Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1944, Blaðsíða 182

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LE NORD
personal tum to his contribution is
likely to make for variety and
vividness.
Nevertheless, the editorial com-
mittee has attempted to lay down
certain lines for the guidance of
the contributors: “The text should
give a picture of the actual course
of events and their causes and ef-
fects, including the interaction of
the subject in question with related
subjects. But writers are not ex-
pected to give critical evaluations
based on any particular principles
which they themselves may hold,
nor to indicate their own wishes
as regards future developments.
They may, however, call attention,
in an objective spirit, to points in
connection with which the question
of reforms may be expected to arise,
and to the general trend which af-
fairs are likely to take in the fu-
ture; but such prognostications must
be brief and objective.” No doubt
the contributors have often had to
excercise a good deal of resignation
in keeping within these lines, and
once or twice the editors have had
to intervene in the case of particu-
larly subjective judgements, but on
the whole the contributors have
loyally deferred to the programme
laid down for them. There are three
widely different subjects as regards
which it has been particularly diffi-
cult to restrain a tendency on the
part of the contributors to strike a
too subjective note, viz. military
policy, art, and literature.
The instractions for the guidance
of contributors contain no direct
warning against going to the oppo-
site extreme: that of uncritical satis-
faction with things as they are. But
even though the writers occasional-
ly have been unable to resist a
temptation to conclude their ac-
counts on a note of enthusiastic
praise of Danish civilization in
spheres where the latter has really
important results to its credit, and in
which it has achieved things which
might profitably be imitated by
other nations, they invariably do
so without undue demonstrativeness
and without degenerating into na-
tional self-complacency or jingo-
ism. This is the more creditable as
most of the writers are men and
women who themselves have been
to the forefront in the develop-
ments of the last decades.
In laying down the principles by
which the contributors were to be
guided, the editorial committee
stressed the desirability of devoting
more space to those fields in which
Danish achievements have been
especially original or important, or
in which they reflect our national
character in an especially distinctive
way, and relatively less to those
fields in which developments have
been on the same lines as in other
countries. Thus, a particularly de-
tailed treatment is devoted to the
social services, the hospital system,
health insurance, the co-operative
movement, the folk high schools,
agricultural organization and train-
ing, the small holders’ movement,