Norway before and after the election: business as usual

There is a general election taking place in Norway today. The result is already known: they won, we lost. The Socialist position is that 'all political parties are but the expression of class interests' and, those contesting
are in the business of protecting the status quo.

The largest of them is the Labour Party, who, after a brief flirtation with
Moscow in the early twenties, embraced conventional reformism thoroughly.
Remarkably, given that they have over fifty years of government experience still
claim to hold 'a vision of a just world without poverty, in peace and ecological
balance, where people are free and equal and have influence on the conditions
affecting their lives'. They are part of the current 'centre-left' governing alliance.

The much younger, smaller, and mis-named Democrats profess to be what they
are not. The thoroughly democratic Socialist Party, by way of contrast, has never had let alone wanted a leader, knowing that working class emancipation necessarily excludes the role of political leadership.

The Progress Party's ideological father is Anders Lange, a campaigner
for low taxes and a supporter of apartheid-era South Africa! The
Socialist Party has since its inception in 1904 claimed that the establishment
of a classless world 'will involve the emancipation of all mankind, without
distinction of race or sex'. With regard to taxation, it is our contention that the burden of payment falls on the propertied class and profits.

The Conservative Party has as one of its policies to increase the number of
policemen/women. Great! More jobs for the working class! But viewing
working for a wage as a form of prostitution, the Socialist Party want a world
of unemployment. And one without police or law. Marx is worth remembering
here:
"The criminal moreover produces the whole of the police and of criminal
justice, constables, judges, hangmen, juries, etc; and all these different lines
of business, which form equally many categories of the social division of
labour, develop different capacities of the human spirit, create new needs and
new ways of satisfying them. Torture alone has given rise to the most ingenious
mechanical inventions, and employed many honourable craftsmen in the
production of its instruments."

The Christian Democrats are against abortion, and clearly have not read an
essay titled "Pro-life" hypocrites.

The Coast Party wants to keep all resources in Norway, along with key
industries etc. in Norwegian hands. This is, of course, utterly irrelevant to
the interests of the working class: wage slavery will continue whether the
means of production and distribution are owned by 'natives' or not. Has the new ruling class of native black capitalists in South Africa ended crass exploitation? No! That the Coast Party is anti-immigration should come as no surprise.

The Green Party have yet to learn that pollution, like war, is endemic to the
profit system.

Another minor group, the Pensioners' Party, is all in favour of prisons. UK
readers may recall the soundbite tough on crime and the causes of crime. Well,
as one Socialist Standard article on this subject stated Whichever side of the law you're on, whether you're in or out of jail, if you're poor there is one sound-bite that will always ring true: Tough on you.

Norges Patriotene, a name which does not require translation, are marching
alongside other far right parties such as the BNP, the Front National and Vlaams Belang.

Red are state capitalists who have recently absorbed the Workers' Communist Party. Much can be said about the WCP, but the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten's headline from the 28th August 2005 probably cannot be
bettered: "They worshiped Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot".

The Centre Party are actually a left of centre group and coalition members of
the present government alongside the Labour Party and Left Socialists. The CP
want, among other things, Norwegian soldiers to desist from travelling the
world, meeting interesting new people and killing them. The only conflict the
Socialist Party supports is the class war.

Venstre, despite their name which translates as left, are a Liberal Party,
favour a minimum wage. This of course means minimum wages for us - and maximum
profits for them.

The Socialist Left Party, part of the centre left alliance, apparently want
a world without class differences. Here, like their fellow reformists in the Labour Party, they are being utterly Utopian.

These parties, like others elsewhere, seek to con us into continuing to ride their reformist bandwagon. Workers of the world wake up and embark on the revolutionary road to a world of free access!