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Articles by Ellen Engelstad
Norway election: Labour narrowly holds on to power amid uncertainty
First published at Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung. Norway’s parliamentary election on Monday, September 8, 2025, was an incredibly close-run race. The left bloc, led by the Labour Party, secured a narrow victory. Labour will likely continue as a single-party minority government, seeking compromises and budget agreements with other left-wing parties as well as across the political spectrum.
In Norway, the Left Is Winning Back Power
In Norway’s parliamentary election on Monday, the country took a significant step to the left, securing one hundred mandates for the left side of the political spectrum, out of a total of 169.
Against Meritocracy
Meritocracy means that the most capable should rule — and that the most capable should make it to the top regardless of their social background. The first claim seems reasonable to many, the latter obviously fair. The world is complex, and in a variety of areas, from courtrooms to airplane cockpits, expertise seems not just desirable but necessary. And if we really want to find the best talent, then surely we should make sure everyone gets an equal chance to prove their worth?
The New Deal Put Huge Numbers of Unemployed Artists to Work
After a divisive election, US politics are anything but back to normal. If Joe Biden pursues the same neoliberal policies that we’ve seen these last forty years, there is little chance of him rebuilding trust among working-class voters. Looking to break with this recent history — and confront a fresh Great Depression — it’s no wonder that many on the Left draw inspiration from the social programs of the 1930s, as they advocate a modern Green New Deal. Franklin D.
2021 Will Be A Make-Or-Break Year For Norway’s Left
Review of Martin Tranmæls Metode, by Mímir Kristjánsson (Forlaget Manifest, 2020). Norwegians will go to the polls in autumn 2021 to elect a government for another four-year term. Since 2013, Erna Solberg and her Conservative Party (Høyre) have led the country with support from a medley of coalition partners: first, the hard-right Progress Party from 2013 onward, with the Christian Democrats and the Liberal Party (Venstre) also joining since 2018.
Norway’s Workers Insisted They Shouldn’t Pay for Coronavirus - And They Won
Like most of Europe, Norway has been hit hard by the coronavirus epidemic. After several weeks of dragging its feet, on March 13, the government moved into action, following its neighbor Denmark in closing schools, kindergartens, and then the border. It made a list of those exercising “critical functions in society,” like nurses, transit workers, cleaners, and people working in grocery stores, who can still work and have daycare for their kids.
Pete Buttigieg’s Favorite Author Despises People Like Him
Pete Buttigieg is extremely smart. He knows that more than anyone — he even boasts that he is fluent in seven languages. One of these is Norwegian, which he taught himself at Harvard in the early 2000s in order to read more of the works of Erlend Loe — an author he fell in love with after reading the English translation of his 1996 novel Naïve. Super. As a Norwegian, I couldn’t help but laugh when I first heard this.
Pete Buttigieg’s Favorite Author Despises People Like Him
Pete Buttigieg is extremely smart. He knows that more than anyone — he even boasts that he is fluent in seven languages. One of these is Norwegian, which he taught himself at Harvard in the early 2000s in order to read more of the works of Erlend Loe — an author he fell in love with after reading the English translation of his 1996 novel Naïve. Super. As a Norwegian, I couldn’t help but laugh when I first heard this.
Sjokkert, eller bare naiv?
Sjokkert, eller bare naiv? Er det nye nasjonalmuseet en politisk kunstinstallasjon? PROBLEMBYGG: Det har vært mange problemer rundt byggingen av det nye Nasjonalmuseet mellom Rådhuset og Aker Brygge helt siden oppstarten, særlig knyttet til arbeidsvilkårene for innleide utenlandske arbeidere.
The Return of “Judeo-Bolshevism”
In the Nazi propaganda of the interwar period, Marxism and Judaism were seen as two sides of the same coin. In a speech at the 1935 Nazi congress, entitled “Communism with the Mask Off,” Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, listed evil Jewish Marxists from Karl Marx to Ferdinand Lassalle, Leon Trotsky, Karl Radek, and Rosa Luxemburg. Just as some right-wingers consistently refer to Obama as Barack Hussein Obama, Goebbels insisted on calling Marx by the name Karl Mordechai Marx.
The Return of “Judeo-Bolshevism”
In the Nazi propaganda of the interwar period, Marxism and Judaism were seen as two sides of the same coin. In a speech at the 1935 Nazi congress, entitled “Communism with the Mask Off,” Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, listed evil Jewish Marxists from Karl Marx to Ferdinand Lassalle, Leon Trotsky, Karl Radek, and Rosa Luxemburg. Just as some right-wingers consistently refer to Obama as Barack Hussein Obama, Goebbels insisted on calling Marx by the name Karl Mordechai Marx.
The Return of “Judeo-Bolshevism”
In the Nazi propaganda of the interwar period, Marxism and Judaism were seen as two sides of the same coin. In a speech at the 1935 Nazi congress, entitled “Communism with the Mask Off,” Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, listed evil Jewish Marxists from Karl Marx to Ferdinand Lassalle, Leon Trotsky, Karl Radek, and Rosa Luxemburg. Just as some right-wingers consistently refer to Obama as Barack Hussein Obama, Goebbels insisted on calling Marx by the name Karl Mordechai Marx.
Myten om den diabolske "jødebolsjeviken" er på vei tilbake - i ny drakt. | Ellen Engelstad og Mímir Kristjánsson
smp-stories-top-widget Det er akkurat 100 år siden Rosa Luxemburg ble myrdet. I den offisielle versjonen fra tyske myndigheter, gjengitt i aviser Europa over, blant annet her i Aftenposten, ble hun drept av en rasende folkemengde. I realiteten ble hun skutt i hodet av høyreradikale tyske paramilitære og dumpet i Landwehrkanalen i Berlin. I dag er Rosa Luxemburg mest kjent som symbol for en revolusjonær, men demokratisk sosialisme.
Norway’s Bad Deal
The Brexit process staggers on, and, from the outside, it looks no less of a mess than it does from the United Kingdom. But while UK newspapers are full of stories about European schadenfreude over Britain’s difficulties, watching the debate from Norway has been a rather different experience.
The Fall of the Norwegian Trump
The last time Norway caught the attention of the international media, it was because Donald Trump remarked that more immigrants should come to the US from countries like Norway and less from “shithole” places. That prompted a string of jokes and jibes about Norway being the whitest country in the world, a perfect fantasy for a racist president.
Federalism and the European left
If a spectre is haunting Europe today, it is not the spectre of communism or socialism. To be sure, leftist politics has never completely disappeared from European parliaments and from civil society. But it is no longer the sort of presence that needs exorcizing, more perhaps a shadow of what it used to be. There are profound causes for this predicament, and some notable exceptions. But the general pattern is very clear.
Teknologien vil sette oss fri
Paul Mason, journalist og økonomiredaktør i britiske Channel 4 News, mener kapitalismen har malt seg opp i et hjørne og at informasjonsteknologien vil tvinge fram massiv endring, for det verre eller bedre. Siden ny teknologi lager et overflodssamfunn hvor størrelser som «arbeid» og «vare» blir kraftig utfordret, må vi tenke helt nytt om økonomien. I sin nye bok, «PostCapitalism.
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