Greenland’s tragedy: the dream of independence now looks like a trap laid by Donald Trump |
There are two tales about the relationship between Greenland and Denmark; both contain truth and blindness. One is the story told by the ruling classes in Denmark, the other is the narrative that unites progressives and nationalists in Greenland.
The moral of the first tale is that Greenland, as a part of the Danish kingdom, has managed the extremely challenging transition to a modern society without sacrificing its culture or identity. This is a rare and impressive achievement. Greenlanders are among the only indigenous people in the world with their own parliament, political institutions and education system and who have maintained their own language. And they have access to the same welfare services as other citizens of Denmark.
This has been achieved under difficult conditions by only around 55,000 inhabitants on a vast island in the North Atlantic and Arctic oceans, isolated from the rest of the world. True, the people of Greenland were not asked to consent when they were integrated into the Danish kingdom in 1953, after more than 200 years as a Danish colony. But in referendums in 1979 and 2008 a majority of them voted in favour of a revised arrangement that allowed them to expand political control over their own territory and resources. Greenland’s constitution calls the period from 1953 to 1979 a phase of “hidden colonisation”, but also recognises that the next decades constitute an era of “decolonisation”.
In this narrative, the Danish kingdom has served as a formidable vehicle for Greenlanders to achieve self-determination. Freedom for Greenland from this perspective is not about formal independence or liberation from old masters, it’s about gradually building institutions and the capacity for self-determination – under the Danish crown.
The other narrative sees Greenland’s recent history as merely a continuation of colonisation. It claims that the Danes have never respected Greenlanders as equals, and that the Danes have always been illegitimate rulers. Here in fact is the “hidden colonisation” in question: a term that reflects the unequal pay between Danes and Greenlanders, the negative attitudes of Danish employers in Greenland and the way in which the Danish media talk about Greenland in general.
Those who tell this story point to scandals such as the practice in the 1960s and 70s of Danish doctors implanting contraceptive IUDs in the wombs of thousands of Greenlandic women and girls without their consent or knowledge, as part of a campaign to limit Greenland’s birthrate. The Danish government has officially apologised, but approximately half the fertile women in Greenland were forcibly fitted with contraception at the time. Then there’s the 22 children who were taken from their families in Greenland and transported to Denmark, where they were supposed to be educated as the next generation of the colony’s capable rulers. The Danish prime minister has acknowledged these moral failures. But such dark episodes reveal, according to this narrative, that........