SWEDEN-REFERENDUM: Swedes Say ‘Yes’ to a New Future in Europe

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Greg McIvor

STOCKHOLM, Nov 14 1994 (IPS) - After centuries of being perched on Europe’s periphery, Sweden awoke to a new future Monday following a narrow referendum vote in favour of European Union (EU) membership.

The result, which followed a tense and closely fought campaign, means Sweden will join Austria and Finland as new entrants to the expanding union in 1995.

Final figures from polling stations early Monday gave the ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ sides 52.2 and 46.9 per cent respectively. Some 0.9 per cent of the 6.5 million eligible voters were undecided.

The figures confirmed a late surge in support of Swedish entry in the past few days following a major eleventh-hour push by the pro- Europe campaign, backed by most of the political and industrial establishment.

Social Democratic Prime Minister Ingvar Carlsson, keenly aware that his party had been deeply split on membership, reacted with restraint, saying only that it was “a good result” and he was “satisfied”.

He said his priority would be to secure a step-by-step enlargement of the union into the former communist states of eastern and central Europe.

Sweden would also highlight the importance of EU-wide measures to combat unemployment, racism, right-wing extremism and environmental pollution.

There was bitter disappointment in the ‘No’ movement, which waged an energetic campaign despite the handicap of having only a tenth of the funds available to the ‘Yes’ lobby.

“In the end, you can’t win if the whole of the establishment is against you,” said Kenth Pettersson, chairman of the Commercial Employees’ Union and a leading anti-EU figure. He accused the government of scaring voters into voting ‘Yes’ out of fear of isolation and economic decline if Sweden stayed out.

Claims from the ‘No’ side that the EU was an elitist project primarily for the benefit of big business grew louder after voting returns showed that a clear majority of blue collar trade union members voted against, while salaried, more educated electors came out in favour.