For the first time-except for periods during the two world wars-the Danish Social Democracy has formed a government with a major bourgeois party. After negotiations that lasted several weeks, a coalition government was formed between the Social Democrats and Venstre-the Liberal Party.
The new government represents more than just a continuation of the incomes policy, which Social Democratic minority governments have implemented in collaboration with different bourgeois parties for several years. It marks a deepening of the class-collaborationist course pursued by the Danish Social Democracy.
The immediate response was an outpouring of protest from locals of the Social Democratic Party and from the tradeunion movement. More than 50,000 of the country's 1.2 million trade unionists stopped work for one or more days, paralyzing 150 of the largest plants in Denmark. So powerful was this pressure from the rank and file that the Social Democratic leadership of the national tradeunion federation-Landsorganisationen (LO)-has been forced to criticize the government.
Parties of Two Different Classes
To understand what lies behind the formation of the new government and the protests against it requires an examina. tion of the roots of the Danish Social Democracy and Liberals.
The Liberal Party is one of the major employers parties in Denmark. Originally, it represented the interests of the big farmers. But as agriculture lost its influence, the Liberals became a typical bourgeois party.
While its base in elections is mainly the petty bourgeoisie, the Liberal Party's policy is one of supporting the capitalist class. Consequently, it has close connections with several of the big monopolies and with the Danish Employers Association. The working class views the Liberals as a capitalist party.
The Social Democracy is a typical reformist party. Apart from a few short periods, it has held governmental power since the Second World War, either in coalitions with smaller, bourgeois parties or as a minority government based on support from different bourgeois parties. For two brief periods, it formed a minority government with support from a small reformist workers party, the Socialistisk Folkeparti (SF—Socialist People's Party).
The Social Democracy is firmly based in and supported by the Danish working class. The party totally dominates the trade-union movement at its top levels. The majority of workers credit the Social Democracy with having helped to overcome the crisis of the 1930s and providing reforms during the economic boom of the 1950s and 1960s.
Immediately before the economic crisis hit Denmark in 1974, the Social Democratic Party was about to lose a big part of its influence. The three other workers parties-SF, Danmarks Kommunistiske Parti (DKP-Communist Party of Denmark), and Venstresocialisterne (VS-Left Socialist Party)-were gaining, as was the bourgeois tax-protest party, Fremskridtspartiet (Progress Party).
But with the onset of the crisis, these trends were cut short. The working class still supports, even though not actively, the Social Democracy. It does so not because it wants or supports the bourgeois incomes policy advanced by the party, but because the party is still associated with economic security.
Thus, the party gained a big majority of workers votes in February 1977 and the support of between 30% and 40% of the total population. This has not meant an increase in membership, however.
The Fight Against the Incomes Policy
Since 1974 a tradition has developed in parts of the Danish working class of industrial action and protest against gov. ernments, laws, and parliamentary agreements.
In May 1974, for example, the Liberal minority government implemented some of the first cutback measures in response to the economic crisis. These were not very severe compared to later decisions of the Folketinget, the Danish parliament.
But they were met with a forceful reaction. Two hundred thousand workers went on strike, and a like number participated in demonstrations in Copenhagen. Smaller demonstrations took place in many other cities.
Later the same year, there were more strikes and demonstrations against the Liberal government, which was subsequently forced to resign, after new parliamentary elections in early 1975. The Social Democracy then formed a government.
The new government carried on and sharpened the austerity policy. Cutbacks in the social sector, in health and education, were implemented. Big subsidies for the capitalists were granted. And narrow limits were imposed on negotiations for general agreements between the tradeunion federation LO and the Employers Association, such as by setting ceilings for Association, such as by seling centigs cor wage increases.
This incomes policy was accompanied by a hardened attitude on the part of the employers in local wage negotiations. The Employers Association financially supported firms that refused to concede wage increases. Thus, there came into being a front consisting of the employers, the bourgeois parties, and the Social Democratic government. This is what we in Denmark call the "zero front"-the front to keep wage increases down to zero.
The Social Democratic governments have been able to do this without provoking the kind of reaction that rocked the Liberal Party in 1974.
For one thing, it has been much more difficult to mobilize for actions against what most workers see as a "workers government" than against an open bourgeois government. Social Democratic propaganda portraying the policy of the party and government as a lesser evil has been partly successful.
