Reykjavík Grapevine - nov 2020, Qupperneq 9

9 The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 09— 2020
Words:
Andie
Sophia
Fontaine
Photos:
Art Bicnick
for Iceland, I'm sure. We're just taking
as many steps as we can in this mara-
thon of a run.
“There is a sort of pull within the
political parties for slow, or no, changes
to the constitution. The system wants
to maintain itself. That's what makes it
a system. I think that's the reason why
we ended up in this cul de sac at the
moment.”
Helga Baldvins Bjargardóttir, presi-
dent of the Women's Association for
the New Constitution, agrees, and
believes business interests are bolster-
ing Parliament’s resistance.
"There are always some owners of
capital who ensure that they have a
say in how policy is being made,” Helga
says. “I think that's the case with all the
old political parties. Currently, it's the
Left-Greens who are standing most in
the way. They should have every means
to pass this, instead we get these terri-
ble excuses for constitutional change.
It was really disappointing to see that
this is as far as they think they can get
when working with the Independence
Party. It's quite sad."
"There's also conservatism at work,”
Katrín says. “There are people who feel
it's too much to change the constitu-
tion in one step; that we should do
it slowly over many steps. There are
many reasons for opposition to the
new constitution. But I'd like to point
out that one of the reasons is the fact
that the current system has built-in
injustices within it and the new consti-
tution makes an effort to challenge
these injustices, but there are people
and companies who do not want to see
those changes."
Another factor slowing progress,
Helga believes, is the smallness of
Iceland itself.
"Because we're such a small nation,
it's easy to rule by fear,” she says.
“People know that if they are very
vocal about something, they might
be ruining their chances of getting a
promotion or the jobs that they want.
Without a culture of protection and
making people accountable, it's easy to
rule by fear."
She adds that rural Icelanders—
many of them voters for more conser-
vative parties—are being misled by
these parties.
"People in the countryside are afraid
that changing things to one person
equals one vote would mean Parlia-
ment would only focus on Reykjavík,
that they would be left out,” she says.
“But they forget that there is an article
in the new constitution which says that
you cannot discriminate against some-
one based on where they live. So the
constitution would actually transform
the way we think about how we provide
services all around the country."
The Prime
Minister and
the people
Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdót-
tir recently announced that she will
submit a bill to Parliament—interest-
ingly, not as Prime Minister but as a
parliamentarian—which would make
some amendments to the current
constitution. But Katrín Oddsdóttir
believes the changes are lacking.
"We personally feel that this isn't
good enough, because the referendum
asked if the draft of the new consti-
tution should be the basis and that's
certainly not what's being done now,”
she says. “They're trying to amend
the old one, a constitution which was
always only supposed to be prelimi-
nary. The big quest of this nation to
own its own social contract is still
being ignored. Secondly, the proposals
she's putting forward are in many ways
just watered-down versions of similar
proposals in the new constitution."
Katrín speculates that one of the
reasons why the Prime Minister is
taking this route comes from a desire
to please everyone in the government.
"This is just my personal theory, but
I think what might have happened is
that inside [the Left-Greens], there are
very conservative people, and they hold
a lot of power inside the party,” she
says. “Basically what they've said to the
people, and to [the Prime Minister], is
that this will never be done unless it's
done with political harmony, where all
the parties come together and make a
solution. But this is completely incor-
rect.”
“Firstly, we see now that this isn't
happening. Even the [Independence
Party] are not backing her up. Why
is she putting [her bill] forward as a
parliamentarian and not a government
minister? Secondly, it is just wrong that
all constitutional changes in Iceland's
history have been done in some kind
of Disney moment where everybody
agrees. We have had huge disputes, like
when we were changing the electoral
territories. Parliament was at war over
the issue."
Katrín does, however, believe that
the Prime Minister is doing what she
can with what she has to work with,
albeit with reservations about the
methodology.
"I think [the Prime Minister] is
doing her best,” she says. “I think she
thought that she would be able to
lead the other parties into some kind
of unity about certain constitutional
changes that would continue after the
next election. Even though she has no
certainty over who is going to lead the
country after the election, so it makes
absolutely no sense. We also have to
remember that the new constitution
was put together by 25 very different
people, and we all had very different
political opinions. It's a huge compro-
mise—and the compromise already
lives inside that document. As soon as
you start treating the new constitution
as some kind of buffet, where you just
pick and choose articles and try shov-
ing them into the old constitution,
they have completely and utterly aban-
doned that big compromise."
Do the people
still want a new
constitution?
Public support for the new constitu-
tion has not waned. A recent petition—
one that requires an official signature
from the National Registry—accrued
over 43,000 signatures in support of a
new constitution based on the draft.
This equals somewhere between 15%
and 20% of all eligible voters, which
in a historic context is a very strong
showing of support. In fact, poll after
poll over the years has shown that
most Icelanders support the initia-
tive, including a poll from Maskína,
conducted during the last week of
October that showed 53.5% in support
of the new constitution, 21.3% opposed,
and 25.2% ambivalent.
There have also been other demon-
strations of support, ranging from a
recent social media campaign employ-
ing the hashtag #hvar (#where), to the
painting of a giant mural by the Minis-
try of Fisheries asking, in bold letters,
“Where is the new constitution?”
"That happened on a Saturday, and
on the Monday they came and cleaned
the wall,” Katrín points out. “Which is
very funny, because this wall had been
filled with graffiti for years and nobody
ever cleaned it. It was like a symbolic
gesture on behalf of the power-holders,
sort of trying to silence this big, demo-
cratic question for Iceland."
Soon after that mural was erased,
“It is a huge democratic
paradox to be fighting
your own Parliament to
honour a referendum
that Parliament called
for.”
Helga Baldvinsdóttir