Jacob Christensen

The goose definitively checked me out here.

This week’s theme was “twisted”. It doesn’t take much consumer electronics to create a mess of twisted cables.

The “noir” in the title has nothing to do with fascism: My inspiration to this post comes from the cartoonist Franquin’s famous Idées Noires which revealed a dystopian and rather dark side to his work. Another inspiration came from a discussion some weeks ago on Twitter where I promised an alternative take on the Danish parties.

If you have the courage: Read on.

The Red-Green Alliance

I never quote Margaret Thatcher approvingly. Still, the quip “the problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money” automatically comes to mind. No rule without exceptions, in other other words.

The Socialist People’s Party

SF was founded in 1958 as the other Social Democracy. It is a party which has thrived as a back seat driver ever since. But what does a back seat driver do when the driver has collapsed behind the wheel?

The Social Democrats

The Social Democrats were a child of the urban industrialisation. They died with the disappearance of urban industry.

The Social Liberals

The Social Liberals are the party of the Very Serious People (to use Paul Krugman’s term). When the VSP are wrong, so much the worse for reality.

Liberal Alliance

Ayn Rand. Just louder and more primitive. (In fact, they would love seeing themselves described in this way).

The Conservative People’s Party

A people’s party without people? Doesn’t make sense. Instead the party has mutated into the back seat drivers of the right wing. The big difference between the Conservatives and SF is that nobody in the Liberal Party cares about the Conservatives.

The Liberals

Over the years, the Liberals have made so many U-turns in policy terms that even professional acrobats would suffer from vertigo if they tried to follow them. Still, what gets you votes and into office is what counts.

The Danish People’s Party

The longest-running film series in Denmark? No, not “Olsen Banden” but “Far til Fire” (“Father of Four”), based on a cartoon series from the 1940s. Imagine characters from the 1940s living in the post-industrial world and you have the ideal DPP society. And yes, the series is in fact about to get a second reboot.

In the meantime, the Modernization Agency runs the country.

This week’s theme was “Steep”. As Denmark is a fairly flat place, it is not that easy coming up with something steep. Still, the park at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebæk north of Copenhagen offers some spectacular slopes which are quite steep.

“Rustic” was not exactly the easiest challenge to meet when you live in the middle of a large town. Still, I managed this picture of a cottage at the river which runs through Odense.

Fashionably late but last week’s theme was “Queasy”. I responded with a photo of the pills and inhaler which help me make it through the birch pollen season.

Given the present malaise on the left wing in Danish politics, the journal Ræson asked a number of political commentators and journalists about the chances for some hypothetical parties.

The parties were:

The Social Democrats II (or should we say: The Social Democrats Redux?) which would stay close to the Social Democratic programme – rather than the policies led by the real existing Social Democracy.

The Respect Party which would stand for the interests of public employees and those hit by cuts in social benefits.

The Openness Party which would stand for greater transparency in lawmaking and public administration

The Periphery Party which would stand for the structurally weak parts of Denmark where the development in employment and growth in the private sector is slow if not outright negative.

One general comment could be that much of problems facing the present government and the Social Democrats and SF in particular stems from the fact that the government is seen as a – in purely political terms not very effective – retrenchment government rather than a social reform government. The government’s initiatives on immigration and issues like gay marriage count for very little electorally: They are irrelevant for the creation of a progressive socio-economic image.

If we look at the proposed parties in cleavage terms, SRII would appeal to (private sector) workers, RP to public employees and those on benefits, OP is tricky as it doesn’t really fit in an electoral cleavage while PP obviously fits in the centre-periphery cleavage.

But what about their chances? As it is, Sweden and German have had their OPs in the form of Pirate Parties but this was also linked with a clash between parts of the youth culture and attempts by the entertainment industry and governments to control the use of the internet. However, both Sweden and Germany have a different history with regard to governmental controls of communication and the integration of the internet in the youth culture so in contrast to Denmark the issue has been politicised in these two countries. There may also be a generational element to this with parts of the younger generation feeling that they have been left out by the developments on the labour markets and the economy in general.

A mainstreamed Red-Green Alliance could easily pick up on this – in Denmark the controversies over the revision of the Freedom of Information Act could motivate more young urban people to support the Red-Greens with the Social Liberals as losers.

The PP is a more complicated story: We know that the centre-periphery cleavage has been incredibly important in the Nordic countries historically, albeit in the basis that agriculture did play a very large role economically and socially in all four countries. These days, the Danish People’s Party appear to be making a large effort to attract traditionally Social Democratic and Liberal voters in the peripheral parts of Denmark – even if we may discuss the partys efficacy in actually promoting peripheral areas. But this is where I would put my money, not on a new party.

We can also see that DF is making inroads in some parts of the “Respect Party’s” electorate – while Kristian Thulesen Dahl was seen as a less charismatic figure than Pia Kjærsgaard, he may also appear as less divisive and in this way find it easier to attract blue-collar workers and people on public benefits and some sections of the publicly employed.

Finally, the Social Democrats Redux. There can be no doubt that the Social Democrats face massive challenges in mobilising their existing and potential voters. In a way, Villy Søvndal’s project was to create a SDR but he failed, in part because of different party organisations and party cultures. Again, the DF is doing an impressive job in promoting a social protection-agenda and attracting blue-collar voters – even if the real results of the party’s parliamentary strategy do point in a different direction.

So, perhaps we are left with the impression that while Denmark has a progessive wing on some social issues – to use US terminology -, the socio-economic progressive wing is withering as an economic technocracy has taken over.

Søren Ulrik Thomsen and Det Glemte Kvarter perform “Ode til regnen”

I took a trip to Svendborg on Saturday because the poet Søren Ulrik Thomsen performed with the septet “Det Glemte Kvarter” (The Forgotten Neighbourhood) – named after one of his early poems. Thomsen has been set to music before – Lars H.U.G’s “City Slang” is a modern classic – but Det Glemte Kvarter’s style is very different from H.U.G’s frenetic techno-rock. The performance Saturday was quite an intense affair and the clip above only shows one dimension of what we who were lucky to be in the audience saw and heard during the evening.

Interview and reading by Søren Ulrik Thomsen

Oh, and a big thank you to Esma – aka @adlaramse on Twitter – who inadvertently made me aware of the performance.

Note: For some reason the embedding of YouTube videos is acting up so you will have to follow the links.

This week’s theme was “peaceful”. Harbours used to be busy places but on a quiet, sunny evening a harbour – such as the one in Svendborg – can be a very peaceful place.

The train was hauled by a Class MZ locomotive, DSB 1401. The terrible thing is that I remember the Class MZs as shiny new locomotives from my childhood.

The modern DSB Class MQ “Desiro” servicing the Odense-Svendborg line is quite a contrast to the vintage luxury train:

The entire set on Flickr is here.