Borders, edited by Susanne Christensen and Audun Lindholm

Borders

with

Ida BörjelMatias FaldbakkenDas Beckwerk

Susanne Christensen & Audun Lindholm, editors

Borders

C H A I N L I N K S

Copyright © 2008 by ChainLinks.

All rights revert to authors/artists upon publication.

ISBN: 1-930068-38-7

“European Waistmeasures“ was first published in Sond (oei

editör, Stockholm, 2004). “Edward Norton’s WaspVille” was first

published in Kontur Magasin, Oslo, March 2002. “The Democracy

– Destination: Iraq” was first published as a chapbook by Gasspedal,

Bergen, 2005.

Thanks Geoffrey Hlibchuck, Øystein Vidnes, and David Horton.

C H A I N L I N K SOakland and Philadelphia

Series Editors: Jena Osman and Juliana Spahr.

Design: Jacqueline Thaw.

Typesetting: King Tender.

Cover photo: Das Beckwerk.

European WaistmeasuresIDA BörJEL

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Edward Norton’s WaspVilleMATIAS FALDBAKKEN

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The Democracy — Destination: IraqThe Democracy — Destination: USADAS BECKWErK

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Contributors141

Contents

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It is in the general interest of the United States to encourage the development of a world in which the fault lines separating nations are bridged by shared interests. And it is in the economic and politi-cal interests of the United States to ensure that if the world is moving towards a common language, it be English; that if the world is moving toward common telecommunications, safety and quality standards, they be American; that if the world is becoming linked by television, radio, and music, the programming be American; and if common values are being developed, they be values with which Americans are comfortable.

These are not simply idle aspirations. English is linking the world. American information technologies and services are at the cutting edge of those that are enabling globalization. Access to the largest economy in the world — America’s — is the primary carrot leading other nations to open their markets.

Indeed, just as the United States is the world’s sole remaining military superpower, so it is the world’s only information superpower. While Japan has become quite competitive in the manufacture of components integral to information systems, it has had a negligible impact as a manufacturer of software or as a force behind the technological revolution. Europe has failed on both fronts. Consequently, the United States holds a position of advantage at the moment and for the foreseeable future. Americans should not shy away from doing that which is so clearly in their economic, political and security interests — and so clearly in the interests of the world at large. The United States should not hesitate to promote its values. In an effort to be polite or politic, Americans should not deny the fact that of all the nations in the history of the world, theirs is the most just, the most tolerant, the most willing to constantly reassess and improve itself, and the best model for the future.

— David rothkopf, “In Praise of Cultural Imperialism”

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Borders INTroDUCTIoN

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An artist who does not speak English is not an artist.— Mladen Stilinovic

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IDA BörJEL

translated from the Swedish by Linda Rugg

European Waistmeasures

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Borders EUropEAN WAISTMEASUrES

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We want to say the following, in order to clarify who we are: Some-times existence itself can feel like a newcomer. Existence can some-times offer a certain cringing pleasure and beauty. Birdsong, bottles of wine, and the opposite sex in nature are such great gifts that they can be comprehended as newcomers. As a sheer gift there are friend-ships with big shots and wives of big shots and scholarships. Then nature is good. From all this altogether we demand, we request, to become newcomers.— Erik Beckman, The Newcomers

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A story to grip

I am the strong, well-composed Austrian brain. My thoughts are settled and collected on a regular basis. All surfaces have been monitored again today. Head and thoughts are in place; face and mind are set. The Austrian family is clean, sharply fused together. Will the Danes moisten their faces before dinner? Can the Belgian hand ever become truly clean? Austrian hands are completely clean and precise over the dinner table. The Austrian mind is strong and clean with no squeamishness about it. The Austrian mind is firm and steady when the bell rings for breakfast, lunch, and walks. The Austrian air is pure, healthy and composed. British air is foggy, Danish moist, Italian sticky with the press of sweat and smutty insinuation. Austrian secrets are kept. One Austrian mind can always trust another. Austrian sons are clean, silent, and good to hunt with. Young Austrian boys have faces with defined features and no blemishes. I am the Austrian stable-keeper and I have everything in place. The Austrian stableboy comes and goes. He is a well-informed sturdy young man who does not shrink from heavier loads. I grease the saddles, the reins, and the halter. I put the bridle in the animal’s mouth. The Austrian horse stands ready, vigorous, poised to set out for the forest, over fields, charging away from it all in quest of the shy and evasive prey. Italian people are family-oriented spendthrifts. When French people visit forests they do not know how to hunt any boar. Irish people hunt them-selves. Austrians have the ability and the presence of mind to keep an eye on it all. In Austria there is no need for any polished mirrors to confirm that the Austrian face is strongly held together and never will come loose

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A story with a trick

Danish people are round friendly thirsty people who have nothing against any dogs. Danish dogs are round friendly creatures with little spots on them. The Danish dog always has a trick to perform in a bar. I am the Danish pubkeeper and my house is your house. Spanish dogs are lazy creatures that get too much sun. Swedish dogs are slim, brushed, and fussed-over creatures with long complicated pedigrees. Swedish dogowners are always talking about comparisons of their dogs’ pedigrees and the condition of their fur. The German dog does not have a trick to perform in the bar. Danish dogowners are warm thirsty people who share thoughts and drinking in the bar. Austrians would not share a thought with their four-legged friends. The Danish dog does not need a leash. Danish dogs follow their owners as an owner follows a dog to a bar. Swedish bars are disinfected powdered places with stooly chairs and watery American music. The Danish pub is a cosy dark place with funny stick-ers and posters. My Danish woman comes in. She is a warm bright colourful being with good strong laughter. The Aus-trian woman the Portuguese woman and the Finnish woman do not have a laugh worth mentioning. The Danish woman comes bright and colourful to my bar. Her laughter is strong, good, healthy. The Danish woman turns up with a fine thirst to deal with. The little round Danish dog performs its trick for her at the table in my bar. The Danish woman laughs and raises her glass to all that see her and hear


