Division and cohesion in society

Bilde

Division or cohesion

Polarization and distrust are challenges to the stability of western societies. In the US and Western Europe there are debates on the potential disrupting effects of internationalization, migration, extremism and cultural wars. The focus is on division rather than cohesion. Norway has long been seen as a mature and stable democracy where citizens have a high level of trust in public institutions. Will that last? 

A profound sense of community

This Academy symposium will not deal with futures, but with trends and challenges. In the 1960s a Princeton political scientist wondered why Norway had such a deep-seated, stable democracy despite strong historic cleavages in culture, class and according to geographical dimensions. His answer was that these divisions were balanced by a “profound sense of community” (Eckstein 1966). Norwegian scholars have long discussed the integration of different cultural and social groups in the process of “nation-building”, in modern Norwegian history - from the political incorporation of the peasants through the 1814 Constitution, the harmonization of the “two cultures” (Danish and Norwegian) in schools and public life, the integration of the peripheral “counter-cultures”, the political and social inclusion of the working class, and, finally, of the integration of women in public life. All these narratives are still debated but the historic cleavages clearly softened in the course of the 19th and 20th centuries.

What is the societal glue in a heterogenous society?

John Stuart Mill argued that “free institutions are next to impossible in a country made up of different nationalities. Among a people without fellow-feeling, especially if they read and speak different languages, the united public opinion, necessary to the working of representative government, cannot exist” (Mill 1861). 
Norway has changed profoundly over the last decades. Immigration, increased economic inequality, debates on stronger minority rights and discrimination, the threat of extremist groups, the rise of parallel societies and closed communities – all of these factors have led to a less homogeneous society. The question is still what will be the glue, making the Norwegian society and policy stick, in the years to come? What is the base for a “profound sense of community” today?

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Program will be announced this spring