time for the Norwegian Labour Party to change to the modern Social-Democratic views it holds today in which the market economy can be used as an instrument to reach the objective of a fair and just society. Many Labour leaders and supporters see the market economy of the European Community as a capitalistic objective and not as an instrument to create peace and prosperity among the Member States. In their campaign, the agrarian Centre Party argued that the subjection to Community rules would imply an increase in unemployment because market forces would be let loose. This market scepticism among politicians has been strengthened by the fact that there has been and, even today, there is a high degree of scepticism towards free trade and a market economy among Norwegian economists. Both Ragnar Frisch and Trygve Haavelmoe, winners of the Nobel Prize in economics, were declared market sceptics. This has strongly influenced the present generation of Norwegian economists and social scientists.

Farmers were traditionally in favour of a market economy but are today heavily dependent on direct grant subsidies, price subsidies and market regulations. They therefore have a vested interest in the present system and, through their strong organizations, will fight all changes, whether they be changes in the GATT and OECD agreements or the EU Common Agricultural Policy.

The last point to which attention should be drawn relates to Norway's enormous natural resources. Traditionally, it was a country whose economy was based on agriculture, forestry and fishing. A great number of our manufacturing industries today are still based on processing raw materials from these sectors. From the turn of the century manufacturing industries have been established based on our vast resources of hydroelectric power. In the late 1960s oil was found on the Norwegian continental shelf and, from then on, the oil sector has developed into being very important for the Norwegian economy. Today, for example, Norway accounts for about 15% of the European Union's imports of oil and gas, meaning that interdependence on the EU is far from being a one-way street.

Although Norway is dependent on the EU for the export of oil and, in particular, gas, this new sector has also given the country a freedom of action that most other countries can only dream of. It can therefore be said that the income and state revenue from this sector gave the Norwegians the freedom to say No' in the referendum. The importance of retaining control of natural resources also played an significant role in the campaign and many Norwegians were not convinced that Norway would retain such control in the EU.

Our fisheries are dependent on the EU for the export of their products. However, the fishing industry world wide faces a crisis of resources. The Norwegian fishermen and the voters in the areas where the fisheries sector plays an important role did not believe that the fisheries policy of the European Union put enough emphasis on the preservation of the fish resources; they therefore voted No'.

The question has been asked of what the chances are that Norway will join the European Union in the future? It is probably a more interesting question to ask whether the EU would want to have as a new member a country that has negotiated membership three times and has turned accession down twice in referendums.

The Norwegian economy is an integral part of the European economy. Roughly 80% of the country's trade is with the European Union. Norway is, except for agriculture and fishing, also part of the EU Internal Market through the EEA Agreement. The No' to accesion does not change this basic fact. In spite of the No' votes, the broad consensus is that Norway should continue to participate actively in European cooperation. More than two thirds of the Parliament support the government's policy of making the most of the EEA Agreement. This means, for example, that Norway has accepted the Schengen Agreement and in this way de facto agrees to be an outer border of the European Union. Norway has also accepted the Commission's Oil Directive. It is therefore fair to say that Norway, in reality, is an economic member of the European Union. In spite of this fact, I believe that only a fundamental change in public opinion and obvious negative consequences of not being a member will bring a Norwegian government back to the negotiation table before the end of this century.