Politics of Denmark

Though coined in 1994 by then leader of Venstre Uffe Ellemann-Jensen, the terms red bloc and blue bloc first became mainstream around the 2011 Danish general election.[9] Left-wing parties are described as belonging to the red bloc while right-wing parties belong to the blue bloc. The Social Democrats and Venstre have historically served as the de facto leaders of the red and blue bloc respectively, though in 2022 leader of the blue bloc party Conservative People's Party Søren Pape Poulsen declared his prime minister candidacy alongside leader of Venstre Jakob Ellemann-Jensen.[10]

The Moderates, founded in 2021 by former prime minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen, rebuke bloc politics and support a government with parties from both traditional blocs, and use the color purple to represent this.[11] Similarly, The Alternative have refused their designation as a red party declaring they are a green party.[12]

Enjoying the status of primus inter pares, the Prime Minister is head of the Danish government (as taken to mean the Cabinet). The Prime Minister and members of the Cabinet are appointed by the Crown on basis of the party composition in the Folketing. No vote of confidence is necessary to install a new government after an election. If the Folketing expresses its lack of confidence in the Prime Minister, the entire cabinet must step down, unless a new parliamentary election is called in which case the old government continues as a caretaker government until a new government can be formed.

Since the 1990s, most governments have been coalition governments led by either Venstre or the Social Democrats. Until 2001, Poul Nyrup Rasmussen (S) led a coalition with the Social Liberals, supported by the SPP and the Red-Green Alliance. A coalition of Venstre and the Conservatives, supported by the DPP, was then in power from 2001 to 2011, led first by Anders Fogh Rasmussen (V) and then from 2009 by Lars Løkke Rasmussen (V). The Liberal Alliance formed in 2007. After the 2011 election, Løkke was replaced by Helle Thorning-Schmidt (S), whose government consisted of the Social Democrats, the Social Liberals, and the SPP. The SPP left the government again in 2014, following heavy internal disagreement over the planned sale of state-owned shares in the company DONG (now known as Ørsted). The Social Democrats and Social Liberals continued in power, with SPP and Red-Green support, until the 2015 election when Løkke returned to power in a single-party Venstre government. The Løkke II Cabinet held only 34 seats in the Folketing, making it the narrowest since Poul Hartling's (V) 22-seat government in the 1970s, and the first single-party government since Anker Jørgensen's (S) fifth government in the early 1980s. After finding it difficult to govern with such a small government, Løkke invited the Conservatives and the Liberal Alliance to join his government in 2016, turning it into the Løkke III Cabinet.[13]

Following the 2019 general election the Social Democrats, led by leader Mette Frederiksen, formed a single-party government with support from the left-wing coalition.[14] Frederiksen became prime minister on 27 June 2019.[15]

In November 2022 general election, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen's Social Democrats remained as the biggest party with two more seats, gaining its best result in two decades.[16] The second biggest was Liberal Party (Venstre), led by Jakob Ellemann-Jensen. The recently formed Moderates party, led by two-time former Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, became the third-biggest party in Denmark.[17] In December 2022, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen formed a new coalition government with her Social Democrats and the Liberal Party and the Moderates party. Jakob Ellemann-Jensen became deputy prime minister and defence minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen was appointed foreign minister.[18]

The first cabinet of Helle Thorning-Schmidt (2011–2014).

According to section 14 of the constitution, the king sets the number of ministers and the distribution of cases between them. The monarch formally appoints and dismisses ministers, including the Prime Minister.[19] That means that the number of cabinet positions and the organisation of the state administration into ministries are not set by law, but subject to change without notice. A coalition of many parties usually means a large cabinet and many ministries, while a small coalition or the rare one-party-government means fewer, larger ministries.

In June 2015 in the wake of the parliamentary election, the cabinet had 17 members including the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister leads the work of the Cabinet and is minister for constitutional affairs, overseas territories and for the affairs of the press. The seventeen cabinet ministers hold different portfolios of duties, including the day-to-day role as head of one or more segments of the government departments.

As Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen heads the Department of State and the Cabinet.

The Danish executive consists of a number of government departments known as Ministries. These departments are led by a cabinet member and known as Minister for the relevant department or portfolio. In theory all Ministers are equal and may not command or be commanded by a fellow minister. Constitutional practice does however dictate, that the Prime Minister is primus inter pares, first among equals. Unlike many other countries, Denmark has no tradition of employing junior Ministers.

