Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1941, Page 132

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LE NORD
discussed by all who read the newspapers; and fortunately it
appears that both the town and country population begin to
realise that on this point a united effort and sacrifices are re-
quired by all, from the top to the bottom of the social ladder.
What we have to do is simply to cover the greatest range of our
requirements by Danish labour and Danish raw-materials to
keep our end up until we see what chances are left to us after
the war.
We shall only be able to a slight degree at that time to de-
termine our own destinies; nevertheless we shall be able to do
so in a higher degree the more we have been able to be self-
supporting. Our last reserve will be the standard of living. Even
now it is not intact by conditions, and it is only to be hoped
that this experience may teach us that a reduction in the standard
of living is not a disaster in itself. It is not the first time that
we have had such experiences in this country. The question is
to an increasing extent whether Europe will have chances, when
quiet and order descends on the world again, to build up new
markets in those overseas areas which are at present far from
being inhabited in proportion to their extention and economic
possibilities; and this we are fully justified to expect.
But some time will elapse, and during that period it will be
necessary to understand that the closely connected ideas of the
state’s relations with economic life and of the economic self-
determination of individuals must be subject to a limitation from
what since the middle of last century has been laid down practi-
cally as a law of nature with reference to economic policy, at
any rate as the only sensible and sound basis of such policy:
“The free play of forces” belongs for the time being in a
museum of commercial policy for the simple reason that it can-
not be applied to Europe because its prerequisite: the constantly
expansible market, does not at present exist in this area. Hence
it is certain that the state must adopt another attitude to industrial
life than the purely passive which was prescribed by the doc-
trine of laissez faire. This is obvious for two reasons: in the first
place because if the liquidation of liberal economy were left to
the struggle between individuals, society would be thrown into
a clash of forces which would have a disruptive effect and entire-
ly dislodge its social structure; this the state cannot allow; in the
second place because the reorientation of Europe will make de-
mands from outside on the individual country, which can neither