European democracy deferred: de Gaulle and the Dehousse Plan, 1960

Abstract

This article examines the first debate within the European Economic Community (EEC) over democracy following the Treaty of Rome. The treaty called for the newly created European Parliament to draw up a proposal for direct, transnational parliamentary elections. A plan in 1960 led by Fernand Dehousse emerged as the consensus choice. Charles de Gaulle, however, opposed the plan and succeeded in defeating it. We see during the1960 debate over the Dehousse Plan competing interpretations of democracy in European unity that still frame the issue today. At stake was the democratic character of the new EEC as well as the proper role of the public in the uniting of Europe. Should the public vote on matters of European integration via transnational parliamentary elections, national referendums or neither? By analytically reconstructing the key participants’ democratic worldviews, the article contributes to developing a deeper understanding of the debate over direct elections to the European Parliament, a fuller comprehension of the early life of the Treaty of Rome and a sharper realisation of the essential interconnectedness of the development of the EEC and the resumption of national democracy in post-WWII Western Europe.     

The Wages of Collaboration: the German food crisis 1939–1945 and the supplies from Denmark

The problem of limited food supplies left its mark on Germany and the Nazi regime during World War II. The Germans faced diminishing food rations and to a great extent had to rely on supplies from occupied Europe. To a small state like Denmark, with its precarious geo-political position, this turned out to be crucial. Thanks to its advanced agricultural production and fisheries and a generous German price policy, Germany was able to extract a maximum of food from Denmark without damaging the structure of Danish agricultural production. Deliveries culminated in 1943–1945, as Denmark supplied German big cities with 14% of their consumption of meat and pork and more than 20% of the Wehrmacht’s consumption, while Danish butter constituted nearly 9% of consumption in big cities and as much as one third of the Wehrmacht’s consumption during the same period. On this account, Denmark obtained a certain political freedom of action. In internal reports, German authorities in Copenhagen and in the Foreign Ministry repeatedly pointed to the fact that any attempt at changing the occupation regime in Denmark would rid Denmark of its democratically based government and jeopardize the abundant food supplies to Germany. The article argues that Danish food supplies to Germany provided the main reason why democratic Denmark was allowed to maintain its political system despite the German occupation.     

Perspectives on democratic consolidation in Southern Africa: The five general elections of 2004

Huntingdon's ‘third wave’ of democracy came late to Africa, but five countries held general elections in 2004, providing an opportunity to reflect on degrees of democratic consolidation in the region. African political dynamics are considered in relation to the political and economic environment together with national, ethnic and regional identities and the way in which these may influence democratic consolidation. The electoral systems of the five countries are considered in relation to the dominant party effect. The course and outcomes of the five elections are examined in relation to indicators of participation and competition suggested by Lindberg. The latter's indicators of legitimacy are considered in relation to more detailed analysis of each election in its national context, paying attention to the influence of ethnic, regional and other divisions on outcomes, which are mapped. Major procedural flaws prevented democratic consolidation in Mozambique and hindered it in Malawi, where the party system also proved unstable. South Africa, Namibia and Botswana satisfied most of the criteria apart from turnover and provide convincing evidence of the institutionalisation and acceptance of democracy, albeit qualified by the continuing dominance of their governing parties. In all five countries the equation of democracy with socio-economic benefits threatens disillusionment in the face of poverty and inequality.     