The imposition of austerity has also been aided by rising unemployment, which has weakened the fighting will of the working class. Nearly 200,000 workers are without jobs today.
Certainly there have been protests and strikes against incomes-policy legislation, but they have declined. One of the reasons for this is that the three other workers parties represented in the Folketinget have not been able to present a credible political alternative to the Social Democracy. In fact the DKP, which has the most influence in the trade unions, has actively discouraged struggles against the incomes policy.
The result is that such struggles have taken place mainly at the local level. There have been long strikes for better wages and against layoffs, and some have been won. Tenants in new, expensive housing projects have refused to pay rent or rent increases. Students and apprentices have taken action in defense of their voice in educational policy and for more financial support. Parents have protested against bad conditions in kindergartens by withholding payments. In Copenhagen, parents and their supporters prevented for half a year the tearing down of a kindergarten.
These actions and others have shown that some groups are ready to fight against austerity. But the struggles have remained localized and isolated, mainly because most of the participants have lacked a coherent political perspective.
Coalition Government—An Excuse for a Procapitalist Policy
At the same time, parliamentary crises have been occurring more frequently.
Earlier this year, four bourgeois parties, among them the Liberal Party, proclaimed that they would collaborate more closely. The purpose was to strengthen their bargaining position before negotiating with the government.
Prime Minister Anker Jørgensen's aim in initiating talks with the Liberal Party for a coalition government was to split this bloc. At the same time he wanted to build a strong government in preparation for the negotiations on wage agreements scheduled for spring 1979. The new coalition government controls just under half of the members of the Folketinget. Thus it needs support from only one or two of the small bourgeois parties to gain a majority for its proposals.
During secret negotiations between the two parties, which lasted three weeks, it became clear that such a coalition government would mean a sharpened austerity policy. Jørgensen hopes that the coalition will provide the alibi he needs to step up moves in that direction.
"We have to defer to our coalition partner," he will say to party members and the rest of the working class.
That this is what Jorgensen has in mind was confirmed when the government was proclaimed at the end of August. None of the demands trade unions and other groups have raised were in the government's program, of course. Neither were some of the traditional Social Democratic proposals such as more just tax and housing policies. And there was to be absolutely no interference against speculators and their "unearned income."
On the other hand, the new government's program called for an increase in the Value-Added Tax (a general indirect tax) from 18% to 20.25%. It also included a freeze on prices, rates, and wages, though everyone knows that only the lid on wages will be effectively implemented.
Apart from these additions, the program was mostly a continuation of the policy of the previous government, plus some vague declarations of purpose.
The government consists of fourteen Social Democratic ministers and seven from the Liberal Party.
The Trade Unions Say 'No'
After the formation of the new government was announced and its program outlined, there were immediate and vehement reactions from the trade-union movement. Resolutions of protest from workplaces and trade unions poured in from all parts of the country.
The day after the announcement, workers of one shipyard, in Frederikshavn, went on strike. Two days later all the other shipyards of Denmark were struck. The postal workers, the sanitation workers of Copenhagen, and workers in the metal industry followed suit.
Demonstrations took place in several cities. The sentiment against the government was so strong that even the local labor councils, which are dominated by the Social Democracy, were forced to participate. They did not use their resources and influence to mobilize the workers, however. And Social Democratic trade-union leaders used the occasion to tell demonstrators to stop striking.
Two national unions, the Painters and the Electricians, held their congresses during the strikes. The Social Democratic leadership of these unions was forced not only to protest against the government, but also to sharpen the wording in resolutions. The steering committees of several other national unions also protested.
Even the chairman of the LO, Thomas Nielsen, dissociated himself from the government. And everywhere in the tradeunion movement the traditionally close relationship between the Social Democracy and the LO was questioned.
The protests from the unions varied in character, of course. Each bore the stamp of the current in the labor movement that had the most influence in that particular place. Among these tendencies are the Social Democratic reformists, DKP/SF reformists, centrists, and revolutionists.
Even in the unions and meetings where the Social Democrats were dominant, the protests varied in regard to the severity of the criticisms and to the radicalism of the demands raised. Generally the resolutions from these meetings contained demands for a more just tax and housing policy. They stressed that not only the working class suffers from the crisis, and they for Okonomisk Demokrati (Ecoasked nomic Democracy) to compensate for the sacrifices being made.