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A story with flesh and emotion

All is body and sun. Spanish people gather at the marketplace in the evening to meet. Spanish people are full of warm pounding blood and strong connected emotions. Italian people are short-lived. Italian people stay strong for a couple of hours but will not last the entire feast. Spaniards last as long as it takes. Finnish people last without a comment. They last but are not worth talking to or knowing. They sit silently and do not move to anything but the Finnish tango. The Spanish move and dance with everyone. The Spanish move is the origin of motions. The Spanish body is the one that dances. The Spanish sun is the sun above the laughter. The Spanish heart is the heart always pounding and the Span-ish hate along with the Spanish love is our Spanish reality. We dance everything together I dance in orbit beneath the sun. French people put up an act the Greeks are acting. The Spanish meal is a complete meal, the Spanish siesta is good heavy sleep. The Spanish woman wakes up to dance some flamenco. The Spanish man wakes up to pick the calf among the calves to kill. Blood from the Spanish meat dries up in the Spanish sun. The Spanish sun dries up everything that was and does not leave anything wet for tomorrow. The Brit-ish sun leaves everything soaked. British people are resentful anaemic people with umbrellas. Spanish people meet up in the evening with warm tanned skin to heat. The Spaniard stays up late and does not give in. All is body and sun. All is heart and sun and blood

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A story of cold and heat

Juha comes to see me. It is the morning after, in the fresh raw frosty Finnish air that always holds the body together. Finnish people will not bend to anything. Finnish people are kind-hearted imposing white-haired people with a fine sense of humour to cope with the climate. Juha drinks a little from the bottle to strengthen his blood. He needs it to keep warm and upright. We drive through the green infinity of the Finnish woods. Always good to hide in always good for berry picking and construction. We built the Finnish sauna and maybe we drank something strong. Name the ones standing. No Dutch person would remain standing. No Brit-ish would keep standing in the Finnish delta with their kind of blood. Look at the Spaniards swaying, the Danish slidings the Greeks to and fro. I am the Finnish woman and I stand straight-backed with pleasure outside the Finnish sauna. Aino passes by. She expresses herself well in a closed form, keep-ing her eyes to the side. Yes we know contrasts, yes we know what cold is and we know heat. The contrasts urge blood through the aorta and keep us alive. Once I was in Portugal on a vacation. There were no contrasts worth mentioning. I remember Portugal as if it were raining although it was sunny. In Finland the weather never causes any hesitation. We are the Finnish survivors. Who else has anything to mention about survival? The Finnish nature is icy snowy and covered with tall Finnish spruces that go on for now and ever. And somewhere between the trees stands the Finnish sauna by a lake. I step in to sit, maybe drink, and notice how blood twitches with life in the body


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A story that passes

All of my sisters my mother and the mothers of my moth-ers wear short skirts and tiny lace bras. In France everything is smell and language. We do not express ourselves much with words that contain a k. Swedes and Germans inces-santly utter words containing k. They are dull boring obey-ing repressed people with no interesting smell about them. We don’t really concern ourselves with h either. The British keep on pronouncing, and the Danes. The Germans start talking with the intention of getting it said. French people speak with strongly lined fascinating mouths in motion. The lips of the French speaker spin a thread to the other’s mouth and pull it closer like a kitten. We invented the kiss and made something more out of conversation. Jean-Jacques comes to the café after his lesson. We stay to talk and then. We talk to continue the movement of mouths. Finnish people talk to return to silence. The Austrians speak in order not to commit any wrongs. Swedes talk to agree. The British write to give clues to a riddle. Luxembourgians would rather not write. Everything is there, in the nuances of the face opposite — a thinly drawn line between incident and lull. Jean-Pierre comes by. French people never cease to happen. French people dare to take themselves seriously, Jean-Jacques does not sweep over the room with a grin. Jean-Pierre draws his words in a bow, I take a few steps into it leaving the subor-dinate clauses hanging leaving the verbal forms hanging and the punctuation marks in the palate over the kiss

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A story with a breeze

The lads come by with their flutes. We take off across the moor. Sheep move about like soft clouds in the valley. The Irish sheep is a good fine thick-woolled sheep with a good sound in its throat. I swiftly send my sheepdog to keep the sheep together. The Irish girl jumps up and down playing with a ribbon in her hand. The Irish girl is a smile and life in itself. Good strong winds sweep through the surroundings. We gather around salted sheep-meat with good chewing-resistance to eat together. A strong warm feeling comes from the sense of the Irish woman. The German woman does not have any sensuality in her. The French woman has no sense at all. The Dutch woman has altogether too much in mind. Irish people are all in all good waterproof people who would not sell Ireland for anything. I walk over the moor and maybe I bring my flute. Judgements fall the deci-sions fall. Even the Irish sheep must be political. An evenly strong questioning wind reaches us from the open sea. Then comes the flute and singing. Irish flutes are wilful virtuous instruments with many ideas and games in them. Austrian flutes harbour no winds. French flute-players just suck on the flute, the Swedes break it into pieces. Portuguese people do not play today, they play tomorrow. The Irish flute knows what it takes to get there and to stay. And as the Irish woman starts to sing the wind does not weaken no the Irish people stand proud for everyone with or without a flute to belong together


