SELCS

Nordic Co-operation

Course code: SCAN7307
Course unit value: 0.5
Assessment: one assessed 5000 word essay (80%), participation in online forum (20%)
Tutor: Dr Mary Hilson

This is a new course for 2012-13 and is taught entirely online, jointly with the University of Helsinki.  The course examines the history of Nordic co-operation and region-building, from mid-C19th Scandinavianism to the present day.  How should we explain its limitations - supra-national integration has failed, unlike the European Union - and its successes, for example the Nordic passport union?  When has it flourished, and why does there seem to be renewed interest in it in the last few years?

The course is taught entirely online to Helsinki and UCL students via a shared Moodle site. Students read a series of set texts and participate in an online discussion. During the academic year 2012-13 there will also be a course fieldtrip to Helsinki, where students will take part in a joint conference and there may also be an opportunity to attend the sixtieth anniversary sessions of the Nordic Council. The costs of the fieldtrip to students (travel and accommodation) will be subsidised as far as possible. The provisional dates for the fieldtrip are 31 October-2 November 2012.

The course is taught entirely in English. No previous knowledge of the subject is required.

Set texts and introductory readings:

Nils Andrén, ”Nordic Integration”, Cooperation and Conflict, 2 (1967), pp. 1-25.

Clive Archer, “The Stoltenberg Report and Nordic Security: Big Idea, Small Steps”, NannaHvidt and Hans Mouritzen, eds., Danish Foreign Policy Yearbook (2010).

Norbert Götz, ”Norden: Structures that do not make a region“, European Review of History, 10, 2 (2003), pp. 323-341.

Jan Hecker-Stampehl, ed., Between Nordic Ideology, Economic Interests and Political Reality: New Perspectives on Nordek(Helsinki, 2009).

Lasse Sonne, Nordek: A Plan for Increased Nordic Economic Co-operation and Integration 1968-1970 (Helsinki, 2007).

Teija Tiilikainen and Kaisa Korhonen, eds., Norden – Making a Difference? Possibilities for enhanced Nordic co-operation in international affairs (Helsinki, FIIA report 29: 2011).

Frantz Wendt, The Nordic Council and Co-operation in Scandinavia (Copenhagen, 1959).

Gunnar Wetterberg, The United Nordic Federation (Copenhagen, 2010).

Uffe Østergård, “The Geo-politics of Nordic identity: from composite states to nation-states”, in Øystein Sørensen and Bo Stråth, eds., The Cultural Construction of Norden (Oslo, 1997).