(The latter is a Social Democratic project through which the trade-union movement is supposed to gain influence in the management of companies. The real result will be a further influx of capital from the workers, who will thereby be tied to their "own" firm. The aim is to break down the solidarity and fighting spirit of the class.)
But in spite of these differences in the protest resolutions, most of them have in common a dissociation from the whole idea of a coalition government between the Social Democracy and the Liberal Party. This view has penetrated deeply into Social Democratic trade-union circles, even though the same people have accepted common drafting of legislation by the two parties.
An Important Split
Protests and severe criticism have also been raised inside the Social Democratic Party itself. Many branches have protested. In fact, in the second largest city of Denmark, Arhus, all branch leaderships in the area, all town council members, all candidates for parliament, and others met to sharply dissociate themselves from the government. In two branches, the Executive Committees resigned. And many members left the party.
Some Social Democratic shop stewards are trying to build a new workers party, the Reform Party, which promises to hold on to Social Democratic politics. However, the new project has no chance of competing with the three reformist workers parties and one centrist party now in existence.
Protests also occurred at higher levels of the Social Democracy, but they soon faded. At an extraordinary meeting of the party's steering committee ten days after the coalition government was formed, criticism was aimed mainly at the procedure followed in arriving at the decision to form a government with the Liberal Party. Anker Jørgensen promised that this would not be repeated.
The outcry against the government in the parliamentary group of the party didn't last long either. Only one Social Democratic, member of the Folketinget voted against the first measures of the new government.
As a result, Social Democratic trade unionists are now discussing how to get more union members into parliament.
Although there are political shortcomings in the protests from trade-union and Social Democratic meetings, and although the actions against the government ended inconclusively, the formation of the coalition government has led to the deepest split in the Social Democracy since communists and syndicalists left the party at the beginning of the century. Never before have so many Social Democrats declared war on a government with Social Democratic participation.
This is a split that goes along classical lines: The nearer you get to the rank and file, the more forceful the protests are. And the trade-union bureaucracy has shown more energetic opposition than the bureaucracy of the state and party apparatus.
Nevertheless, it cannot be ruled out that the party and government will ride out the gale, at least until the spring 1979 generalagreement negotiations. There is no force to the left of the Social Democracy strong enough to put forward a real political alternative to the coalition government and able to mobilize the working class and its potential allies against class collaboration.
Other Workers Parties
During the crisis, the three other workers parties represented in the Folketinget have often formed a common but inconsistent front against the bourgeois austerity policy. Therefore they are seen by a majority as a left wing in Danish politics.
The SF is a reformist party formed in 1958 by a right-wing splitoff from the official Communist Party. Their declared aim is to draw the Social Democracy to the left, mostly through negotiations. A wing of the party does participate in rank-andfile activities in various movements.
The Stalinist, pro-Moscow DKP is clearly reformist. It rejects the "Eurocommunist trend." The DKP has the largest influence in the trade unions next to the Social Democracy, mostly at the shopsteward level. The party has a majority in quite a number of local trade-union leaderships, it forms a minority in some national trade-union leaderships, and it controls the Sailors Union.
VS is a centrist party formed in 1967 as a left-wing splitoff from SF. The break came when SF, which was supporting a Social Democratic minority government, voted against automatic cost-of-living compensation. VS combines opportunism in the Folketinget with a thoroughly sectarian attitude in the mass movements toward the Social Democracy and the majority of the working class that supports that party.
These three parties responded to the coalition government by forming another class-collaborationist coalition. They drafted a common resolution with a small bourgeois party, Retsforbundet. The resolution pointed up the fact that these four parties, together with the Social Democracy, control a majority in the Folketinget.
The resolution promised support to some Social Democratic proposals that were not a part of the government program. They wanted thereby to show that there exists "another majority,"-in contrast to the majority that the Social Democracy normally forms with bourgeois parties.
As a result of this class-collaborationist project, the parties have cut themselves off from influencing those Social Democrats opposing the government. They have presented an alternative that is really no alternative at all.
The resolution does not address some of the most important problems of the working class, such as unemployment. And no wonder, since to do so would have provoked serious disagreements with their old-style bourgeois-liberal ally.
Furthermore, the resolution has a purely parliamentary aim, and therefore it will not be possible to realize even the diverse and modest proposals the parties have agreed upon.
This was made clear at the news conference where the resolution was presented. The chairman of Retsforbundet declared that his party was strongly opposed to extraparliamentary actions.
