Abstract

This article examines the Icelandic model of emergent sovereignty, based on selective integration into the European space without full membership in the European Union. The empirical basis for the analysis is provided by data from the Sovereignty Index (Burke Index) of the International Burke Institute for 2024–2025, according to which Iceland’s aggregate Index score is 558.4 out of 700 points (79.8%). Despite one of the highest levels of political sovereignty in Europe (91.8 out of 100), Iceland’s profile is characterized by pronounced structural asymmetry: the gap between the country’s mean score and its military score (52.1) reaches 27.7 points. The article argues that the Icelandic case represents not an erosion of emergent sovereignty, but rather a distinctive configuration of it—sovereignty produced through managed delegation in one domain while retaining control over strategic resources in others.

Keywords: emergent sovereignty; Burke Index; Iceland; EEA; selective integration; sovereignty of limits; security delegation.

1. Core Argument and Research Problem

Iceland preserves its sovereignty not by rejecting international integration, but through selective integration. The country is embedded in the European space through the European Economic Area, the Schengen Agreement, and the European Free Trade Association, while not transferring full political and legal control over key areas of national policy to the European Union. The Icelandic model therefore demonstrates that contemporary sovereignty can exist not as isolation, but as the capacity of a state to determine independently the depth and forms of its interdependence.

The central argument of this article is as follows. Iceland develops emergent sovereignty because its sovereignty is constituted not in opposition to international integration, but through the management of integration. By remaining outside full membership in the European Union, Iceland seeks to retain national control over strategic resources—above all, fisheries, agriculture, and economic policy—while simultaneously benefiting from access to the European market. Accordingly, non-membership in the EU should be understood not as an anti-integrationist stance, but as an active strategy for constructing a distinctive form of sovereignty under conditions of interdependence.

The starting point of the analysis is Iceland’s historically rooted understanding of independence as the capacity to control its own resources and make decisions that shape national development. The experience of the “Cod Wars” is particularly significant, as Iceland progressively expanded its control over its fishing zones. For this reason, the potential transfer of certain powers to the EU under the Common Fisheries Policy is perceived not merely as an economic issue, but also as a potential constraint on national autonomy.

2. Theoretical Framework and Data Source

Emergent sovereignty is understood as a form of sovereignty that is not constituted once and for all through a fixed set of exclusive state powers, but instead emerges and is reproduced through the continuous interaction of the nation-state with supranational and international institutions. The methodological foundations of the seven-dimensional model and the typology derived from it—resource conversion, dependency architecture, alternatives, reversibility, limits, second-order sovereignty, and reproduction—are presented in The Dynamics of Emergent Sovereignty: From the IBI’s Seven-Dimensional Sovereignty Index to a Dynamic Theory of Sovereign Agency.

Among the mechanisms identified in this typology, the sovereignty of limits is of particular analytical significance in the Icelandic case. It refers to the capacity of a state to determine independently the boundaries of permissible external dependence and the delegation of powers. In the Icelandic case, this mechanism can be expressed through the formula “integration without membership, interdependence without complete surrender of autonomy.” Iceland accepts a substantial body of European rules and participates in the single market through the EEA while retaining the capacity to determine policy independently in areas of fundamental national importance.

The empirical basis of the analysis is the Sovereignty Index (Burke Index), developed by the International Burke Institute (IBI). The Index assesses a state’s real autonomy across seven dimensions: political, economic, technological, informational, cultural, cognitive, and military. Each dimension is scored on a scale of up to 100 points, with an aggregate maximum of 700 points constituting the overall Index value. The calculation is based on official data from international and national sources, including the United Nations, World Bank, UNESCO, IMF, ITU, FAO, SIPRI, PISA, and others, and is supplemented by an international expert survey. For each of the seven components, at least 100 experts from more than 50 countries are surveyed using a standardized questionnaire consisting of ten questions rated on a ten-point scale. The final score for each dimension is calculated as the arithmetic mean of the statistical and expert-assessment scores. The Institute estimates data coverage for Iceland at between 85% for the cognitive dimension and 97% for the technological dimension.

Iceland’s Sovereignty Index Profile

3. Burke Index Data: Iceland’s Sovereignty Profile

Table 1. Sovereignty Index (Burke Index), 2024–2025: Iceland

Source: Sovereignty Index (Burke Index), International Burke Institute (IBI), 2024–2025. Deviations from the mean calculated by the authors based on Index data.

3.1. Asymmetry of Iceland’s Sovereignty Profile

Iceland’s aggregate score of 558.4 points (79.8%) places it in the upper tier of the global ranking. However, the distribution of scores across the seven dimensions reveals a pronounced structural asymmetry, which constitutes the central object of analysis.