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A story al dente

I bring power and trinkets for my mother. I walk where my brothers can spot me. In the evening I collect my sisters and put them in the house. Italian sisters are big-mouthed sisters who need to be collected. French sisters are sharp-mouthed and are not collected. They are obstinate self-focused people in high heels. The British sister refuses to be collected, she collects herself and stays indoors. Full-blooded black-haired Italian sisters with expressive eyebrows always have some-thing to say. The Swedish sister cannot think of anything to say. She giggles and smiles and lingers in the setting sun. Danish sisters have little needles with them to make me keep my distance. Portuguese sisters are too sleepy to pay atten-tion to any collector. Italian sisters sit up straight on chairs and drink good strong sweetened black Italian coffee straight down. The coffee-habits of others are not worth mention-ing. The Swedish people drink coffee but they only drink a lot. The Italian coffee is strong rich and the thing to start the day with. I am big enough to take care of my sisters. I am big; I can take care of them and make sure that they are well. I carefully collect them and bring them to laughter. They let themselves be collected and there is nothing frightening about the sisters then. I collect the sisters. I show my mother I can. She is so gorgeous, she is the ocean and the mountains and the earth as well. She stirs heavy casseroles with a ladle. I collect my Italian sisters with a power to be witnessed. We gather around the table. All members of the Italian family know how to eat and to sit with substance and presence. That is when the Italian mother puts out her pots

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A story without fuss

The Luxembourgian borders are easy to survey. We live inside and behind them. Luxembourgians are clean precise people. Luxembourgians have ironed clothes made with seams that will not give way. Luxembourgian people are people without ugly faces names and numbers. Austrian people are not unsoiled enough to wipe away their tracks or features. Austrian people smear themselves in the forest with blood from the flesh of the boar. Luxembourgian people are wealthy educated people with no fuss about them. All the countries altogether keep on fussing outside the Lux-embourgian borders. All Luxembourgian homes are clean vacuum-cleaned surfaces to stand on. Greek people walk barefoot on the kitchen floor over the bathroom floor and out into the hall. Luxembourgian men do not walk in any mud and never ever show any filth under their fingernails. Luxembourgian babies are clean white silent. And then we won the Eurovision song contest. I am the nameless faceless numberless Luxembourger. I sit down at the kitchen table after work with a glass of wine in my hand. The sky expres-sionless: mute. On the other side of the street in the opposite house a man is sitting. He is probably about my age and looks pretty much like me. We avoid looking at each other. The first thing I check as I sit down after work is whether he sits in front of me or not and I know he does the same. Cars pass by. Sometimes I get up almost straight away, most often I sit a quarter of an hour. The sky immovable, stiff. Quite quiet. Like a lid over thoughts. At times it shall happen that we remain seated for hours, both of us


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A story

Everything has a function to connect together. You may not always manage but you have to try and do what you can to make people and things function. I am the Swedish farmer and my tasks do not leave a moment to spare from morn-ing until dusk. The Swedish woman is beautiful with soft blond hair on her body like the cornfields. She has blue eyes that make one see if she is lying and she knows it. Most things go on in their usual way. My Swedish woman puts the dinner on the table and at my side a beer is placed. We do not use spice and we do not say much. The Italians the Spanish use too much spice; it is not good for the blood. A spice too strong makes blood rush to the head and that is not a good thing to get involved with. One has to tend one’s lot in life and not become a load and a burden. I work the soil, I bend it and turn clods, herd cattle and tell my wife that if she wants to she is free to work naked in the flowerbed. The space surrounds us. The silence. One has to try to take care of oneself and not surrender. But sometimes I feel the weariness of the ground under my feet and the seed does not take root in the mould. Then it may happen that I go to the cows at night. I walk between their deep breaths. I let the calves suck the salt off my hands. And then I can see whether something has become of what I have done on earth

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A story with a boat

The sun lays its pattern over the city. Portuguese people are good level-headed people with sun above. I will not be bothered. Others bother. Spanish people are loud sensation hunters with flapping gestures. The French being sits still in long sentences for a space of time. Then her nerves start to quiver. Who decides what is of weight? I tell them I signal that I am not willing to drive them in my car. British people jabber like monkeys in a cage. I find myself a good shady spot to lie down and rest for a while. If it matters what mat-ters. The Portuguese bus comes when it comes. And if I want to take the Portuguese boat somewhere I can do it when it does. But if I go away I would do so just to come back not to stay. I shut myself out from all that talk of direction and course. We are a couple of taxi drivers driving a gang of sail-ors down to the harbour. The sailors eagerly wave the flag and strike up a chorus. German people, British and French say they are up to something. I say I need not become. I am. A ship drifts by itself towards the coastline. The sailors hook their arms as they go up the gangway, smiling with evenly white teeth. I tell my Portuguese partners that if something really needs to be counted then why not count the waves the fish the wind


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A story to unfold

The German mother is the mother of all things. The German mother knows when to take part and when to leave it open. The British mother fears her sons and daughters. The Danish mother will not leave her house without a cigar. The German mother always picks which clothes her family should wear so that she can spot them easily in a crowd. I stand to be brought up like a good steady German mother. I stand to know the difference between this and that. The German mother stands determined in the kitchen door. The German mother knows the difference and the shapes and the limit. The German mother knows what belongs in which places and does not need to say it out loud. I prac-tice to be the mother of all intentions. I practice to separate emotion from it all. The Swedish mother always puts feelings into everything and cannot separate the mourning from the joy. The French have it all mixed up. The Luxembourgian mother cannot grasp anything wider than the Luxembourg-ian border. I stand to practice to be the German mother. I learn each particular place for things to put in the kitchen or in our hall. German children need strong decent steady German mothers to show them how to cope with it all. German husbands need firm muscular flesh in big amounts to keep calm in the house. German mothers do not need each other to talk to. They stand without hesitation keeping watch over the hall. German mothers do not take any spirits to sweep away the day before night-time. They have their hands full and need not cry or understand it all, how it has become

