Denmark: left stays at home during EU summit
15 December 2002

At the European Union summit in Copenhagen 20 more countries were given the green light to join the club in 2004.

The architects of the new super power in the making were quite successful. Unfortunately, the same canât be said about the anti-summit mobilisation by the anti-capitalist movement.

Despite good numbers arriving from Sweden, Norway, Finland, and other countries, the turnout was low both on Friday and Saturday.

The protest on Friday against Fortress Europe must be judged a failure. Probably not more than 3,000 people marched from Enghave Plads to RŒdhuspladsen (City Hall). The organisers were the âInitiative for a different Europeâ.

At the gathering in Enghave Plads several speakers tried to cheer people up. Julie Waterson, from the British Anti-Nazi League, gave a very left-wing speech, and was cheered by many. But she didnât have much to say about the terrible new, racist laws of the Danish government, which might be understandable since sheâs probably not familiar with the details.

But other speakers as well, who should know better, like Mona Sheik ö European MP for the Socialist Peopleâs Party ö did not make the necessary and almost unavoidable connection between the general issue of racism and the current situation in Denmark. Sheik blamed the growing racism on those who donât care, who just go home to their coffee, and thereby abandon humanism and solidarity.

There was no militant call to action, no call for a broad campaign in the labour movement on the issue of racism.

The best speaker at RŒdhuspladsen was, without any competition, S¿ren S¿ndergaard from Enhedslisten (Unity List), whoâs an MP and a member of the USFI. He managed to say a number of good things, but he didnât denounce the opportunism or complicity of the main parties of the Labour movement.

No wonder then that the immigrant community in Copenhagen, which is probably half a million strong, showed very little interest in the demonstration. Here was a number of well-meaning Danes, Swedes, Norwegians and others, protesting against racism, but keeping silent on the most burning issues of immigrants in Denmark.

It is almost beyond belief that the Danish left missed the opportunity to focus this protest ö where they were supported by hundreds, maybe more, of comrades from neighbouring countries ö on the domestic government and its racism. Not one slogan was heard against Anders Fogh Rasmussen and his racist government.

It's cheap talk to speak about the Nazis and the 1930s, about the ignorant workers and ordinary people who vote for racist parties, but the courage to speak out and make a militant call for fight against the Danish government proved to be beyond the left in Denmark.

The Danish left needs to be shaken up. It must wake up from its dreams about "little Denmark" and all their attempts to create even smaller communities ö squatted houses or the Chritiania hippie community. It seems like many on the Danish left are content with having their small reservations, where they donât run the risk of confronting the big issues of today.

And social democracy? They were nowhere to be seen at the protests. In order to make sure that no authoritative representative of the party could be with the protesters, the party decided to have an emergency conference at the same time as the protests, but not in Copenhagen, but in far away Odense.

Social democracy lost the elections last year and are now trying to recover. The former prime minister Poul Nyrup Rasmussen was dumped as party leader, at the same time as the EU leaders were meeting in Copenhagen. Nyrup Rasmussen could at least be said to have distanced himself from the racism of the main bourgeois parties, the Liberals (Venstre) and the Conservatives, supported by the openly racist and anti-Muslim Danish Peopleâs Party of Pia Kj¾rsgaard.

The new social democratic leader, Mogens Lykketoft, spells disaster for immigrants and workers in Denmark. On his appointment as party leader, without any real challenge, he made a statement that social democracy now "accepts the main policy" of the bourgeois government in relation to what in Denmark is called "foreigners".

Lykketoft doesnât want any conflict with the government on the question of the racist measures against immigrants and asylum seekers. And this at a time when compromise with the racist government only can end in disaster.

Lykketoft especially invited the government to hold out a hand to social democracy in favour of a more effective policy for integration. He also "confessed" that Nyrup Rasmussenâs government was too late in dealing with the "problems". This is said to have been the result of a divided leadership and government where several important politicians wanted to fight the racist campaign of the bourgeois parties.

Sad to say, with the election of Lykketoft, it looks like social democracy in Denmark will unite behind the racist government. Danish workers, immigrants and the left must change course! They must put up sharp resistance to Fogh Rasmussenâs racist measures. A campaign of civil disobedience among union members involved in implementing the new laws could be an effective weapon.

If Danish workers donât fight this government, and refuse to listen to all talk about the dangerous "foreigners", especially from Muslim countries, they will soon realise that they are also a part of Fogh Rasmussenâs plans for a "different" Denmark. There will inevitably be attacks against wages, working conditions etc.

All in all, to paraphrase a famous line from Shakespeare, there is something rotten in the Danish left. The time for resistance is now!

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