A department acts as the secretariat to the Minister. Its functions comprises overall planning, development and strategic guidance on the entire area of responsibility of the Minister. The Minister's decisions are carried out by the permanent and politically neutral civil service within the department. Unlike some democracies, senior civil servants remain in post upon a change of Government. The head of the department civil servants is the Permanent Secretary. In fact, the majority of civil servants work in executive agencies that are separate operational organizations reporting to the Minister. The Minister also has his own private secretary and communications personnel. Unlike normal civil servants, the communications staff is partisan and do not remain in their posts upon changes of government.

As known in other parliamentary systems of government, the executive (the Cabinet) is accountable to the parliament (the Folketing). Under the Danish constitution, no government may remain in office with a majority against it. This is called negative parliamentarianism, as opposed to the principle of positive parliamentarianism—as in Germany and some other parliamentary systems—a government needs to achieve a majority through a vote of investiture in parliament. It is due to the principle of negative parliamentarianism and its proportional representation system that Denmark has a long tradition of minority governments. Nevertheless, minority governments in Denmark sometimes have strong parliamentary majorities with the help of one or more supporting parties.[2]

The current government of the Social Democrats is stable due to their support by the Social Liberal Party, Socialist People's Party, and the Red–Green Alliance and informally supported by The Alternative. The previous government coalition between Venstre (the Left), the Liberal Alliance, and the Conservatives had support from the Danish People's Party despite not being an official member of the government.[24] This system enables minority parties to govern on specific issues through an ad hoc basis, selecting partners for support based on common interests instead of legislative need. As a result, Danish laws are born of extensive negotiations and compromise. It is common practice for both sides of the Danish political spectrum to cooperate in the Folketing.

With the implementation of the first democratic constitution in 1849, Denmark's legislature was constituted as a bicameral parliament, or Rigsdag, composed of Folketinget (a lower house of commoners) and Landstinget (an upper house containing lords, landowners and industrialists).[25] In 1901, parliamentarism was introduced to the Danish Parliament, which made Folketinget the essential chamber, as no sitting government could have a majority against it in Folketinget. With the constitutional reform of 1953 the Landstinget was abolished, leaving only Folketinget.

During the occupation of Denmark during the Second World War, on 29 August 1943, the German authorities dissolved the Danish government following the refusal of that government to crack down on unrest to the satisfaction of the German plenipotentiary. The cabinet resigned in 1943 and suspended operations (although the resignation was never accepted by King Christian X).[26]—all day-to-day business had been handed over to the Permanent Secretaries, each effectively running his own ministry. The Germans administered the rest of the country, and the Danish Rigsdag did not convene for the remainder of the occupation[27] until a new one was formed following the liberation on 5 May 1945.

The Folketing is composed of 179 seats, of which two are reserved for the Faroe Islands and two for Greenland. The remaining 175 seats are taken up by MPs from elected in Denmark. All 179 seats are contested in elections held at least every four years and in the present parliament, all seats are taken up by members belonging to a political party.

All parties receiving more than 2% of the votes are represented in parliament. Comparatively, this is quite low; in Sweden the minimum level of support necessary for getting into parliament is 4%. Often, this has led to the representation of many parties in parliament, and correspondingly complex or unstable government majorities. However, during the last decade the political system has been one of stable majorities and rather long government tenures. Independent politicians running for parliament need about 15,000-20,000 votes in the electoral district they ran in. Since the 1953 constitution of Denmark, only one independent, Jacob Haugaard, has been successful in doing this. Only two politicians have done this in the history of the Danish parliament.

Denmark uses a system of proportional representation for both national, local, and European Parliament elections. The parliament Folketinget uses a system with constituencies, and a system of allotment is indirectly prescribed in the constitution, ensuring a geographically and politically balanced distribution of the 179 seats. 135 members are proportionally elected in multi-member constituencies, while the remaining 40 seats are allotted nationwide in proportion to the total number of votes a party or list receives. The Faroe Islands and Greenland elect two members each.