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A story to go

I can do what I want but what. If someone lies there asking for help then I help. Afterwards I go skating on the canal. I let it go. I am the Dutch bachelor and I have had a lot of practice in skating on the ice. I have played hockey, I have gone racing and touring too. I can go as fast as I want and anywhere I want. No one will stop me. I can stop myself. When the British reach a certain point they cannot stop themselves. Spanish people do not stop until the feast is over. The French only stop to start again. The Portuguese do not stop because they have not started. The Luxembourgers stay within the Luxembourgian borders. The Belgians stop and start at intervals behind the Belgian curtains. I can start and stop whenever I want. I can die or live the way I prefer. I can go where I want but where is that. I skate further and further on the ice of the Dutch canal. I go as fast and slow as I please but what do I please. Dutch people are nice open-minded people who always lend a helping hand. We are good decent people who do not cause any trouble as long as we can do what we want. The question is not what or when but how. I go fast, I am confident, but there always seems to be some-one behind me or ahead. In my language there are many open surfaces, firm and fragile above the abyss, where one cannot say much about anything. I skate three four hours a day. Sometimes it feels as if the ice is going to crack. I go a bit further


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A good story is one with a case

A story of interest is always one with murder. Any time is time for tea. It is always nice and appropriate. Tea is sooth-ing strengthening and consistent. You prefer it with milk do you not? You have a cat on the sofa and another at your feet. In that way the British day passes, the year passes. In the summer the roses grow. Then a murder might occur in the neighbourhood. I stand in my promised rose garden ponder-ing some strange things that may happen. All of a sudden Jane comes by for tea. Perhaps I have noticed something odd around here, have I? I act normal and point out some roses to her. Have you seen Alan lately, she asks me. Others yes, Alan no. Calm down Jane, now have some tea. Murders and attempted murders are constantly being committed. Wilful murders are found in Austria, Luxembourg, Belgium and among the Dutch. The impulsive ones are more likely to be found in Spain, Finland and the Netherlands. In Sweden they murder themselves. English people are good fascinat-ing people with something going on inside. We wear jump-ers and cardigans made of sheep. The clothes are sturdy and complete, keeping it all together and have nothing to show underneath. I stop by the butcher to have a chat. He is a round friendly being with fine eyes and a lot of things seen. When I am about to go home he sums up with a fine raw bloody pun to consider. I dissect it. One of the cats scratches my leg, making a hole in the stockings and the skin. The other kitty comes out of hiding, she purrs and licks me clean. One takes what one gets and makes something of it, some-thing to go and ponder, something of interest

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The only story

I have my Greek pride to hold and not to burst. I walk out on my piece of Greek land and there it is. In the Greek ground the world grew. I grow olive trees in the soil where Greek geniuses once trod. Little neat Greek goats run about, leaving their tracks. The black Greek goat jumps up on the roof of the restaurant and tosses its little head in the peace-ful Greek village, affirming it all. So Italian people claim to have history, so Germans and Finnish make their claims. The modest Greek women come walking together in black and they will never forget. Others keep forgetting. Belgian people forget, the Danish do not remember. Luxembourg-ian people cannot think of anything to recall. I walk, back bent, under the Greek foliage to collect my olives. Greek goats come running. They make the same noise they always have made since the beginning, but who seems to remem-ber? I stand beside my trees and it is the beginning of it all, but who gives pride its proper place? The Italian blood keeps rising the French burst for nothing at all. I stand in the Greek dusk just as they once did before me. The black Greek women silently nod at each other from the donkeys along the road

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EUropEAN WAISTMEASUrES

A story with nothing behind

If you look there you can see. There is nothing to hide. If you look over there you can see a house. It is built. It is a big strong house of the future to be. Things can happen they already are. We the Belgian people are rich with various experiences and have various dishes we prefer. Well, sooner or later we arrange the meetings around the elliptical table for all to be seen. Then we lock the door. Behind Swedish windows and doors the Swedish people sit thinking about their sorrow and pain. Belgian people do not have anything to hide, why should we? Belgian people are fine warm-hearted cheerful people. I do not lie, why should I? Belgian people know the importance of sharing and they know all about parting. Yes, Belgians know partner, participant and peculiar. Yes, we know particular and party. Will a tension arise between the walls? If the curtain is already drawn why keep on pulling it back? See how it fits the window. Finnish people are afraid of going mad in the solitude. Their curtains never fall. The French forget themselves in the dark. The Dutch hide among each other, the Irish among their sheep. The Danish hide inside their bodies, the Luxembourgers within the Luxembourgian borders. On Fridays I play canasta with my wife and my business partner and his wife. Belgian people do not have anything hidden, how could we? My wife deals the cards. The colleague mentions something by the way, adding a couple of names. The wives have strong cards in their hands. I mention something by the way and undo the top button of my shirt. The women win the first; win the second hand. The colleague reels off a couple of jokes with an allusion. Later I go with the colleague for a beer

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MATIAS FALDBAKKEN

translated from the Norwegian by Gardar Eide Einarsson

Edward Norton’s WaspVille

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Borders EDWArD NorToN'S WASpVILLE

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At the general assembly of The Enterprise Foundation, on Thursday September 3, 2001 in the city of Columbia, Mary-land, Hollywood actor and board member Edward Norton takes the rostrum to introduce a project proposal titled Wasp-Ville. The proposal causes instant debate and Norton is asked to seriously reconsider the project in its entirety, as well as to provide a more ideologically thorough and structured account of the concept at the next board meeting.

