In this chapter, we introduce the concept of awkwardness inregional integration, showing how it can apply both to states and to therelationship between states and their respective regional organisationsand processes. We apply the terminology and variables developed byPhilomena Murray, Baogong He, and Alex Warleigh-Lack in their 2014article to the cases of our five Nordic states and sketch the relationshipbetween the five states studied in this volume and European integration.We close the chapter by presenting the structure of the volume andintroducing its following chapters.