Apart from this initiative, members of the three parties do participate in the protests and strikes against the government, without however giving them political or organizational direction.
VS has demonstrated its total inability to take advantage of the opening that the formation of the coalition government has created inside the Social Democracy. VS has made it a central part of its agitation and propaganda to stress that nothing really is changed by the Liberal Party's participation. The movements must continue their opposition to the incomes policy and cutbacks, VS says, paying no special attention to what kind of government is in power.
A Revolutionary Answer
In contrast, the Revolutionaere Socialisters Forbund (RSF-Revolutionary Socialist League), Danish section of the Fourth International, has provided a clear-cut class answer. It has already had some success in presenting its proposals, even though its modest size prevents it from having a decisive influence on the development of the antigovernment mobilization.
The RSF has explained the character of the Liberal Party, how the Social Democratic leadership will use the coalition, and why the outcome is bound to be unfavorable for the working class.
In a Central Committee resolution, the RSF points to some of the demands that have been raised in the trade unions and other movements and poses the question: What are the prospects for winning these demands when the Liberal Party is in the government? It says, for example:
There justifiably exists great dissatisfaction with taxes. The working class pays 80% of the taxes, while employers, real estate sharks, and other speculators pay only a small fraction of the value they are squeezing from Danish workers.
Will there be a more equitable tax policy as long as the Liberal Party is in the government? No! Why should this party agree to tax the social class it represents, the capitalist class?
Concerning the motives of the Social Democratic leadership, the resolution states:
We must not forget that the Social Democracy, whether in or out of government, has not helped the working class to defend its standard of living and its democratic rights. On the contrary.
But the government coalition will be used by Anker Jørgensen as an excuse for implementing a more severe antilabor policy. The coalition is the means to pressure party supporters into acceding to the functioning of the Social Demoas a highly useful tool for the crisis cracy solutions of the employers.
For a Workers Government
As an alternative to the coalition government, the RSF puts forward the slogan of a workers government, consisting of the four workers parties. But as the resolution points out:
We know that nothing is settled just because the workers parties form a government. We must demand that this government implement a policy in the interest of the working class, and we must be ready to take action to make it do this. Otherwise it will not be the workers government that we need.
The resolution sets out the demands making up a workers policy. The RSF puts forward and supports the same demands in the trade unions and other mass movements.
• A thirty-five-hour workweek with no reduction of pay and no speedup. This demand is gaining more and more support in the trade unions. Recently the chairman of the National Union of Metalworkers declared that it must be raised in the general-agreement negotiations.
• Payment of the "frozen cost-of-living adjustment." This refers to a portion of the automatic cost-of-living adjustment that was stolen from the workers through legislation passed in August 1977. Instead of the employers' payments going to the workers, the state placed this money in the public workers pension fund. A lump-sum payment would amount to 6,000 Danish kroner (about US$1,100). This is the most widespread demand in the trade unions today.
• An improved cost-of-living adjustment that compensates fully for inflation-that is, a sliding scale of wages.
• Proposals for an improvement in the situation of the unemployed.
• The construction of 40,000 new apartments a year. This is a Social Democratic election promise that the party will not carry out.
• A freeze on residential rents.
• A halt to preparations for nuclearpower production in Denmark.
• Removal of a ministerial directive that bans picketing by workers and others engaged in struggle.
A number of other demands are raised concerning special groups and the defense of democratic rights. The latter have been under heavy attack as part of the effort to stymie the struggles against the incomes policy.
The RSF resolution points out that such a line will not be accepted as a matter of course by the employers. The demands interfere with private property, and many of them cannot be fully implemented so long as the profit drive is the guiding force in society.
Thus, the workers government must be ready to implement a broad program of nationalizations, including companies that will not comply with the demands of the workers, as well as the entire housing sector and the building industry.
The Active Support of the Working Class
The resolution continues:
A government would not be able to carry this policy through on its own even if it had the best of intentions. Only the working class and other oppressed layers can fight back against the capitalist offensive and show the way out of the crisis on a basis that corresponds to their interests.
Therefore, the government must encourage and support activities in all the combat organizations of the class, ranging from trade-union locals to strike committees and workers defense guards, that can protect against strikebreakers and other employer-backed gangs. It must also support the activities of tenants associations, rent-strike committees, tenants defense guards, women's liberation organizations, the antinuclear movement, soldiers unions, and so on.