The highest score is recorded in the political dimension (91.8). This reflects the absence of permanent foreign military bases; national ownership of the military infrastructure at Keflavík; the practice of the Supreme Court of Iceland, which has repeatedly accorded precedence to national law over decisions by EEA and EFTA bodies in constitutional and sovereignty-related matters; as well as relatively high scores for political stability (1.21 on a maximum scale of 2.5) and government effectiveness (1.54 under the WGI methodology). The economic dimension (86.7) is underpinned by near-complete energy independence, with 100% of electricity generated from renewable sources; national control over currency issuance, with 98–99% of domestic payments conducted in Icelandic króna; and self-sufficiency in basic food products.

The lowest score is recorded in the military dimension (52.1). The gap between the mean score across the seven dimensions (79.8) and the military score amounts to 27.7 points, while the gap between the political and military dimensions reaches 39.7 points, representing the largest within-profile range. This assessment reflects the absence of a standing military, dedicated military expenditure (approximately 0.01% of GDP in 2024, compared with a NATO benchmark of 5%), a domestic defense industry, and a military reserve. Defense functions are instead distributed among a national police unit, the Coast Guard, and an air-surveillance system, with an overall mobilization capacity of up to 800 personnel.

The technological dimension occupies an intermediate position (73.2) and is the only dimension, apart from the military, to fall below the country’s mean score. Despite R&D expenditure of 2.65% of GDP (2023), Iceland remains dependent on imports of equipment, software, microelectronics, and server infrastructure and has no domestic chip-manufacturing capacity.

4. Security Delegation as a Test of Sovereignty of Limits

Iceland’s military score requires a specific interpretation within the emergent sovereignty framework. A formally low score should not be equated with a loss of sovereignty: Iceland’s security is ensured through a three-tier external architecture consisting of a bilateral defense agreement with the United States, NATO collective defense, and an agreement between Iceland and the European Union covering Arctic monitoring, cybersecurity, and climate-related threats. This configuration represents a form of sovereignty through delegation.

Importantly, the absence of armed forces in Iceland is rooted not in a temporary political choice but in national identity. As Professor Valur Ingimundarson has noted, the issue is not a matter of current political policy but an element of Icelandic national identity. From the perspective of the proposed typology, this means that delegation in the military domain is not the result of external coercion: the state itself has defined the limits of permissible dependence, consistent with the mechanism of sovereignty of limits.

At the same time, the Index data help identify the model’s zone of vulnerability. The sovereignty of limits remains effective only insofar as the state retains the capacity to define those limits autonomously. The contrast between Iceland’s level of military expenditure and the NATO benchmark of 5% of GDP points to growing external pressure on the existing configuration of delegation. If the limits of participation begin to be determined by the alliance architecture rather than by national choice, sovereignty of limits gives way to externally imposed boundaries, and the delegation model as a whole approaches a breaking point. This constitutes the principal strategic risk of the Icelandic model, even as its performance across the other six dimensions remains strong.

A particularly revealing comparison can be drawn with the Maldives, whose aggregate Index score is 382.1 out of 700 points (54.6%), with a military score of 28.1. Despite their markedly different absolute levels, the gap between the aggregate score and the military dimension is remarkably similar: 27.7 points for Iceland and 26.5 points for the Maldives. Both states are fully sovereign in formal legal terms, yet each lacks one of the conventional foundations of sovereign capacity—Iceland lacks autonomous defense capabilities, while the Maldives lacks a physically defensible territorial base. This convergence points to a measurable form of structural fragility within the Burke Index framework.

5. Iceland in Comparative Perspective

Table 2 compares Iceland’s sovereignty profile with those of Belgium and Slovakia, the two cases analyzed above.

Table 2. Comparative Sovereignty Profile Indicators (Burke Index, 2024–2025)

Source: Authors’ calculations based on Sovereignty Index (Burke Index) data, 2024–2025.

5. Comparative Analysis and the Concept of Sovereignty as the Management of Limits

The comparison reveals three significant findings.

First, Iceland and Belgium have nearly identical aggregate scores—558.4 and 551.5 points, respectively, with a difference of only 6.9 points. Yet their profiles differ substantially: Iceland exceeds Belgium by 12.0 points in the political dimension, while falling behind in the cultural dimension (by 5.9 points), the technological dimension (by 4.0 points), and the military dimension (by 3.0 points). In other words, similar aggregate scores conceal qualitatively different configurations of sovereign capacity.

Second, all three states record their lowest score in the military dimension, within a narrow range of 52.1 to 55.1 points. Despite an 86.2-point difference in aggregate scores between Iceland and Slovakia, their military scores differ by only 2.4 points—and the difference is not in Iceland’s favor. This reinforces the proposition that resource capacity does not automatically translate into defense autonomy.