At the board meeting of October 28 that same year Norton steps up to the podium once more to present a new version of the proposal, this time with the heading: WaspVille: A Planned Community Solution for Mainstream Dissidents. Towards the end of Norton’s 45 minute Power Point presentation the chairman and ceo of The Enterprise Foundation F. Barton Harvey iii gets up. He interrupts Norton to read a passage from the press release that was issued upon Norton’s coming onto the board:

Norton, a graduate of Yale University, has a long-standing interest in the health and welfare of com-munities. It is a cause he was drawn to early in his life, growing up in Columbia, md, a racially diverse com-munity designed by his grandfather, Jim rouse.1

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Double Oscar nominee Edward Norton retorts by leaving the premises as chairman Harvey iii repeats: “A racially diverse community, Edward, racially diverse…”

James W. RouseNorton’s grandfather, the humanist, architect and visionary, Jim rouse (James W. rouse 1914-1996), has been credited with a number of things. After having founded The Moss-rouse Company with Hunter Moss in April 1939, a com-pany that offered affordable mortgages to low-income fami-lies, he was one of the first to predict the “white flight” from American inner cities and the suburbanization of the white race that was to follow. rouse soon realized the importance of planned communities which he felt could work as forti-fications against this uncontrollable suburban sprawl. Using the commercial core (the plaza) of classical Central European cities both as ideal and model, rouse was the first to launch what was to be come known as strip shopping centers, and in 1958 The rouse Company opened Harundale Mall, the first indoor shopping mall.2

The shopping mall was the first in a number of actions taken by rouse to reel in the hordes of people leaving the city centers and sluice them into new planned and controlled communities. He continued to develop the idea of the Central European market place through among other things establishing Faneuil Hall Marketplace, Boston, but it was through the foundation of a series of “new cities” in the 60’s, among these Columbia, Maryland, that his ideology for urban planning, New Urbanism, gathered momentum. As Alex Marshal describes:

He [rouse] was determined to improve the design of suburbia, to build a better, more manageable kind of sprawl, where commerce, religion, schooling, shopping and all the components of 20th century life would


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take place in a more practical and harmonious fashion. rouse was also determined to build a socially better place, where a mix of all races and even incomes would live and work together, avoiding or overcom-ing the derisive racial battles then ripping apart the nation.3

Columbia, Edward Norton’s home city, is said to be the most successful of rouse’s visionary “new cities”.4 In 1997 Columbia had 85 000 inhabitants, 20% of which were Afro-Americans. The inhabitants, heterogenous in class as well as ethnicity, are spread over villages loosely grouped around a regional shopping mall that works as the heart of the city. Mixed into this multi-ethnic Our Town-like city structure are parks, schools, inter-religious centers, offices and some industry. To maintain the unifying village features — albeit a rather Disneyfied version of central European village features (rouse was also one of the masterminds of Disney’s Cel-ebration, Florida) — the inhabitants are prohibited from for example painting windowsills and doors according to their own tastes as well as putting up ornamentation in their yards. But this is the price one has to pay for being able to walk, rather than drive, to the store for milk.

The general suburbanization continued throughout 70’s America in spite of rouse’s relatively successful initiatives. His city projects were realizable through a large amount of private capital, but outside of the controlled and subsidized town-enclaves his pet-project, the shopping mall, had started working as the catalyst for the processes it was intended to slow down. rouse was horrified, but his grandson Edward Norton has always been full of praise for what his grandfather accomplished in Columbia:

It was his idea for the 20th century model commu-nity in America. And most people who grew up there

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think it was very successful in that sense. I grew up there from the late Sixties on, and even then it was a highly racially and socioeconomically integrated com-munity — way, way beyond the national average.5

Jim rouse founded The Enterprise Foundation together with his wife Patricia (Norton’s grandmother) in 1982 and Edward Norton was elected to the Board of Trustees in the summer of 2000. On the Enterprise Foundation’s homepage one finds the following statement: Our mission is to see that all low-income people in the United States have the opportunity for fit and affordable housing and to move up and out of poverty into the mainstream of American life. This statement is to be seen as a synthesis of and foundation for rouse’s philanthropic life’s work, but in 1998 board member and grandchild Edward Norton developed an obsession on the formulation the mainstream of American life.

Woody Allen and JudaismIt was grandfather Jim rouse who encouraged Edward Norton to try his hand at acting, or if nothing else, to pursue his dream:

He told me “Don’t, don’t, don’t go into a job just for money or because you think that’s what you have to do.”6

When Norton finished his History studies at Yale to try his luck as an actor, he was convinced that he was making an unconventional and contrary life decision, but during the filming of Woody Allen’s Everyone Says I Love You (1996), his self image as the self-imposed outsider was relativized. During preparations Norton became aware that his voice-over in the movie was similar to the one Allen usually has when he acts himself. He asked Allen about this:


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“I said ‘Is this the part you would’ve played?’” Norton recalls. “He said ‘Well, no. He’s a Wasp!’” I said “Good point,” but thought: “I’ve actually been hailed in here to represent the mainstream.” And at the same time I realized that Mr. Allen had an advantage by simply being a Jew, which I didn’t have as a Wasp.7

Norton excused himself to Allen saying he had to go to the bathroom and quickly walked out to his car. Once there he wrote four words on a post-it note and sat staring at it for 20 minutes: What’s Wrong With Wasp?

