ABSTRACT
It seems that since the end of the Cold War, the role conceptions of Norway and Sweden have converged. Before 1989/90, the states represented extreme cases on opposite ends of the spectrum. Norway was a founding member of NATO in 1949, while Sweden has maintained a policy of neutrality since 1814 and did not join the European Union until 1995. This chapter argues that the inception of the European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) in 1999 has been the crucial “trigger” for the changes in both Sweden’s neutral and Norway’s Atlantic role conception. The Norwegian case in particular indicates that membership in the European Union is not a necessary precondition to trigger role change; rather, interaction with the Union seems sufficient for role change to occur.