Front and Back Covers,Volume 37, Number 2. April 2021

Front and back cover caption, volume 37 issue 2 Front cover THE CAPITOL INSURRECTION Thousands of people marched toward the US Capitol building on 6 January 2021. The rally that day was part of an attempt to overturn the outcome of the presidential election. The attempted coup was carried out by multiple means. While the violent attack on the Capitol building that day has captured the world's attention, attempts to undermine democratic processes in the United States have a longer, more insidious history, including multiple forms of voter suppression, some of which are built into the system. The US has never been a direct democracy. In fact, in 2000 and 2016, candidates who lost the popular vote ‘won’ the election. The 2020 presidential election was perhaps outstanding because the unabashed attempts to disenfranchise voters – primarily minority voters – were suddenly on full display. The losing candidate tried to strong-arm state election officials into fraudulently changing the vote count and pressured the vice president to overturn the lawful outcome of the elections – all of which happened in full view of the public. When it became clear that the vice president would not undermine the election result, the losing candidate called on his supporters to come to Washington, DC to demonstrate their belief that the election had been stolen from him and from them. The ensuing violent attack on the Capitol building was a spectacular display of a larger failed attempt at a coup. In this issue, Gregory Starrett and Joyce Dalsheim narrate their eye witness fieldwork accounts of the ‘March to save America’ rally earlier on that fateful day. Back cover THE MYANMAR COUP On 2 March 2021, police shot Kyal Sin, a 19-year-old protester, in the head from behind with live ammunition while she was engaged in peaceful civil disobedience in Mandalay against the Myanmar military, which seized control through a violent coup on 1 February. The artwork depicts Kyal Sin, whose name means ‘pure star’, as one of the martyrs of the democracy movement. Prior to attending the rally, Kyal Sin had posted on Facebook her wish for her organs to be donated should she die during the protest. Since the coup, millions of civilians across Myanmar have taken to the streets in protest. Civil servants, along with the general public, have participated in a nationwide strike. In response, the military have fired weapons into crowds of peaceful protesters, engaged in extrajudicial killings, raided civilian homes and businesses, kidnapped and illegally detained protesters, strikers, political and civil society leaders, tortured detainees and terrorized countless other civilians. In this issue, Seinenu M. Thein-Lemelson reviews the history of violence and persecution perpetrated by the Myanmar military against participants in the Burmese democracy movement. The persecution of activists has included repression of their cultural and ritual life. The democracy movement possesses its own list of saints, martyrs (azarni) and heroes (thuyegaung). Between 1988 and 2012, keeping photographs or artistic depictions of these martyrs and heroes constituted an illegal act. During that time, owning or publishing this artwork of Kyal Sin could have resulted in imprisonment and torture. Indeed, even now the Myanmar military is so concerned about her martyrdom that they exhumed her body and filled her grave with cement. When Kyal Sin was shot, she was wearing a black T-shirt emblazoned with the words: ‘Everything will be OK’, revealing a youthful hope and innocence. This sense of child-like purity has deepened the poignancy and loss felt by all those who mourn her death. Kyal Sin's nickname was ‘Angel’ and a halo hovers above her head. She holds the Myanmar flag, shredded with bullet holes, in her left hand. Behind her are the outlines of other protesters or perhaps past martyrs of the movement, giving the three-fingered salute, in approval and solidarity.     

Positioning in the Cold War – Swedish and Danish History Textbooks and the Totalitarianism Doctrine. Historical Cultures in Comparison

The Nordic countries Sweden and Denmark have a long and intertwined history. The Second World War, though, formed different experiences in the two countries that led to diverging paths in the Cold War. Denmark became a member of North Atlantic Treaty Organization, while Sweden stayed non-aligned. Thus, it can be assumed that Denmark was more likely to adopt Western foreign policies and doctrines than Sweden. Or was it? On a programmatic political level this may have been the case, but what about cultural perceptions developed in Swedish and Danish ‘minds of men’? Is there a tension between les évenéments and les longues durées?

The underlying assumption in this article is that there is a contradiction and a tension between the programmatic political level and historically-inherited enemy images, and that this tension may be studied through the concept of totalitarianism and its position in the historical cultures of Sweden and Denmark in the post-war era. The totalitarianism doctrine was one of the main ideological weapons during the Cold War, serving as a basis for the Truman doctrine. It implies that Nazism and Soviet communism shared common features and may be subsumed under the same label. But would a Dane find it reasonable to view the Red Army, which belonged to the Allies which liberated his or her country, as of ‘the same kind’ as the German occupants? And would it make sense to a Swede to stay neutral to Soviet Russia, the historical enemy? The one who for a Swede is ‘the other’ might for a Dane appear as a historical ally.

The empirical sources are history textbooks for senior secondary school students, studied as artefacts of national historical cultures.     

