Denmark Parliamentary Election - June 18, 2015

[Gustaf]

This has probably been discussed before, but how come the Christian Democrats are so weak in Denmark compared to other Nordic countries?

[Gustaf]

Conservatives here is consistently referring to Konservative Folkeparti right?

That's a bananas campaign.

[Gustaf]

This has probably been discussed before, but how come the Christian Democrats are so weak in Denmark compared to other Nordic countries?

Some of the answers are in my write-up in the beginning of the thread.

Otherwise:

1) Small Bible Belt/few Evangelicals giving them a very small base.

2) Evangelicals being unpopular in Denmark - many stereotypes associated with the main group Inner Mission (often the bad guys in fiction and popular culture).

3) Schizophrenic party: Having moderate left wing positions on most issues, but allying with the centre-right to not frighten their core supporters in the Liberal heartland = not getting much done and not being able to reach out to potential supporters in Eastern Denmark (see also the Kornbek-Videbæk feud -described in the second post in thread). Was in an SD led government 1993-94, but has otherwise refused to be the classical swing party that could support either side - making them irrelevant. Being a very small centrist party firmly anchored on the right is not a viable position.

4) Being anti-free abortion is seen as an extremist position in Denmark. Even if the party has said it is not on the practical political agenda, and that they are working to reduce abortion numbers by social policies and information etc., many potential supporters wont vote for the party because of this.

5) Danish popular Lutheran culture is split between (the remnants of) the two old laymen movements from the 19th century - Grundtvigians and Inner Mission with the former as the big one. KD is associated with Inner Mission, which has blocked any success among the free school/folk high school Grundtvigian crowd, who are either Liberals, Social Liberals or SPP. I think a culturally Christian party with Grundtvigian roots and profile would have been more successfull (even if the actual content of the Grundtvigian tradition in the modern world is hard to define). The old Grundtvigian motto "Human first and Christian then" would have been a good starting point - and fits most of the party's actual policies

tl;dr (and simplified): The liberal tradition is stronger than the conservative in Danish Lutheranism.

Christian Democrats founded in the 70s as a protest against free porn and legal abortion (legalized by a Conservative Minster of Justice..). Forever torn between its core supporters from pietistic Inner Mission in the "Bible Belt" in Western Jutland (even in the heart of this so called Bible Belt only 5-7% are fundis) and liberal Christian greenies in the Big Smoke. Its core constituents sees themselves as solidly centre-right despite having views on welfare, environmental issues, refugees and aid to the Third World much more in line with the left, hence demanding the party always supports a Liberal government and eliminating any chance of real influence - driving more tactically minded types to despair. Copenhagen based chairman Bodil Kornbek and West Jutlandic Tv station manager Tove Videbæk tore the party apart with un-Christian vengeance. Now its led by a Conservative renegade with a DUI conviction and permanently under the threshold (while Videbæk ended up with the Conservatives and Kornbek in the Social Democrats).

(the DUI guy has since left them and is in a Danish version of the Norwegian Senterpartiet)

Thanks. I guess the more fundamental question is then why the evangelical movement wasn't more successful in Denmark to begin with.

[Gustaf]

Does anyone have an exit poll from the last election or something like that which breaks down demographics in Danish politics? Gender, occupation, etc.

[Gustaf]

Great thanks to both of you, gonna geek out a bit.

Fascinating how the class divide in Danish politics is essentially gone. Had no idea it was that extreme.

[Gustaf]

Fascinating how the class divide in Danish politics is essentially gone. Had no idea it was that extreme.

Well, the Rungsted results say otherwise.

I guess it is mostly true if you view class through traditional lenses and omit class as a cultural thing.

1) Private vs. public sector (which also includes a strong gender component) is more important than the worker/functionary divide. The private sector is blue and the public is red.

2) Income determines political  attitudes to redistribution. Note that part of the skilled workers have higher incomes than many functionaries (incl. some public sector academics).

3) If you define class a cultural thing and view an engineer with working class parents as working class etc. class explains a lot more.

...

We have two catch-all parties: Liberals, with a private sector (and Jutland) tilt and SD with a public sector tilt.

But the rest are - more or less - class based:

The Red Greens is an alliance between disadvantaged groups (incl. more workers than one might expect) and public sector employees in primarily the welfare sector. So the Red Greens is both an interest organization for poors and the ones who make a living from helping them.

DPP is a working class/cultural working class party + (mostly rural/small town) petit bourgeoisie. A small segment of old school National Conservative bourgeoisie has joined them, but it is a very limited group.

You then have four small white collar middle class parties: Liberal Alliance, Conservatives, Social Liberals and SPP. With the first two being mainly private sector and affluent and SPP being public sector and less so. SocLibs make good money as well and are the best educated.

I guess two of the three big parties not being class based makes it a non-class based system, but a least five of the eight parties have a clear class profile.

I meant more on a bloc basis - like the blue bloc getting a higher share of the working class vote than the upper class vote (under the definitions used there). I'm aware of the points you bring up about new class structures but that hasn't had much impact in other countries I'm aware of, so I was still surprised.

[Gustaf]

I   Liberal Alliance      83%

C   Konservative      69%
O   Dansk Folkeparti   68%
V   Venstre              65%

K   Kristendemokraterne   61%
A   Socialdemokraterne   57%
B   Radikale Venstre   55%

Å   Alternativet      48%
F   Socialistisk Folkeparti   44%
Ø   Enhedslisten      42%

[Gustaf]

From figures I saw before it seemed as if the class dimension was shockingly lacking in Denmark, at least as compared to Sweden, due to both Venstre and Dansk Folkeparti having such strong support among workers.

I still don't get the proliferation of left-wing parties in Denmark. If the Redgreens are the traditional far left and Alternativet is the alternative green left then what purpose does the SPP have?