Third, the degree of profile asymmetry increases with aggregate score: the standard deviation is 13.5 for Iceland, 11.1 for Belgium, and 9.1 for Slovakia, while the military dimension falls below each country’s mean score by 27.7, 23.7, and 13.0 points, respectively. The states with the highest resource capacity in the sample thus exhibit the most uneven profiles. This finding is of particular importance for assessing emergent sovereignty: the greater the asymmetry, the more dependent the overall sovereign capacity becomes on a single weak link.

At the same time, the substantive interpretation of the Icelandic and Belgian cases differs. In Belgium, the gap between the economic (85.6) and military (55.1) dimensions is accompanied by internal political and institutional fragmentation that constrains the production of a coherent national strategy, which has been characterized above as an erosion of emergent sovereignty. In Iceland, by contrast, the political dimension is the strongest in the profile (91.8), while delegation in the military domain is accompanied by a continued high capacity for autonomous decision-making. The Icelandic case should therefore be characterized not as an erosion of emergent sovereignty, but as a distinctive configuration of it—deliberately asymmetric, yet manageable.

6. The Central Concept: Sovereignty as the Management of Limits

Iceland’s decision to remain outside full membership in the European Union therefore represents not a rejection of European integration, but an attempt to redefine sovereignty through the management of its interdependence with Europe. The Index data support the effectiveness of this strategy: despite deep integration into the single market, Iceland retains the highest political sovereignty score in the sample (91.8) and a high level of economic autonomy (86.7), including control over currency issuance and energy independence.

At the same time, the data reveal the cost of this configuration. The Icelandic model concentrates its structural vulnerability in a single dimension, and its resilience depends on the state’s continued ability to determine autonomously the limits of delegation in the security domain. In terms of the proposed typology, this means that Iceland’s level of emergent sovereignty is critically dependent on the mechanism of sovereignty of limits, while the mechanisms of resource conversion and preservation of alternatives work in its favor.

7. Conclusions

The analysis permits the following conclusions:

1. Iceland’s aggregate Burke Index score of 558.4 out of 700 points (79.8%) places the country in the upper tier of the ranking. However, the diagnostically relevant factor is not the aggregate score but the structure of the profile, which exhibits the highest degree of asymmetry in the sample (standard deviation of 13.5; range of 39.7 points).
2. The Icelandic model of selective integration is supported by the Index data: the highest political sovereignty score (91.8) is combined with a high level of economic autonomy (86.7), despite participation in the EEA, Schengen, and EFTA without full EU membership.
3. The military dimension (52.1) falls 27.7 points below the national mean and 39.7 points below the political dimension, reflecting a three-tiered external security architecture. At the same time, this delegation has been chosen by the state itself and is consistent with the mechanism of sovereignty of limits rather than external coercion.
4. The principal risk to the Icelandic model lies not in delegation itself, but in the potential loss of the state’s capacity to determine its limits autonomously, as indicated by the contrast between national military expenditure and allied benchmarks.
5. The technological dimension (73.2) constitutes a second constraint on the resource-conversion chain: despite relatively high R&D expenditure (2.65% of GDP), Iceland remains dependent on imports of microelectronics and software.
6. Comparison with Belgium (551.5) and Slovakia (472.2) demonstrates that even when aggregate scores are similar or, in the case of Iceland and Belgium, nearly identical, configurations of sovereign capacity may differ qualitatively: the Belgian case is characterized as an erosion of emergent sovereignty, whereas the Icelandic case represents managed asymmetry.

A limitation of the present analysis is the static nature of the data used. The 2024-2025 Index captures a single cross-sectional snapshot, whereas assessment of sovereignty reproduction requires the construction of a time series and analysis of the trajectory of the indicator, including possible changes in military expenditure under the influence of allied commitments.

Sources

1. Iceland’s Sovereignty Index (Burke Index), 2024-2025. International Burke Institute (IBI). URL: https://ibi.institute/read/icelands-sovereignty-index-burke-index-2024-2025 (accessed September 6, 2026).
2. Sovereignty Index (Burke Index), 2024–2025: Consolidated Country Data. International Burke Institute (IBI). URL: https://ibi.institute/index/2025 (accessed September 6, 2026).
3. A NATO State With Zero Army-and a 27.7-Point Sovereignty Gap. Burke Institute. April 10, 2026. URL: https://burkeinstitute.substack.com/p/a-nato-state-with-zero-army-and-a (accessed September 6, 2026).
4. Iceland vs. Maldives: The Paradoxes of Countries with “Fragile Sovereignty”. International Burke Institute (IBI). URL: https://ibi.institute/read/iceland-vs-maldives-the-paradoxes-of-countries-with-fragile-sovereignty (accessed September 6, 2026).
5. The Dynamics of Emergent Sovereignty: From the IBI’s Seven-Dimensional Sovereignty Index to a Dynamic Theory of Sovereign Agency. Manuscript, current research project.
6. Slovakia and Belgium: Two Trajectories of Emergent Sovereignty in Europe. Manuscript, current research project.