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Battered rightist government faces ies to private companies and maintain the social security net, when more and more companies are going bankrupt and there is a growing army of the unemployed demanding benefits. In the present conditions, to try to continue such a policy stormy seas in Denmark COPENHAGEN - "It was a totally pointless election," head of the Danish employers association Hans Skov Christensen said, expressing the disappointment of business circles about the January 10 Danish general elections. [For a detailed breakdown of the Danish election results, see IV, No 45, January 30, 1984]
In the days preceding the elections, the stock market soared, in response to polls that showed the Conservative Party doubling its seats and the rightist coalition government getting a safe majority.
The stock market settled back into its old rut when it became clear that a record turnout of voters had saved the Social Democrats from the disastrous defeat that had seemed to be in store for them.
The two parties to the left of the Social Democracy, the Socialist People's Party and the Left Socialists maintained both their popular vote and their number of seats.
The Conservatives did gain, but mostly at the expense of the other bourgeois parties. The biggest loser was the Progress Party, headed up by the anti-tax demagogue Mogens Glistrup, who was jailed not long before the elections for tax fraud. This party was deeply divided, with the majority of its deputies refusing to vote for the government's austerity budget. They wanted even deeper cuts in government spending ahe he or of her ting.
The next biggest loser was the Center Democrats, a member of the ruling coalition. The head of this party, Erhard Jacobsen, specialized in attacks against teachers, day-care workers, radio journalists and even pastors, whom he has accused of using their pulpits to spread socialism.
Conservative Party leader and premier Poul Schlueter called the elections when he failed to get a majority in parliament for his 1984 budget. In October 1982, the Social Democrats allowed him to form a minority government that was able to survive only with the support of the Progress Party and the Left Liberals. In the January 10 elections, on the basis of a late recount that turned on less than 100 votes, the coalition managed to get a bare one seat majority.
In 1983, Schlueter's budget was passed with Social Democrat votes. He used this helping hand from the Social Democrats to put a 4 percent ceiling on wage in26 creases, cut social security and freeze unemployment. He also broke a threemonth-long dockers strike by means of police violence and prosecution of the
During the fall of 1983, there was increasing pressure on the Social Democratic leadership from trade-union officials, antiwar activists and party branches demanding that the party do something to
Schlueter government down. This pressure was focused on the point that the Social Democrats at least should not vote for Schlueter's budget again, if with contradictory demands from the Left Liberals, who wanted fewer cuts in social spending, and the Progress Party, which wanted more, Schlueter chose to yield to the Left Liberals, since he realized that this time the Social Democrats might not come to his rescue. On the basis of favorable polls, he planned after the elections to drop his alliance with the Progress Party and work only with the Left Liberals.
After some hesitation and wrangling in the leadership, the Social Democrats decided to yield to the pressure from the ranks and vote against the budget, for the first time in fifty years.
The government parties and the Left Liberals accused the Social Democrats of playing a spoilers role, undermining the stability of the country without offering a real alternative. that a lot of voters bought this line. Moreover, Schlueter tried to claim personal credit for the effects of the beginning international economic upturn.
Nonetheless, the premier gained at best a hairline majority for his 1984 budget. In this situation, he will be under very strong pressure to negotiate with the Social Democrats. The Schlueter government seems to have run out of steam. What is more, if the economic upturn falters in the fall and undermines the cabinet's economic "stabilization," the government will be very weak indeed.
The election campaign highlighted the Social Democrats' lack of perspectives in a period when the capitalist economy has gone into a prolonged general decline. The economic bases for "socially balanced" management of the capitalist economy and state are disintegrating. It is no longer possible both to give subsidleads to a pyramiding of government debt.
This crisis of government finances has hit the Danish model "welfare state" very hard. And it has hit the chief political exponent of this policy, the Social Democrats, at least as hard.
present crisis demands more consistent solutions, either drastic attacks on the welfare state and the workers real wages, or workers power and economy planning. The Social Democrats, however, are unwilling to take either path. They are afraid to mobilize the working class against Schlueter and his big business backers. But they are also afraid of cutting social spending and wages too much, for fear that the workers would turn away from them, looking for a more left-wing alternative.
This contradiction was illustrated in the very contradictory campaign waged by the Social Democrats. The party leaders would raise loud cries of "Stop Conservatism." Then, the next minute, they would reassure the journalists of the capitalist press and business people that they would of course cut government spending, only in a more "justly and socially balanced way."
The only thing the Social Democrats were consistent about was appealing to the workers to rally around them and turn away from the parties to their left. Their appeals, however, went unheeded. The Social Democrats did not win away votes from the Socialist People's Party and the Left Socialists. They were saved by those who had abstained in the previous elections.
While both the People's Socialists and Left Socialists held their vote, the election was a catastrophe for Denmark's philo-Soviet Communist Party. In the last general elections, the CP got 1 percent. This time it got only 0.7 percent, 23,000 votes.
The acolytes of Peking and Tirana also did badly. The former Maoists of the Communist Workers Party were unable even to collect the 20,000 signatures needed to get on the ballot. Having gone through a number of splits and crises, this party hardly does any public work now.
The pro-Albanian DKP-ML, however, got on the ballot for the first time and got 975 votes.
