INTERVIEW: 'If we continue, we can turn Denmark against the monarchy'
At the end of last year, Denmark's main republican campaign group nearly shut down for good. With the abdication of Queen Margrethe II, the group's young new chairman is hoping for a revival.
The abdication of Queen Margrethe II has thrust Mads Rundstrøm, the chair of the anti-monarchy campaign group Republik Nu! into the spotlight, with the 27-year-old pulled onto countless TV panels over recent weeks to debate the future of Denmark's royals.
"I've been in all of the Danish media over the last week, and when I walk on the street, I get weird looks from people because they recognize me," he told The Local.
Often, he says, he has been derided and attacked by the policians he has been pitted against.
"Yesterday in the evening, I was in a live debate on the news with Pia Kjærsgaard, the former leader of the [national conservative, ed.] Danish People's Party and she was being very sarcastic and very demeaning in her rhetoric. But I'm fighting for what I believe in, so I don't really care about that."
But the result has been a 50 percent surge in membership for the fringe movement Rundstrøm has led since December.
"We've got around a hundred new members since I released a press release on January 1st," he said, saying that in total the organistion now has about 300 members.
When Margrethe II abdicates on Sunday she will be handing over at a time of extreme popularity for the Danish royals, with 70 percent of people thinking the monarchy should be preserved and only 17 percent in favour of abolishing it, according to a survey by Epinion for the public broadcaster DR published on December 30th.
About 84 percent said they had a positive opinion of Crown Prince Frederik.
Rundstrøm said that his opposition to the monarchy folllowed naturally from his passionate belief in democracy.
"There's nothing democratic about people being born into titles and not even the monarchists argue against that," he said. "I really find it hypocritical when people say, 'yes, I agree that it's not democratic, but...'.I mean, but what? Either it's democratic or it's not democratic."
He conceded, though, that his movement has historically been something of a lost cause.
"The organization I'm leading hasn't really been active for a lot of years," he said. "I saved it from being closed in the autumn. The board was basically a bunch of old people and they were like, 'none of us have the energy to keep the fight up any more, so we might as well close the organisation'."
It was only the intervention of Sweden's Republican Association, which has over 7,000 members, he said, that stopped this happening, with the Swedish organisation sending over a member from southern Sweden to sit on the board of its Danish sister organisation, and Rundstrøm then taking over.
He put the popularity of royalty in Denmark, Sweden and Norway down to a type of Stockholm Syndrome, which describes situations when hostages start to feel warmth for their captors.
"We are proud of our democracy and of our human rights and how we act as countries in Scandinavia, and then at the same time we have constitutions that are not democratic."
Rundstrøm believes that it will be easier to campaign for a republic under the future King Frederik X than it has been under the popular Margrethe II.
He points to the situation in the UK, where the anti-monarchist group Republic on Monday published a poll in which public support for the monarchy dipped below 50 percent for the first time ever measured, something he says could "definitely" happen in Denmark too.
"If we continue our work, and if we keep up as hard and consistent work as Republic has done, we can definitely do it."
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The abdication of Queen Margrethe II has thrust Mads Rundstrøm, the chair of the anti-monarchy campaign group Republik Nu! into the spotlight, with the 27-year-old pulled onto countless TV panels over recent weeks to debate the future of Denmark's royals.
"I've been in all of the Danish media over the last week, and when I walk on the street, I get weird looks from people because they recognize me," he told The Local.
Often, he says, he has been derided and attacked by the policians he has been pitted against.
"Yesterday in the evening, I was in a live debate on the news with Pia Kjærsgaard, the former leader of the [national conservative, ed.] Danish People's Party and she was being very sarcastic and very demeaning in her rhetoric. But I'm fighting for what I believe in, so I don't really care about that."
But the result has been a 50 percent surge in membership for the fringe movement Rundstrøm has led since December.
"We've got around a hundred new members since I released a press release on January 1st," he said, saying that in total the organistion now has about 300 members.
When Margrethe II abdicates on Sunday she will be handing over at a time of extreme popularity for the Danish royals, with 70 percent of people thinking the monarchy should be preserved and only 17 percent in favour of abolishing it, according to a survey by Epinion for the public broadcaster DR published on December 30th.
About 84 percent said they had a positive opinion of Crown Prince Frederik.
Rundstrøm said that his opposition to the monarchy folllowed naturally from his passionate belief in democracy.
"There's nothing democratic about people being born into titles and not even the monarchists argue against that," he said. "I really find it hypocritical when people say, 'yes, I agree that it's not democratic, but...'.I mean, but what? Either it's democratic or it's not democratic."
He conceded, though, that his movement has historically been something of a lost cause.
"The organization I'm leading hasn't really been active for a lot of years," he said. "I saved it from being closed in the autumn. The board was basically a bunch of old people and they were like, 'none of us have the energy to keep the fight up any more, so we might as well close the organisation'."
It was only the intervention of Sweden's Republican Association, which has over 7,000 members, he said, that stopped this happening, with the Swedish organisation sending over a member from southern Sweden to sit on the board of its Danish sister organisation, and Rundstrøm then taking over.
He put the popularity of royalty in Denmark, Sweden and Norway down to a type of Stockholm Syndrome, which describes situations when hostages start to feel warmth for their captors.
"We are proud of our democracy and of our human rights and how we act as countries in Scandinavia, and then at the same time we have constitutions that are not democratic."
Rundstrøm believes that it will be easier to campaign for a republic under the future King Frederik X than it has been under the popular Margrethe II.
He points to the situation in the UK, where the anti-monarchist group Republic on Monday published a poll in which public support for the monarchy dipped below 50 percent for the first time ever measured, something he says could "definitely" happen in Denmark too.
"If we continue our work, and if we keep up as hard and consistent work as Republic has done, we can definitely do it."
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