Taking a right turn
We had local elections, and once again Icelanders are voting in parties who have proven, time and time again, that they are out to exploit.
One of the main questions I am examining in my upcoming book The Shape of Silence is how—or, rather, why—Icelanders keep voting for people or parties that have proven over and over again that they are in politics not to serve their constituents but primarily their own cronies, families and financial backers.
This question has again come into focus after this weekend’s local elections, which revealed a sharp shift to the right across the country, with the uncontested winner in most localities being the Independence Party.
Reykjavík, Iceland’s largest and most impactful municipality, has for many years been a stronghold of left-leaning parties, in particular the Social Democrats (Samfylkingin). Not after this weekend. The Independence Party won there by a landslide on Saturday. A coalition is pending, that may or may not include the far-right Centrist Party—remember, the ones that have been surreptitiously flirting with MAGA.
In truth, the result was not fully unexpected, at least not in Reykjavík. The Social Democrats have made some, erm, questionable decisions in the last several years, and I get why people were getting irritated. Personally I found their policy of þéttingu byggðar, increasing the population density in Reykjavík, more than a little misguided. I get the point—they want more people in a smaller area to save on transport costs, road maintenance and other infrastructure, but the way they went about it was bizarre. They gave out lots that were right on high-traffic thoroughfares on which developers built high-end apartments that few could afford, many of which—and this boggles the ol’grey matter—had no parking facilities. Sure, the future vision was to have this new public transport network called Borgarlína making it so people wouldn’t need cars … but the key word here is future. Right now getting around the Reykjavík area by public transport is an undertaking that few Reykjavík residents are keen to engage in, given that a ten-minute car ride can take an hour or more by bus. Consequently Reykjavík now has a) far more traffic than even two years ago and it is increasing, b) a sh*tload of unsold properties, because even if someone were to scrape together the funds, space in a below-ground parking garage can cost an additional ISK 40,000 (USD 325) a month, and there is no parking on the street anywhere nearby (see: thoroughfare).
So the movement to the right may have simply been a vote for change—any change. What is alarming is that it involves this shift to the right with all its hostile-to-humanity policies.
The implications on the national level, meanwhile
… May or may not be significant, but are worth looking at.
We are currently one year into a term led by the Social Democratic Party after it won big in the last elections and formed a coalition with the Reform Party (Viðreisn) and the People’s Party (Flokkur Fólksins). All three parties are headed by women, and the coalition is definitely left-leaning. Their promise, among other things, has been to wrest power from the hands of the elite and distribute our collective wealth and resources more equitably—which is the opposite of what the parties that won so big this last weekend stand for.
Many commentators now fear that last weekend’s results bode ill for the current government. Incidentally, this is only the second time the Independence Party has not been in a position of power since the founding of the Republic of Iceland in 1944. The other time was right after the economic collapse in 2008, which happened on their watch. Some are going so far as to predict that the referendum on whether or not Iceland should continue accession talks with the EU will be felled, and that these parties will be ousted in the next national elections.
