The Significance of Transnational Cooperation in Nordic Atlantic Regions

The article investigates two different cases of transnational cooperation: The Nordic Atlantic Cooperation (NORA) and The Barents Euro-Arctic Region (BEAR). The two cases represent different forms of transnational cooperation, the former with emphasis on low politics and the latter on high politics. They also include very different regions: NORA covers Greenland, Iceland, Faroe Islands and coastal Norway, while BEAR includes northern regions of Norway, Sweden, Finland and European Russia. The cases are compared in relation to their possible socio-economic effects in practice in fisheries. Possibilities are investigated on three levels: On the macro-level, it is discussed what does the legal status of regions mean to transnational cooperation. On the meso-level, the article investigates cooperation in resource management, processing and tnarketing in fisheries. And on the micro-level, it is discussed how innovative regions emerge. The empirical material has its main focus on the early and mid 1990s.