Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.2002, Page 36

34
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF TRANSNATIONAL COOPERATION
IN NORDIC ATLANTIC REGIONS
cooperation; the initiatives include differ-
ent areas of the overall region of interest,
and are, namely:
- The Barents Euro-Arctic Region
(BEAR), established in January 1993,
which includes the northern regions of Nor-
way, European Russia, Finland and Swe-
den, but state representatives of the Russian
Federation and all Nordic countries and the
European Union (EU) are also included in
the Barents Council. The Regional Council
includes members from the regions in-
volved: Finmark, Troms and Nordland of
Norway, Nordbotten and (since 1998)
Vasterbotten of Sweden, Lapland and
(since 1998) Oulu of Finland, and Mur-
mansk Region, Karelian Republic, Ark-
hangelsk Region and Nenets Autonomous
Okrug of Russia.
- The Nordic Atlantic Cooperation
(NORA) established in January 1996 as a
regional element of the broader Nordic Co-
operation. Nordic Atlantic Cooperation has
been developed as an extension to the earli-
er West Nordic Cooperation founded in
1980, originally initiated by the Faroe Is-
lands and Eastern Iceland, incorporating
the rest of Iceland in 1980, and extended to
include Greenland in 1983. Northern and
Western Norway joined this cooperation
when the Nordic Atlantic Committee su-
perseded the West Nordic Committee in
1996. The West Nordic Committee/Nordic
Atlantic Committee is a function of the
Nordic Council of Ministers, or more pre-
cisely, the regional ministers and their com-
mittee of officials (NERP = Nordic Com-
mittee of Officials for Regional Policy).
West Nordic cooperation gave the Faroe
Islands and Greenland a more formal role
in the region and their own regional forum
as self-governing sectors of the Danish
Realm. The Faroe Islands and Greenland
are also represented as part of the Danish
delegation to the Nordic Council (a cooper-
ation of parliaments), and through the Dan-
ish government in the Nordic Council of
Ministers (a cooperation of governments).
In 1985, West Nordic Parliamentary Co-
operation (The West Nordic Council) was
also initiated as an informal supplement to
the Nordic Council. There were earlier pro-
posals, however, for the formation of a
West Nordic Council of Ministers to give
West Nordic Cooperation a higher priority
and a more visible status intemationally
(Aalbu and Sande, 1991). So far this has
not been accepted.
As such, the Barents Euro-Arctic Region
Cooperation and the Nordic Atlantic Coop-
eration can at the initial conceptual level al-
ready be viewed as two very different ap-
proaches, founded in different historical
contexts in the overall development of the
Nordic countries. The Barents Euro-Arctic
Cooperation was founded through an ener-
getic initiative by the Norwegian Foreign
Ministry, which initially represenled the
combined interests of the Northern regions
in an international context after the end of
the Cold War and of Nordic EU member-
ship applications. The initiative explicitly
tried to implement the concept of a “Europe
of the Regions”. It was a regional, but fun-
damentally internationally oriented project
from the very beginning, to give the so-
called Euro-Arctic Region a more signifi-
cant role, especially in European integra-