The Millennial of Castile (1943): the historical culture of Spanish Fascism

The creation of new symbols and historical myths were common practices of nationalist politics, especially in Fascist regimes. In 1943 the Franco regime organized the most impressive historical commemoration celebrated in post-war Spain: the Milenario of Castile. With its heterogeneous mixture of history and spectacle, the Milenario of Castile was by far the greatest historical commemoration promoted by the State during the 1940s. Taking the commemoration of the Milenario as a case study, this article examines the historical culture of Spanish Fascism, as well as the attempts of the Falangist intellectual elite to impose a concrete national narrative in post-war Spain. At the same time, the article analyses the historical discourses and aesthetics displayed throughout the commemoration, underlining its Fascist character, and consequently the transnational dimension of the Fascist politics of the past. Finally, the article reflects on the scope and limits of the process of Fascistisation in Franco's dictatorship, especially in its commemorative culture.     

Golden age,apathy or stealth? Democratic engagement in Britain, 1945–1950

This article revisits democratic engagement in post-war Britain in a context of debates about political disaffection in the current period. The study systematically reanalysed volunteer writing in the Mass Observation Archive and represents a significant methodological advance on previous studies. Little evidence was found to support common existing interpretations: whether ‘golden age’ narratives of deference to authority, partisan alignment and high voter turnout or revisionist accounts of apathy. Instead, evidence was found of something akin to what Hibbing and Theiss-Morse call ‘stealth democracy’. Citizens thought democracy to be important and felt a duty to vote, but wished for government by experts in the national interest. This ‘stealth’ interpretation builds on existing studies of duty, populism and expertise in twentieth-century Britain. It helps to move discussion of democratic engagement after the Second World War beyond the binaries of self/collective and private/public, and to explain the paradox of high voter turnout in a context of hostility to party politics. It also promises to inform debates about declining political support in the current period.     

Structures and Agency: a transnational comparison of the struggle for women's suffrage in the Nordic countries during the long 19th century

This article is a transnational comparison of the struggle for women's suffrage during the long 19th century, mainly around 1900, with an emphasis on the five Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden). The article questions the widespread notion of these countries as similar democratic and peaceful nations, different from the rest of Europe. It points to the timing of women's suffrage and to how the claim for this reform challenged the gendered meaning of political citizenship as well as core elements in the understandings of masculinity and femininity. It proceeds to analyse important structural changes that have been seen as vehicles for women's suffrage: the growth of democracy, the construction of nation states, revolutions and wars, asking if these structures played as important a role in the Nordic countries as elsewhere. Finally, the article concentrates on women's agency, mobilization and organization, looking for similarities and differences among the five Nordic countries.     

Australian Democracy: Modifying Majoritarianism?

The use of the single transferable vote (STV) for Australian Senate elections since 1949 has modified the majoritarianism of Australian democracy in two ways. First, it has increased the differences between the two houses of the legislature and hence strengthened the bicameral system. Second, it has operated like a true PR (proportional representation) system, and it has therefore increased the overall proportionality of political representation at the national level. In modern democracies, PR does not have negative effects on the quality of macroeconomic policy-making-contrary to the conventional wisdom on this matter. And PR has a strong positive effect on important democratic qualities like women's representation, income equality, voter turnout, satisfaction with democracy, and the proximity of the government to the median voter.     

Introduction: not a normal election: roots and consequences

The March 2018 Italian general elections can be described as a historic turning point, another watershed moment in the turbulent history of contemporary Italian politics. After a stormy and complex legislative term, characterized by a variety of institutional and political phenomena, Italy has faced one of the most important electoral challenges since the return of democracy in the mid-1940s. After examining the major political events that led to the latest general elections, this introductory article presents and analyses the rules, the actors and the outcomes of the electoral contest that has seen the victory of two anti-establishment parties: the Five Star Movement and the League. In the concluding section, the article discusses the potential tensions that may emerge from the clash between the populist attitude of the new governing parties and the constitutional constraints of a liberal democratic regime.     

