Reykjavík Grapevine - 13.11.2015, Blaðsíða 14

Iceland’s Pirate Party
has topped the opinion
polls all summer.
Could they be Iceland’s
next government?
by John Rogers_
⁄⁄ Hacking Politics ⁄⁄
One or two things have changed in Ice-
landic politics during the intervening
millennium. For example, people no lon-
ger gather annually around Lögberg, the
Law Rock, at Þingvellir national park, to
hear the new laws of the land being read
out. Blasphemy is now legal (thank fuck-
ing god). And you can’t kill Basque sailors
on sight in the Westfjords these days. Af-
ter more than a thousand years, though,
democracy remains quite popular with
the Icelanders, with around 80% of Ice-
landers voting in general elections.
Now, the Alþingi might be heading
for another big moment in political his-
tory. This summer, Píratapartýið (The
Pirate Party)—a small, radically forward-
thinking, activism-based political organ-
isation—stormed from being a marginal
presence with three sitting MPs (out of
63), to being the front-runner in the na-
tional opinion polls. Amongst many re-
formist policies, their agenda includes an
eye-catching reboot of democracy itself,
via increased voter participation that al-
lows the people to guide parliament on
key issues via e-democracy, direct influ-
ence on policymaking, and referendums.
The Pirate Party is an international
organisation that began in Sweden, and
first made their name championing
copyright reform and freedom of infor-
mation. But the Icelandic group took an
ingenious next step when they extrapo-
lated their political philosophy into a
framework they call the Core Policy.
These guidelines were employed to cre-
ate the Pirate Platform—a wide-ranging
manifesto that covers everything from
fishing quotas and healthcare to internet
porn and data protection (both the Core
Policy and the Pirate Platform can be
found on their website: www.piratar.is).
Their message has clearly resonated
with the public, with the impressive poll
numbers holding steady since March. At
the last count, the Pirates had 34.5% of
the vote, making them de-facto favou-
rites to lead Iceland’s next government.
Two years is, of course, a long time in
politics. But should this current swell in
popularity hold until the 2017 parliamen-
tary election, the Pirates will be tasked
with governing Iceland. And they’ll be
aiming to make those thick stone walls a
lot more transparent.
Pirates in parliament
After years of articles and movies about
terrorist threats, “ring of steel” security,
armed police guards and elite bodyguard
units, it’s a strange feeling to walk up to
Alþingishúsið completely unchallenged
and just try the handle. I find the build-
ing’s imposing front door locked and no
longer in use—around the corner, there’s
a modern metal and glass extension,
where an old security guard takes my
name, checks the computer, hands me a
clippy visitor’s badge, and waves me in-
side with a minimum of fuss.
In the airy atrium lobby I find former
Wikileaks volunteer, freedom of infor-
mation activist, Icelandic MP and some-
time Pirate Party figurehead Birgitta
Jónsdóttir, dressed in a smart skirt-suit,
a colourful scarf draped over her shoul-
ders. She’s standing with a camera crew,
and shoots me her trademark mischie-
vous smile from beneath a distinctive
shock of black hair. “I’ll be with you in
just a minute,” she says, “I just have this
interview.”
I wander down the hall, feeling like
something of an invader, looking at
framed prints and glancing into half-
open doorways. Austere meeting rooms
sit ready for use, with pitchers of water
and plates of uneaten pastries (the Prime
Minister must be away). One room is dif-
ferent—the shades are drawn, and there’s
a large pirate flag hanging over the win-
dow, next to ‘V For Vendetta’ and (hand-
altered) "Free Bradley Chelsea Manning"
posters. A laptop covered in stickers (Tor
project, pi symbol, pirate flag) sits on the
table, and a wall-mounted TV blares out
the ongoing discussion of the Alþingi’s
chamber. Birgitta soon reappears and
shows me into the Pirates’ parliamentary
office.
I ask if things are always this hectic
for an MP. “You know, I didn’t realise un-
til I got here how badly organised all this
is,” she says, smiling breathlessly. “And I
think it’s intentional. You can never fully
prepare yourself before you enter the
chamber, because you just get to know
the agenda in the morning... you can’t
do the research. I almost always miss
the Foreign Affairs committee meetings
because I’m in another committee at the
time; and all three of us Pirate MPs are in
our main committees simultaneously, so
we can’t even have someone jump in for
us. And the office of parliament shows no
will to change it to make it work.”
The hacker perspective
Coming up against the bureaucratic re-
alities of government seems to act less
as a deterrent than as an additional mo-
tivation for the Pirates. Their shared
interest in hacking—that is, examining
systems, identifying their characteristics
and weaknesses, and modifying them
through experimentation—comes in use-
ful. In fact, as the Pirates seemingly come
Alþingishúsið, The Parliament House, is a hulking grey
stone building that sits on the edge of the sleepy Aus-
turvöllur square in downtown Reykjavík. It's the seat
of Iceland's Alþingi, an institution that was famously
inaugurated in the year 930 by a coalition of chieftains
who, in essence, founded the world’s first parliament,
and began governing over what many claim to be the
world’s oldest functioning democracy.