The resolution also says that a workers government must call for the formation of committees and organizations that can see to it that the workers' demands are implemented as intended. For example, employers would have to be investigated to make sure they were not vitiating the reduced workweek with speedup, or preparing to send capital out of the country.
The RSF explains that such a government will meet fierce resistance from the capitalists. But, the resolution continues: It can count on a much stronger social force-the active support of the working class and the many other oppressed groups that suffer from the profit drive and the malaise of capitalist society.
This will be so because it will be carrying out a working-class program that points directly to the final solution of the capitalist crisis: a planned economy under workers rule, assured by the working class and its allies depriving the capitalist class of its social power.
The resolution, which was adopted just before the coalition was actually formed, also explains what the RSF will be doing in this situation:
In the months ahead, the RSF will spread and win support for this policy, concentrated in the demands: Break with the bourgeoisie, form a workers government, implement a working-class policy.
At the same time, the RFS will support any proposal for the independent activity of the working class for just one or a number of these demands.
Then the resolution lists some of the initiatives that trade unions and other movements can take against the coalition government. For example:
• Pass resolutions that strongly protest the coalition government and that call upon the workers parties to unite on a working-class policy.
• Discuss and prepare effective measures that can put force behind the demands, such as protest meetings, demonstrations, shop-steward during work conferences, workers meetings hours, and strikes.
The RSF will propose that the local initiatives become as powerful as possible through a national coordination of the protests....
A temporary culmination could be a national day of protest.
Revolutionary Politics in the Factories
This political line has been propagated through the fortnightly paper of the RSF, Klassekampen (Class Struggle), and through the distribution of 20,000 leaflets that reproduce the most important parts of the Central Committee resolution.
Members of the RSF have taken the platform into the factories, unions, housing districts, and various movements they are active in.
Both Klassekampen and the leaflet have been positively received in many places, and RSF members have gotten support for several of their proposals. There is a certain unwillingness, though, in movements other than the trade unions to taking a formal position on the government.
But in some work places, RSF members have been able to gain a majority for their proposals. For example, a shop steward for 115 throwers in a big porcelain factory, Bing & Grendahl, in Copenhagen, gained support among his comrades for the following resolution:
We reject the incomes policy. We have no use for bourgeois politics. We need a working-class policy.
That is, a policy that fights unemployment with a thirty-five-hour workweek at no reduction in pay; secures the real wage with a full cost-ofliving adjustment; secures a good general agreement in 1979; stops the skyrocketing of residential rents and secures the building of 40,000 inexpensive apartments per year; secures tax relief for common wage-earners, heavily taxes rich people, and confiscates the profits of real estate speculators; stops the profiteering of the employers and nationalizes banks, bankrupt companies, and companies that will not accede to the necessary demands of the workers.
The Social Democracy, SF, DKP, and VS must form a workers government that fights for these demands. Such a government will receive the support of the throwers of Bing & Grendahl. We also think that the trade-union movement and the tenants organizations will support it.
The resolution supports a proposal for a nationwide day of protest on October 3. The proposal was first put forward by the trade unions of Fredericia, a provincial city, and is now backed by other sections of the trade-union movement.
October 3-A Day of Protest
The direct protests lasted only for a couple of days. After a week all strikes and demonstrations stopped.
The task now is to prepare a militant show of force October 3 that involves even larger sections of the working class in demonstrations and strikes. This day can also be a preparation for the mobilizations that will be necessary at the time of the general-agreement negotiations.
It is then that the decisive confrontation between the coalition government and the working class will take place. One way or another, the government will try to prevent the workers from making gains. At the same time, there is a widespread reluctance in the trade unions to accept dictation from a government that includes the Liberal Party.
But the Social Democrats at the head of LO are absolutely not interested in mobilizing the working class against the government. They will try to water down the demands even before they are presented to the employers, and they will be ready to defer them as well.
One government proposal is for tripartite negotiations-between the government, the trade unions, and the employers-to decide the outcome of the general agreements. In this way the tradeunion movement would effectively be deprived of its right to negotiate and to take action.
LO said no to these negotiations initially, but a few days later they withdrew their objections.
The task of the RSF in the period ahead is to encourage the oppositional trend inside the Social Democracy and help maintain the willingness to take action that has been shown.
This must be done by spreading the idea that the socialist alternative to the coalition government is a workers government, and by making October 3 an unforgettable experience for the present government and for the trade-union tops.
September 9, 1978