THE VIETNAM WAR

This article investigates the role of the Vietnam War in Danish and Norwegian politics. We argue that Danish and Norwegian membership in NATO and an unstable parliamentary situation may explain why these countries, unlike Sweden, did not take on the lead in the international protest against the war. Non‐socialistic coalitions came to power in Norway and Denmark in the latter half of the 1960s which to an extent explains why the social democratic parties in both countries became more critical of the US. By the end of the 1960s, foreign policy as well as public attitudes towards the war converged in Denmark, Sweden and Norway, and in all three countries powerful protest movements emerged that were remarkably similar. The Vietnam War strengthened the left in general and promoted a leftist politics of solidarity that influenced Swedish, Danish and Norwegian foreign policy‐making of the 1970s.     

Zionism and Irish Nationalism: Ideology and Identity on the Borders of Europe

This paper is a comparative cultural history of Zionism and Irish nationalism, focusing on themes of race, gender and identity. It seeks to highlight the strong similarities of both nationalist projects: to show how Zionists and Irish nationalists were both heavily invested in state-building projects that would disprove European racist stereotypes about their respective nations and yet, paradoxically, were also part of the general history of European nationalism. Both Zionism and Irish nationalism sought to create idealised images of the past and claimed to be rebuilding a glorious ancient society in the future as a means of escaping a degraded present. Both movements saw language revival as a key means of carrying out this ‘return to history’. And both emphasised martyrdom as a way to build up prideful ideals of devotion to the nation and used sport, militaries and agriculture as forms of nationalist social engineering. Despite their claims to the contrary, neither national movement was truly unique.     

Ambivalent patriotism: Jacob Aall and Dano‐Norwegian identity before 1814

Abstract. Like many Norwegian elite, Jacob Aall (1773–1844) lived between two national identities – Norwegian and Danish. On the one hand, he was a subject of the Danish crown, educated in Denmark in the refinements of European knowledge and high culture; on the other he was a loyal provincial son of Norway, engaged in building the political and economic autonomy of his homeland. This article examines the two sides of national identity in Jacob Aall's life and work by focusing on the evolution in his understanding of the concept of the Norwegian nation. It argues that the patriotism central to Aall's understanding of modernity and the coming‐to‐age of Norway contains two disparate, but equally necessary sides. The one is characterised by an abiding sentiment of national romantic cultural belonging, the other is a learned commitment to the Enlightenment utilitarian principles that gave force to the Norwegian national movement.     

Hebrews and phoenicians: An ancient historical image and its usage

The modern nation-state is the most common, and so far the most stable, vehicle for modern democracy. The case of Zionism offers a unique opportunity for inquiring into this connection since mainstream Zionism consciously founded its institutions on the premise that democracy and the national state are mutually dependent. Moreover, ever since the early days of Zionism, opposing plans to separate the two—a non-democratic national state and a non-national democratic state—have been, and still are, hotly debated. This article surveys the origins of these ideas and argues that, both politically and theoretically, neither the party of non-democratic nationalism nor the party of non-national democracy offers a viable or even coherent plan. It would seem that non-national democracy will subvert democracy as well as nationalism, and non-democratic nationalism will undermine the national as well as the democratic character of the state.     

The Bullock Report on Industrial Democracy and the Post-War Consensus

The post-war settlement among the policy elite is central to much historical literature. This article considers the rise and fall of the idea of ‘industrial democracy’, and its relationship to this settlement. The elite failed to respond coherently to claims for workplace democracy. The notion that politicians could work with ‘the unions’ and ‘industry’ was shown to be deficient. The unions contained numerous views, many hostile to industrial democracy in the form proposed by Bullock and the TUC. Industry was almost uniformly antagonistic. The notion of consensus ostensibly underpinned the attempts of Labour and Conservative politicians to progress this issue. In truth, this was a curious approach. The debate over Bullock was, at root, an argument over whether the owners of capital should cede some of their power in favour of organised labour. There was never likely to be agreement on this. The inconclusive debate over Bullock ultimately showed how fragile the consensus was. The political elite could not forever smooth over underlying disagreements between capital and labour, or between groups of workers with differing interests.     