Parties must pass a threshold of 2% of the total vote to be guaranteed parliamentary representation. As a consequence of the system, the number of votes required to be elected to parliament varies across the country; it generally requires fewer votes to be elected in the capital, Copenhagen, than it does being elected in less populous areas. Voter turnout in general elections normally lies above 85%, but has been decreasing over time. Turnout is lower in local elections, and lower than that in European Parliament elections.

2019 election

Overall the election was a win for the "red bloc" – the parties that supported Mette Frederiksen, leader of the Social Democrats, as Prime Minister. In total, the Social Democrats, the Social Liberals, Socialist People's Party and the Red–Green Alliance won 91 seats. Green party The Alternative chose to go into opposition as a "green bloc".[28]

The Social Democrats defended their position as the largest party, and won an additional seat despite a slightly reduced voter share. They were closely followed by Venstre, who saw the largest gains in seats, picking up an extra nine. In the "blue bloc", only Venstre and the Conservative People's Party saw gains, the latter doubling their seats. The Danish People's Party's vote share fell by 12.4 percentage points (pp), well over half of their support. Leader Kristian Thulesen Dahl speculated that the bad result was due to an extraordinary good election in 2015, and that some voters felt they could "gain [their] policy elsewhere".[29] The Liberal Alliance saw their vote share fall by over two-thirds and became the smallest party in the Folketing, only 0.3pp above the 2% election threshold. Their leader Anders Samuelsen was not reelected and he subsequently resigned as leader, succeeded by Alex Vanopslagh.[30][31]

Of the new parties, only New Right won seats, with Hard Line, the Christian Democrats and Klaus Riskær Pedersen failing to cross the national 2% threshold, although the Christian Democrats were within 200 votes of winning a direct seat in the western Jutland constituency.[32] On election night, Klaus Riskær Pedersen announced that he would dissolve his party.[33]

In the Faroe Islands, Republic (which had finished first in the 2015 elections)[34] dropped to fourth place and lost their seat. The Union Party replaced them as the first party while the Social Democratic Party finished in second place again, retaining their seat.[35] In Greenland, the result was a repeat of the 2015 elections, with Inuit Ataqatigiit and Siumut winning the two seats. Siumut regained parliamentary representation after their previous MP, Aleqa Hammond, was expelled from the party in 2016.[36][37] Hammond later joined Nunatta Qitornai,[38] which finished fourth and failed to win a seat.[37][39]

Largest party in each nomination district.

Party		Votes	%	Seats	+/–
Denmark proper
	Social Democrats	914,882	25.90	48	+1
	Venstre	826,161	23.39	43	+9
	Danish People's Party	308,513	8.74	16	–21
	Danish Social Liberal Party	304,714	8.63	16	+8
	Socialist People's Party	272,304	7.71	14	+7
	Red–Green Alliance	245,100	6.94	13	–1
	Conservative People's Party	233,865	6.62	12	+6
	The Alternative	104,278	2.95	5	–4
	New Right	83,201	2.36	4	New
	Liberal Alliance	82,270	2.33	4	–9
	Stram Kurs	63,114	1.79	0	New
	Christian Democrats	60,944	1.73	0	0
	Klaus Riskær Pedersen	29,600	0.84	0	New
	Independents	2,774	0.08	0	0
Total		3,531,720	100.00	175	0
Valid votes		3,531,720	98.94
Invalid votes		10,019	0.28
Blank votes		27,782	0.78
Total votes		3,569,521	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		4,219,537	84.60
Faroe Islands
	Union Party	7,360	28.32	1	+1
	Social Democratic Party	6,640	25.55	1	0
	People's Party	6,181	23.79	0	0
	Republic	4,832	18.60	0	–1
	Progress	638	2.46	0	0
	Self-Government	334	1.29	0	0
Total		25,985	100.00	2	0
Valid votes		25,985	99.16
Invalid/blank votes		220	0.84
Total votes		26,205	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		37,264	70.32
Greenland
	Inuit Ataqatigiit	6,867	34.35	1	0
	Siumut	6,063	30.33	1	0
	Democrats	2,258	11.30	0	0
	Nunatta Qitornai	1,622	8.11	0	New
	Partii Naleraq	1,564	7.82	0	0
	Atassut	1,098	5.49	0	0
	Cooperation Party	518	2.59	0	New
Total		19,990	100.00	2	0
Valid votes		19,990	97.16
Invalid/blank votes		585	2.84
Total votes		20,575	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		41,344	49.77
Source: Statistics Denmark, Kringvarp Føroya, Qinersineq

