ABSTRACT

This chapter analyses Danish foreign policy from the end of the war in Europe to Danish membership of the European Communities in 1973. In considering the internal influences on foreign policy, Denmark shared with The Netherlands a concern with broadening and expanding its trade and economic interests. Despite this familiarity with the bases and impact of the external environment, Denmark's adaptation to its specific post-war contours was comparatively less assured and less decisive than that of The Netherlands. For Denmark, age-old patterns of amity and enmity had defined its local security complex as one that spanned northern and western Europe. Similar pressures arising from the Cold War exacerbated the tensions that underlay the definition of Denmark's local security complex. The dynamism and fragmentation of Danish party politics, coupled with minority coalition government, a strong parliamentary tradition and an abiding search for consensus, was fertile ground for the development of various interest groups in Danish politics.