“The ill effects of a happy childhood”Due to the successful racial integration in Columbia, Norton was unaware of the state of the rest of the nation when it came to tribalization or ethnic segregation. He had his first awakening when he came to Yale as a freshman and saw the problems a couple of boys from white West Coast cities had sharing their room with a black boy from Compton, la. He found this “unexpected and strange” and after this became “an avid community-watcher.”8

His career catapulted, and after the filming of Everyone Says I Love You he came to Memphis, Tennessee, to shoot Larry Flynt. There he was once again surprised:

“It seems the whole black community is on one side of town,” he slices the air with his hand, “and on the other is the whole white community.” Amazement sneaks out in his voice.9

It started to dawn on Norton that a frictionless childhood was not all good as a background for an actor. There is something proto-humane in the segregation, the hate and the alienation that is foreclosed by harmony, he thinks, and becomes more and more concerned with what he calls “the

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ill effects of a happy childhood.”10 Norton sinks deeper and deeper into the view that it seems an advantage to have a subgroup or minority to anchor one’s anger and suffering to:

I used to envy people who were driven by the tex-tures of their history. I believed that unique art was produced by intense needs to break out of some kind of confinement. I didn’t think defining and iconic art could come out of a sheltered life. Thus it’s hard to say whether Columbia was an Eldorado or a “Hell-dorado,” so to speak, for an aspiring actor or artist like me.11

Discovery of anger in American History XAmerican History X, the story of a neo-Nazi front figure who is incarcerated for a racially motivated homicide required Norton to do research in extreme right wing circles. This gave him an understanding of how many troubled white youths, who from the outset did not belong to a minority or subgroup, were out to actively transform themselves into one in order to feel a sense of belonging. Norton understood that neo-Nazism at bottom is not about ideology, but about “a need for belonging or an alternative family.”12 And with what he came to call his “zero-experience and zero-belong-ing” he entered into the interpretation of the neo-Nazi character of Derek Vinyard with a fundamental understand-ing.

[T]he challenge of creating that guy as an actor was really thrilling.13

Norton has said that it felt like “something special” to walk around with a swastika on his chest; he thought of it as a will to create a white middle class resistance against a main-stream that “is always already both white and middle-class.”14


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Norton has also said that this insight, in addition to the prac-tical experience from American History X, gave him a basic understanding for the phenomenon of wanting to become totally anti-establishment. This was an understanding he tell-ingly enough had to go out of Columbia to find.

However, it was not until the filming of Fight Club that these insights started having personal consequences for Norton.

Fight Club and anti-mainstreamThe circumstances around Fight Club gave Norton another chance to formulate the disharmony he started feeling in relation to his background. More and more often he made generationally specific statements in interviews and among other things claimed that Fight Club had “a generational energy to it, a protest energy.”15 It was especially the baby-boomer generation and its legacy Norton started showing strong antipathy towards — in line with the film’s aggression against franchise-culture (ikea, Starbucks), Placebo-industry (Prozac, Olestra, rogaine) and the repressive tolerance of the boomer generation. A selection of statements by Norton:

I guess I’ve felt for a long time that a lot of the films that were aimed at my generation were some baby boomer perception of what Gen-X was about.16

An all-ikea-furnished apartment is blown to bits. A reissued Volkswagen Beetle suffers a memorable fate; it was a personal target of Norton’s, “vis-à-vis the baby boomers’ repackaging their youth culture and selling it to my generation,” he [Norton] sneers.17

So much of what’s been represented about my genera-tion has been done by the baby boomers. They dismiss us: the word slacker, the oversimplification of the

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Gen-X mentality as one of hesitancy or negativity. It isn’t just aimlessness we feel; it’s deep skepticism.18

In the interviews given in the wake of the movie Norton started showing that he had minimal tolerance for the boomers’ criticism of the movie. The New Yorker’s David Denby tried to say that the anti-consumerism of the movie was eclipsed by a sado-masochist and homoerotic subtext, that the dangers of ikea were forgotten, and asked why one needed to pick on ikea in the first place. Norton spoke his mind:

“This is exactly what we’re indicting in this movie,” responds Norton, his voice rising to a crescendo; he cannot fathom how anyone who calls himself a man could defend the soulless Scandinavian-furniture store. As he speaks, I can picture him breaking an imitation Philippe Starck end table over Denby’s head.19

Fight Club established Norton’s understanding of himself as a Gen-Xer — although a little late (1999). His contact with David Fincher (director), Chuck Palahniuk (author of the novel Fight Club) and co-star Brad Pitt (who also grew up in a suburb, this one in Springfield, Missouri) gave him valu-able perspectives on the problems of mass culture: that mass culture creates disillusionment in the masses; that the white male yuppie existence fosters a massive feeling of empti-ness; and perhaps most important of all: that all important art works grow out of conflict, not consensus as mass culture does. Norton later claimed that his grandfather Jim rouse gave him a feeling of social, but not cultural responsibility:

“You don’t generate as much energy if you don’t have conflict,” Norton agrees. “In Buddhism there’s Nir-vana, and then there’s Samsara, the world of confusion


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and disharmony. That world is our testing ground, where we have the experiences that help us become enlightened. I’m not saying Fight Club is The Book of Living and Dying, but it was kind of that idea: You’re challenging yourself to break out of the world.”20

The idea of pure conflict as cultural catalyst made Norton draw on the experiences he got from his research for Ameri-can History X. The innate will that lay behind some of the young extreme right-wingers’ decision to make themselves cultural and social abjects fascinated him. Norton progres-sively started to firstly bring up his understanding of a Nietz-schean state of beyondness and secondly to put it in context with the character Tyler Durden’s (Brad Pitt’s) function in Fight Club:

A lot of people have been responding to Tyler as a sort of Nietzschean übermensch in the sense that he’s advocating liberation of the human individual through the rejection and destruction of the institutions and value systems that are enslaving us.21

And it is in the wake of the launch of the movie that Norton starts playing with ideas of a community that — provoca-tively enough — can encompass his social background as a Wasp. While traveling between interviews and round table discussions schematizing the Gen-Xers newfound will to resistance, the emptiness of the white middle-class and Sala-ryman’s Angst as such, he comes up with titles/terms such as: Flight Club, White Club and the combination of the two that in a way honors his grandfather Jim rouse’s invention: White Flight Club.22

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Grandfather and resistanceIt soon becomes paramount for Norton to underline that Fight Club and the ideas that flourished in the circumstances surrounding the movie is not in opposition to the work and utopian ideas of his grandfather. He on the contrary holds that the Fight Club-attitudes speak across three generations. He often seizes the opportunity to underline that very fact:

And if there is a subject about which Norton will gladly play rouse’s scion, it is the “malling” of Amer-ica — the notion that homogeneity is suffocating eclecticism at every turn. […] I ask how he views the fact that Starbucks and other chains have snuffed out the independent retailers that were part of his grand-father’s initial vision for his developments at Boston’s Faneuil Hall and New York’s South Street Seaport.