The following is the number of constituency seats for each party with each asterix (*) indicating one of the seats won was a levelling seat.[40]

2022 election

Social Democrats (Socialdemokraterne) was the biggest party with 50 Denmark seats, gaining two more seats. Liberal Party (Venstre) was the second with 23 Denmark seats, losing 20 seats. The third was the biggest winner, recently founded Moderates (Moderaterne) with 16 Denmark seats. Green Left (Socialistisk Folkeparti) secured 15 seats. In 2022 founded anti-immigration, far-right Denmark Democrats (Danmarksdemokraterne) and Liberal Alliance secured both 14 seats.[41]

Iceland, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands used to be dependencies of Denmark. The Danish–Icelandic Act of Union (1918) changed the status of Iceland into that of a kingdom in personal union with Denmark. Iceland remained subordinate to Denmark until independence in 1944 amidst World War II. In the nineteenth century Greenland and the Faroe Islands were given the status of counties, and their own legislatures were disbanded, becoming integral parts of a unitary state.[49] They later gained home rule; the Faroe Islands in 1948 and Greenland in 1979.[49]

Today Greenland and the Faroe Islands are effectively self-governing in regards to domestic affairs,[49] with their own legislatures and executives. However, the devolved legislatures are subordinate to the Folketing where the two territories are represented by two seats each. This state of affairs is referred to as the rigsfælleskab. In 2009 Greenland received greater autonomy in the form of "self-rule".

Former U.S. President George W. Bush and former Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen hold a joint press conference outside Marienborg, July 2005.

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and former Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen hold a joint press conference, April 2010.

The foreign policy of Denmark is based on its identity as a sovereign nation in Europe. As such its primary foreign policy focus is on its relations with other nations as a sovereign independent nation. Denmark has long had good relations with other nations. It has been involved in coordinating Western assistance to the Baltic states (Estonia,[50] Latvia, and Lithuania).[51] The country is a strong supporter of international peacekeeping. Danish forces were heavily engaged in the former Yugoslavia in the UN Protection Force (UNPROFOR), with IFOR,[52] and now SFOR.[53] Denmark also strongly supported American operations in Afghanistan and has contributed both monetarily and materially to the ISAF.[54] These initiatives are a part of the "active foreign policy" of Denmark. Instead of the traditional adaptative foreign policy of the small country, Denmark is today pursuing an active foreign policy, where human rights, democracy and other crucial values is to be defended actively. In recent years, Greenland and the Faroe Islands have been guaranteed a say in foreign policy issues, such as fishing, whaling and geopolitical concerns.

Following World War II, Denmark ended its two-hundred-year-long policy of neutrality. Denmark has been a member of NATO since its founding in 1949, and membership in NATO remains highly popular.[55] There were several serious confrontations between the U.S. and Denmark on security policy in the so-called "footnote era" (1982–88), when an alternative parliamentary majority forced the government to adopt specific national positions on nuclear and arms control issues. The alternative majority in these issues was because the Social liberal Party (Radikale Venstre) supported the governing majority in economic policy issues, but was against certain NATO policies and voted with the left in these issues. The conservative led Centre-right government accepted this variety of "minority parliamentarism", that is, without making it a question of the government's parliamentary survival.[55] With the end of the Cold War, however, Denmark has been supportive of U.S. policy objectives in the Alliance.

Danes have enjoyed a reputation as "reluctant" Europeans. When they rejected ratification of the Maastricht Treaty on 2 June 1992, they put the EC's plans for the European Union on hold.[56] In December 1992, the rest of the EC agreed to exempt Denmark from certain aspects of the European Union, including a common defense, a common currency, EU citizenship, and certain aspects of legal cooperation. The Amsterdam Treaty was approved in the referendum of 28 May 1998. In the autumn of 2000, Danish citizens rejected membership of the Euro currency group in a referendum. The Lisbon treaty was ratified by the Danish parliament alone.[57] It was not considered a surrendering of national sovereignty, which would have implied the holding of a referendum according to article 20 of the constitution.[58]