民主党派与抗日战争时期的民主宪政运动

民主党派在抗日战争时期参与的民主宪政运动极大地推进了抗日战争时期中国政治民主化进程,深刻影响了未来中国政治发展的走向。追求民主政治的强烈意愿是民主党派参与民主宪政运动的根本动因;国民党的独裁专制统治是其参与民主宪政运动的直接原因;国内外要求民主的强烈呼声是其参与民主宪政运动的外在动力;共产党的引领和帮助是其参与民主宪政运动的重要条件。民主党派经过民主宪政运动的历练,日渐成为中国政治舞台上一支不容忽视的力量;民主党派经过民主宪政运动的实践,对民主的理解更为深刻,对国民党蒋介石的本质认识得更加清楚;民主宪政运动是共产党与民主党派合作共事的成功实践,为革命胜利后中国共产党领导的多党合作和政治协商制度莫定了基础。     

Pacifying War Heritage: Patterns of Cosmopolitan Nationalism at a Danish Battlefield Site

Former battlefields are often held to be important nodes in national iconographies. This article offers an analysis of a Danish battlefield site which has historically been taken to epitomise fervently ethnic national qualities. The article traces significant shifts in the ways its relevance has been and currently is being imagined and expressed. The heritage and commemorative practices conducted here are analysed as an ongoing symbolic struggle between ‘civic’ and ‘ethnic’ conceptions of nation. It is argued that a third mode of identification, termed ‘cosmopolitan nationalism’, seems to be on the rise here. In such an understanding, the war site becomes ‘pacified’, i.e. symbolically associated with qualities of peace‐keeping and humanitarianism. Importantly, however, such agendas do not simply erase the site’s national significance but are analysed, rather, as re‐imbuing the site with a new strand of Danishness—now taken to entail cosmopolitan and reconciliatory values.     

British Conservative Opinion and the Problem of Germany after the First World War

This work examines British conservative attitudes towards the Weimar Republic through the lens of several specific issues from the armistice up to the Ruhr Crisis of 1923. The author argues that a curious feature of British conservative opinion following the First World War was the consistent hostility British conservatives demonstrated towards the new German democratic state. To be sure, Great Britain had just fought a long and costly war against Germany, and there had been little time for the passions generated by the war to cool. Still, from the early days of the political changes in October and November of 1918, the German government was firmly committed to democratic principles. This was a development that the British nation claimed to favour, but the war left many British conservatives ill disposed to consider that the ‘inner change’ in Germany might be genuine or that a stable German democracy was possible. During its formative years, the Weimar Republic faced enormous challenges that would have tested any nation. Yet, even as political and economic conditions within Germany undermined prospects for democracy to succeed in that country, many British conservatives declined to take these developments seriously. Indeed, the attitudes of British conservatives substantially added to the difficulties the German government faced in dealing with the problems of the post-war world.     

Ordinary anti-Fascism? Italy and the fall of Fascism, 1943–1945

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the immediate years after the fall of the Fascist regime from 1943 through the end of World War II. It asks: What did the Italians make of Fascism and its role in the country’s history as they witnessed the demise of the regime? How should we assess the nature of their anti-Fascist reactions at the time? Does the post-war conflation of Resistance and Liberation with anti-Fascism adequately represent their experience? Drawing on personal diaries written during 1943–1945, the article specifically examines three key temporal moments: the downfall of Mussolini on 25 July 1943, the armistice of 8 September 1943 and Italy’s proclamation of war against Germany on 13 October 1943. The article’s ultimate goal is to bring out the meanings that emerge out of the lifeworld of ordinary citizens in interaction with official narratives.     

The Price of Goodness: Everyday Nationalist Narratives in Denmark

Abstract: One of the most important political issues in Denmark today is the new upsurge of nationalism. This reached its height at the two latest general elections in Denmark, which in many ways struck the left with surprise and shock. The purpose of this paper is to try to make sense of this situation. The paper falls into four parts. After introducing the problem and contextualizing it in the “new” Europe, we provide a short presentation of the theory, methodology and analytical strategy behind the article. In the third section, we identify two conflicting discourses in current Danish debates on this issue. In the fourth section, we argue that in order to understand the present situation, a much more differentiated understanding of nationalism and its (re‐)construction in everyday life is needed. Here such an understanding is pursued on the basis of an interview analysis of narrative constructions of nationalism conducted in a medium‐sized Danish town. This, finally, is taken as the background for discussing the present advancement of nationalism in Denmark as interference between particular and more “universal” factors.