“I look on it very negatively,“ says Norton. “And my response to that was Fight Club. I think my grand-father would have loved Fight Club, actually, because it spoke to the same things he was railing against for years: the franchising of America, the creation of sameness everywhere, all our transactions taking place within these places that are totally indistinct.”23

In the spring of 2001 Norton decides to make an attempt at updating his grandfather’s visions and dress them up in a contemporary costume. In June 2001 he publishes an article in Cache titled: “Communities for the Alienated.” The article starts with a short anecdote about a visit he made to his home town a few months earlier.

Home in ColumbiaNorton’s father, Edward James Norton Sr., is struck by a case of acute kidney failure and Edward has to go home to Columbia for a brief period of time (his mother, robin


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Norton, died in 1997). After two days of walking and pon-dering in his home town he receives an e-mail from Graham Fuller (journalist with Interview), whom he is in sporadic e-mail contact with after the interviews they did together. Fuller asks Norton to read an article published in Harper’s Magazine in April 1996 by the author Jonathan Franzen.24 Towards the end of the article Franzen refers to an exchange he has had with David Foster Wallace on the issue of margin-alized communities. Wallace writes:

A contemporary culture of mass-marketed image and atomized self-interest is going to be one without any real sort of felt community. […] And it’s not an acci-dent that so many writers “in the shadows” are straight white males. Tribal writers can feel the loneliness and anger and identify themselves with their subculture and can write to and for their subculture about how the mainstream culture’s alienated them. White males are the mainstream culture.25

Norton speaks of the enormous recognition he is struck by in the statement “white males are the mainstream culture,” and understands that this is the core of the complex problem he has tried to come to grips with ever since the meeting with Woody Allen during the shooting of Everyone Says I Love You. He formulates it like this:

Wasp-frustration stems from hate against the main-stream — from the hate of being the mainstream.26

Driven by an acute feeling of rootlessness he goes into the attic of his childhood home and starts rummaging around in the crates where his childhood possessions are stored, in the hope of finding something that will give clues to what formed him as a cultural being, as a cultural participant.

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He discovers a series of props stemming from his time as a W.A.S.P.-fan — a time his years at Yale had made him repress — and they catch his interest. It doesn’t take him more than a couple of minutes of reflection to understand that the W.A.S.P. props are the most genuine expression of white man’s culture he has come across in several years. He imme-diately understands that this expression has been formative for him:

What is it that a Heavy Metal band like W.A.S.P. riots against? It’s own mainstreamness, and only that!27

Blackie Lawless and W.A.S.P. Edward Norton spends the following days finding informa-tion on what happened to the heavy metal band W.A.S.P. after the 80’s in order to flesh things out a little. He unfurls one reference after the other. First of all he comes across titles of albums and songs that he feels express the quintes-sence of his own reflections:

The album Helldorado from 1999 hits the bullseye on his description of his home town Columbia (see footnote 8), and further titles like Unholy Terror, K.F.D. (Kill Fuck Die), Still Not Black Enough, Wasted White Boys, Great Misconception of Me, and Chainsaw Charlie, close in around his mass cultural speculations of the last years.

Secondly he finds more interviews with vocalist and songwriter Blackie Lawless made after the heyday of the 80’s. Lawless, whom Norton has never considered a serious cultural player or even a thinking person, turns out to be not only reflective and serious, he appears to Norton as a kind of proto-Gen-Xer considering his almost prophetic grasp of identity problematics and alienation. Ever since the formation of the band these were central themes:

Well, when we first got together [1981-82], I would


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say we understood everything about ourselves with the exception of one thing: who we were as people.28

These kinds of statements combined with Lawless’ linguistic inventiveness made Norton certain that he had found in the 46 year old Lawless the grandfather of self-conscious dis-illusioned white man’s culture; according to Norton it takes more than youthful aggression to come up with the follow-ing line:

Deb: Inscribed on the first cut of your first record it says “We Are Sexual Perverts,” is that the true meaning of W.A.S.P.?

Blackie: We Ain’t Sure Pal!29

Norton draws on Lawless’ logic and language games in his article:

During Fight Club, I remember looking at Brad [Pitt] and thinking: “This guy is the center of everybody’s attention, he’s basically the epicenter of the world, but there’s something missing.” And after reading Wallace’s comment in Franzen’s article I understood what was missing in Brad’s life, and also in mine. We’ve got nothing to identify with. We’ve got nothing to identify our anger with. When you’re the King of the World, you identify with nothing. You can ask young-sters like Brad and me about who we are as people, and you will most likely wind up with this answer: We Ain’t Sure Pal!30

The band’s real name — White Anglo-Saxon Perverts — is a name choice that vulgarizes the “exalted” wording of the term Wasp by literally perverting the religious aspect of the

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ethno-religious description White Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Blackie Lawless’ strict Protestant upbringing mirrored Nor-ton’s, and Lawless’ will to conflict and dissent found its coun-terpart in Norton’s understanding of the disruptive cultural contribution. The following description of Lawless’ apparent anti-subtlety —

He’s the one who propelled the over-the-top Animal (F*** Like a Beast) single into the hearts of censors everywhere, including Tipper Gore’s Parents’ Music resource Center in 1985. He and [Chris] Holmes (guitarist) also created W.A.S.P.’s vicious comeback album with 1997’s K.F.D. (Kill, Fuck, Die). Let’s just say the disc and tour took subtlety and sodomized it.31