The Socialist Workers Party (SAP), Danish section of the Fourth International, got about 2,000 votes, about as many as in the previous election. The
International Viewpoint 13 February 1984
SAP suffered this time from a number of handicaps. Many people who sympathize with our politics vote for the People's Socialists or the Left Socialists, since they do not expect us to top the 2 percent threshold for representation. This tendency was strengthened this time because the polls indictated that the Left Socialist vote would drop below 2 percent, and they appealed to left voters to keep them in parliament. The Left Socialists do not have a political program but argue in various ways for socialist revolution.
Moreover, in this election the Left Socialists took a less sectarian line than usual. Among other things, they took a position advocated by the SAP, calling for a united campaign of the workers parties and trade unions against Schlueter.
The results of the elections point up the need for the unity of the working class parties, including more discussion between the Left Socialists and the SAP.
The Social Democrats still have most of the opposition seats in parliament. And they have repeatedly shown that ready to compromise with Schlueter, if they are not subjected to strong pressure from outside the parliament, by antiwar demonstrations, tradestrikes and appeals from
It is this sort of social pressure that movement will resume the offensive. The polls show that a majority of the population supports the anti-missiles movement and the fight for a shorter workweek. In of the working class have gained experience in political demonstrations and strikes. can achieve unity and appeal to the supporters of these movements and the Social Democrats' mass base, Denmark will soon see new mass demonstrations against the government's rightist policies. new parliamentary crises will be inevit-
New Portugese abortion law step forward for women's rights On January 27, 1984, Portuguese women held a vigil outside parliament where the deputies were discussing a new law on abortion proposed by the ruling Socialist
The proposal was supported by the Communist Party, the Union of the Left for Socialist Democracy and the Portuguese Democratic Movement. The Socialist Party's coalition partners, the Social Democratic Party were opposed, although their youth organisation was in support.
The new law, which legalises abortion in cases of rape, malformation of
Fourth Internationalist youth summer camp During the last three years youth organisations in solidarity with the Fourth International have been formed in almost every European country.
This year they are organising a joint summer camp for several hundred young people from July 19-30. This camp has already been supported by: the Roter Maulwurf circles in Germany, the supporters of Revolution in Great Britain, the Jeunesses Socialistes Revolutionnaires of Switzerland, Rebel from the Netherlands, the Jeunesses Communistes Revolutionnaires of France, cireles in Italy, the Jeune Garde Socialiste in Belgium, the Barricada circles from the Spanish state, Ungosocialisterna in Sweden, the youth circles of the
Revolucionario in Portugal, of the Gruppe Revolutionaere Marxisten in Austria and the Ligue Communiste Revolutionnaire in Luxem-
Other youth organisations from Australia, the United States and Japan, the Antilles, etc., will be invited.
The camp will take place in Germany in the midst of a forest area. It will be an opportunity for an exchange of experience and debates with other currents active in the youth movement: ecologists, young Christians and socialists and immigrant groups.
It will not be a political education school but a meeting place open to young people active in the anti-missiles and antiwar movement, anti-racist activity, solidarity campaigns with Poland and Central America, the women's movement and young people's campaigns. It will be a camp for leisure and relaxation - swimming, sports, etc. It will also be for cultural exchange with music groups, theatre, films, photo exhibitions, etc. International Viewpoint 13 February 1984
Each day will be organised around a particular theme: the anti-war movement, exploitation of the Third World, solidarity with El Salvador and Nicaragua, anti-bureaucratic movement in Eastern Europe, anti-racist activities, the struggles against women's oppression, youth struggles against austerity, for the right to education and jobs, open access radios, alternative press, the soldiers movement....The debates will be in the form of lectures, round table discussions, workshops, with a part in simultaneous translation, and with numerous
In general the political forums will be organised in the morning, the afternoon being kept for relaxation and exchange of information and the evening for cultural
On Saturday July 29, there will be a grand closing day with Ernest
Accomodation will be organised in tents grouped in villages, and food prepared by one team for all the participants. Everything possible has been done to keep down costs and make the camp accessible to young people despite the economic crisis.
But the cost of transport and the stay are still high for young workers and students who do not have high or regular
For this reason the participating youth organisations will be organising fund-raising activities - collections, socials, sponsored walks, etc. - to make it possible to send more young comrades to the camp. The members of the Fourth International and the readers of International Viewpoint will want to be the first to contribute to their efforts.
the foetus or danger to the physical or mental health of the mother, was ap proved by 132 votes for and 102 against. A further proposal by the Communist Party that would have added a 'social clause' , i.e. to allow abortion in cases of economic or social hardship, was rejected. The time limit is fixed at twelve weeks.
The only previous time that the ques tion of abortion has been discussed in parliament was in November 12, 1982 when a proposal by the Communist Party along similar lines to the position this time around, was de-
The campaign to legalise abortion in Portugal has continued campaign over ten years ago in protest at the prosecution of Maria Conceiao and others for having had or helped to obtain abortions. The law then in force, which dated from 1886, stated that abortion was a crime and in all cases punishable by two to eight years in prison.
It is this law - which forced Portguese women into 200,000 backstreet abortions per year and thus 2,000 deaths - that the Catholic hierarchy continued to defend when in January the Archbishop of Lisbon called on Catholics not to vote for 'parties and personalities favourable to abortion'.
Although the new law is far from guaranteeing Portuguese women the right to choose, it nevertheless represents a certain victory.
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