In August, Icelanders will vote on whether the small Nordic island should restart negotiations with the European Union about joining the bloc.
The referendum campaign has not taken off yet, but most agree questions about fishing rights, sovereignty and the euro will feature prominently when it does.
Slotting Iceland into the 27-state union would be fairly easy in many areas. It is already in the Schengen travel zone that suspends border checks.
Iceland is also part of the union’s single market as a member of the European Economic Area (EEA), alongside Norway and Liechtenstein, meaning it aligns with many EU laws and regulations.
On defence, it has been a Nato member since the western military alliance was founded. There are none of the worries about corruption or democratic backsliding associated with some candidate countries in the Balkans and eastern Europe.
Fishing rights and the question of access to Iceland’s economic waters will be the big sticking point.
Iceland, the sparsely populated island in the north Atlantic a little bigger than Ireland, wants to protect its vast, 200-nautical mile fishing waters. Its fishing industry still accounts for almost half of goods the country exports.
A yes vote on August 29th would give the go ahead to resume dormant membership negotiations. At the end of those talks, a second referendum would be held on whether to join.
“I imagine questions around fishing rights and stuff like that will feature pretty heavily,” says Margrét Einarsdóttir, professor of law at Reykjavik University. People were worried about vessels from other EU countries fishing in Icelandic waters, she says.
Iceland first applied for EU membership in 2009 and negotiations moved quickly, given the extent its laws already synced up in many areas.
Reykjavík hit the pause button in late 2013 when a more Eurosceptic government took office. The space between the two positions on fishing waters had seemed too great to bridge.
Erna Bjarnadóttir, secretary of Heimssyn, a group that opposes EU membership, expects the coming months to be polarising.
“We want Iceland to be a sovereign country, and in the framework we understand the sovereignty of Iceland today, and that joining the EU would surrender part of our sovereignty, we think we are better off with staying as we are,” she says.
Bjarnadóttir worked for the Icelandic farmers’ union for more than 20 years and was heavily involved in the previous debate about joining the union.
The no campaign believes the suggestion Iceland could retain full sway over its fishing waters as an EU member state is “unrealistic”, she says.
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Foreign minister Þorgerður Katrín Gunnarsdóttir is one of the drivers behind the EU push in the coalition government. She recently warned against fearmongering and interference in the coming campaign.
Negotiations to tease out a deal governing Iceland’s entry into the bloc would probably take two years, in the event of an initial yes vote.
“We are part of the internal market, so I mean all that legislation, free moment of goods, people, services, capital … What we are not a part of is fishery policy, agriculture policy, the euro and then foreign and security policy,” says Einarsdóttir.
The academic says some leeway or “adjustment” on fishing rights would be needed for an Icelandic government to successfully sell EU membership to the population.
Brussels officials seem open to showing a fair bit of flexibility, she says. “If we ever want to join the EU I think now we would have a chance to get an agreement that would be suitable for us.”
Then there is the Donald Trump factor.
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Some within the US administration would love to see the EU fracture, to break the power of Brussels as a regulatory counterweight. Washington has actively backed anti-EU parties in recent European elections and will likely continue to do so.
Trump’s tariff threats and heavy-handed talk about annexing Greenland have ironically done a huge amount to underline the safety in numbers the EU offers its member states.
Interestingly, Iceland joining the EU fold would pose questions for Norway, as the other main EEA country not part of the political union.
“We are preparing for the possibility that Iceland could be an EU member by 2030,” Norway’s foreign minister Espen Barth Eide told parliament last month.
A yes vote would shift the focus of Brussels and Reykjavík to accession negotiations, something he said would have “immediate ramifications for existing activities in the ongoing EEA co-operation”.
So how will the vote in August go? “I think so many things can happen from now that it’s difficult to say,” says Bjarnadóttir of the no camp.
“I think it will be close,” adds Einarsdóttir.