This winter has been eventful here in Iceland to say the least. The recession activated a new force in our country, a force of activism, a powerful hunger for justice, and the longing to understand how things could go so utterly wrong.
In early October of last year, in the immediate after math of a total financial collapse, hundreds of individuals in Iceland had had enough. Something had to be done. I could not stand the idea of watching my country slowly sinking into complete failure without at least doing something. I had heard that a man named Hörður Torfason had already started protesting at Austurvöllur, a small park in the center of Reykjavík. So I went there and talked to him, this was in the first week after the collapse and I stood there during lunch with a couple of old ladies and a few elderly men. We could not have been more than 10 at that point, a crowd that turned into thousands a few weeks later. This moment was a turning point for activism in Iceland. Without knowing, hundreds of other people, many who had never been involved in activism before, had the same feeling as I did. This was our change of making a difference, although most of us were complete strangers with different opinions on many issues, we could all agree that the current coalition of the Independents Party and Social Democrats had lost all trust and could not continue.
The Saucepan revolution was a success. Bankers who thought they could just carry on like nothing had happened were forced to resign, and politicians resigned, an event uncommon in our history. In the end the coalition was forced out of power. After months of protesting and hard work from many brave people, we had made a real difference. Let me remind you, we did this without any violence at all. Almost no one got injured, except a few dozen protestors with pepper spray in their eyes and a policeman who had to be taken to an emergency room when a rock hit his head; fortunately he had his helmet on. I don’t count a few walls covered in dairy products or the occasional broken window as violence, nor should anyone.
We now have elections coming up in a few weeks and the war is on. For me, and I suspect many others, the biggest victory was to get the Independents Party out of power, at long last. They have been in power for the last 18 years and desperately need a breake after bankrupting our country with unfiltered libertarianism straight from their friend, Milton Friedman. Mr. Friedman visited Iceland on many occasions and was personal friends with some of the most powerful people inside the Party. They were even going to make Iceland the financial capital of the world, a nation of 300 thousand people, just imagine.
After being knocked out, barely standing on their feet, the Independents Party is starting the campaign to get back into power. The message is being sent out, apparently the protests were planned by the Left-Green Party and the Social Democrats. It was all just a big conspiracy to get them out of power. The sad thing is that many people take the bait, but the truth is, no one planned the revolution, it happened because a lot of people got angry and felt betrayed. We wanted justice, but the Independents Party will never acknowledge that. It happened because of their failed policies.
One of the more popular myths is that no one protested in front of the headquarters of Baugur Group, a company which the right-wing has been trying hard to connect to the left for years. Again, to divide us up and against each other. The fact is that no one got a free card in what happened, there was a protest in front of the Baugur headquarters at least once and in many of Baugur owned companies like Bónus. No one was spared.
The Independents Party is a strange beast. It has most of its philosophy from the US’s Republican Party and wants nothing more than to make Iceland a part of the United States, the 51st State, if you will. Their complete financial policy was built on the neo conservative policies of Ronald Reagan and his like. It’s no wonder Davíð Oddsson, their old leader and former chairman of the Central Bank, has been called the last neo-con in Europe. Iceland was no longer a nordic welfare state, but an American ultra-capitalist experiment gone horribly wrong.
Another popular meme is that all of the people protesting were just leftist communist hippies who were being controlled by the left and told what to do. As you can see, these people don’t even bother coming up with their own lies. They are partially right though. Most of the people were left leaning. But it wasn’t because of some invisible communist hand directing people to protest against the Capitalists. Let’s quote Hannes H. Gissurason (the Karl Rove of Iceland), a staunch defender of the Party and a close friend to both Davíð Oddson, former PM Geir Haarde and Milton Friedman: “Voters of the Independents Party are very loyal to their leader [..] they don’t think much about politics and are rather apolitical. These are people who like to profit during the day and barbecue in the evening”. He then added that leftists liked to argue and solve problems by reading poems and have meetings. No wonder we didn’t see any Independents Party voters down at Austurvöllur this winter. They were all busy, cleaning barbecue sauce from their faces.
By Andri Sigurðsson