In fact the 13% result was a disappointment for the FrP. In the polls just before the election, the FrP was moving up towards the 20% mark - one poll even gave them more than Høyre!
In spite of their political differences, above all on the issue of Norway's relationship to the European Community, the 20 three main bourgeois parties, Høyre, the KrF (Christian Social Party), and the St
(Center Party) promised the voters a new bourgeois coalition after the elections. They also agreed that there would be no deals with the FrP. The election results gave new confidence to the smaller partners of the bloc, KrF and SP, since, for the first time in years, they stopped losing votes, or, in the case of KrF, actually gained. The big loss of votes for Høyre, on the other hand, weakens its position in relation to its partners. It will strengthen those tendencies in the party that want to pull the party closer to the FrP, and will make the negotiations for putting together a new government very difficult.
Heyday of Norwegian social democracy is passed
The elections were yet another confirmation that the heyday of Norwegian social democracy is passed. The result for the DNA was the worst since the Second World War. The main reason for the DNA's decline is the breakdown of the social democratic model of "class compromise" established after the war. With the DNA as the arbitrator, big capital and the trade unions traded rising living standards and social reform against industrial peace and modernization. The end of the long postwar boom removed the economic foundation of this policy. In Norway, the expansion of the high-profit oil industry concealed the changed situation for many years.
The massive inflow of revenue from the North Sea gave the government plenty of room for maneuver. Although successive governments have tried to implement anti-working class policies, the results have been less than in other European
International Viewpoint #171 • October 16, 1989
NORWAY • USSR
MINERS
THANK YOU ALL FOR HELPING
ME WITH PERESTROIKA, AND IF
• YOU CONTINUE
TO HELP YOU'LL
ALL BE
SHOT!
SUMMER SADAMSENA
Norways 1989 election results
%
Votes
% change
Party
Seats since 85
DNA (Social Democrats)
895,164
84.3
63
- 6.5
Hayre (Conservative)
579,036
22.2
37-
-8.2
KrF (Christian Social)
221,828
8.5
14
+ 0.5
SP (Center- farmers)
170,137
6.5
11
- 0.3
FrP (Ultra-right)
339,260
13.0
22
+ 93
SV (Left Soc. Democrat)
261,374
10.0
17
+ 4.6
V (Liberal)
83,091
3.2
- 1.8
FMS (Comm/Maolst)
21,223
0.8
0
+ 0.1
Greens
0.4
1801
SI (openly racist)
8,765
0.3
0
FAF People's Action for Finnmark
8,713
0.3