— is in close dialogue with Norton’s:

If Fight Club wasn’t disturbing, if we didn’t piss a few people off, we wouldn’t have done our job properly.32

Anger as motivation (Salaryman Anger instead of Salaryman Angst) had interested Norton throughout American History X and Fight Club and Lawless’ mature comeback also turned out to be motivated by a violent aggression:

One of the things that happened when Chris and I got back together was we had both come out of bad relationships. He had just divorced Lita and I had a girl that comes up to me after three years and tells me she is gay. So if anger was people, we would’ve been China!33

So what do you do when you are frustrated and feel anger without apparent reason?, asks Norton in his article “Com-munities for the Alienated.” Shall one say as Cioran did:


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“When one cries without any reason it is a confirmation that one has understood everything”? No, he feels. When one is angry without any reason it is a confirmation that one has everything. A confirmation that the only thing you don’t have is something to lose. And how do you get some-thing to lose? You have to create your own community. You have to invest in yourself and what is yours. That was what his grandfather Jim rouse had understood, and that is what Norton now realizes he must do. He understands that he must use his new won position on the board of The Enter-prise Foundation to realize his vision. And with that the idea of WaspVille was conceived.

WaspVilleAt the board meeting of The Enterprise Foundation on October 28 2001, Edward Norton presents the proposal: WaspVille: A Planned Community Solution for Mainstream Dis-sidents. The first thing he explains is that he has upgraded the meaning of the term Wasp, from White Anglo-Saxon Protes-tant to White Alienated Straight Person. He says he has chosen “person” rather than “male” first because one needs both sexes to create a community, and second because he feels that women are so equal in the western world that they can no longer be considered a subgroup:

You don’t think: “That’s a woman” when you see one, but you do think: “That is a black person,” which basi-cally means that black people have an advantage when it comes to being different.34

The founding idea for Norton is that WaspVille will func-tion as a place where white, heterosexual persons avoid being representative of the mainstream. It is to be a place one comes to when other centers are taken over by diversity (sexual and ethnic heterogeneity). According to Norton “the

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losers have become the winners in the identity war” in the sense that those representing subcultures are the only ones who have an identity. The peasants have become kings. It is because of the white straight identity deficit that he among other things suggests that WaspVille must be kept clinically clean of “aliens” in the same way that the Amazon-Indians are sheltered from tourism etc. in order to, as he says ,“avoid bastardizing this new community.”

Norton presents a short history of the band W.A.S.P. — he among other things claims that it is an interesting paradox that the vocalist of W.A.S.P. calls himself Blackie. Blackie Lawless — according to Norton — plays on the unconscious subversive quality of the word “Black,” something that can be called the privilege of alienation of black slaves. He feels that Lawless has understood this and that he is a first rate representative of what he calls “the White Man’s New Burden”; the burden of not being anyone (he refers to W.A.S.P.’s “I Wanna Be Somebody Too” and “Wasted White Boys”), or the burden of continuously being taken for the one who has all advantages (he refers to the song “Great Misconception of Me”). Norton further explains the choice of W.A.S.P. as the main reference for WaspVille by claiming that political incorrectness is the white straight alienated persons only weapon against further levelling and nullité. And the political incorrectness is always best at its most spontaneous and unreflected. He gives an example of how Blackie Lawless and Chris Holmes reacted to the political turmoil surrounding their public appearance:

I remember back in 85, me and Chris are sitting on the tour bus watching the tv. One of the Washington wives was on and Chris looks at me and says “What’s the big fuckin’ deal all about?” and I said “I don’t know.” It was all very child-like. Because we didn’t know.35


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Lawless does not compromise. Compromise belongs to a sick idea of pride based on consensus as value. Norton continues to quote from Lawless interviews:

Deb: With the political issues you are hitting now, you seem to be thoroughly interested in what’s going on in the world and quite educated on it as well. If it were a possibility would you ever consider running for an office?

Blackie: I’ve talked about it a number of times. The problem with something like that is, politics has long been considered the art of compromise. I’m not good at that. For the foreseeable future, however long that may be, a couple of years anyway, I’m better off where I am right now because I can voice my opinion with-out somebody trying to put a lid on it.36

And, Norton adds, it is when one hears this kind of stuff that one elects Blackie Lawless as mayor of one’s town. You can’t pick David Foster Wallace, or any other cultural persona as mayor of WaspVille because he will always know what “the big fucking deal is all about” (see footnote 35), because he has constructed the big fucking deal. And by being a construc-tor rather than an instinctive interventionist he will always be placed mid-stream in the cultural consensus. People who construct their position will always compromise and be driven by sick democratic pride, he says and continues:

In WaspVille you have to abandon Pride, just as they did in Thomas Moore’s Utopia. Moore believed that for there to be no classes, there could be no Pride. I believe that for there to be no races, there can be no Democratic Pride. The thing WaspVille offers is the security of not being mainstream.37

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Just before chairman and ceo F. Barton Harvey iii stands up to read from his press release, Susan G. Baker (Co-Founder and Co-Chairman) asks if there isn’t a chance Norton’s intentions could be misunderstood. Norton replies aggres-sively with the same monologue he served Graham Fuller in Fighting Talk:

You cannot pursue a creative statement because of the fear that it will be misinterpreted. […] Many of the things that have been called subversive are regarded as classics now, including much of Oscar Wilde. Because some men pursue their sexual obsessions with young girls, does that mean Nabokov shouldn’t have written Lolita? Should Martin Scorsese not have made Taxi Driver because there was the potential that someone like John Hinckley would use it as the excuse for his particular pathology? Should I not involve myself in the particularities of Western Apathy of Straight Per-sons, because of some Hitler-fetishists, or whatever? I think the answer to that is definitely no. Art has an important role in holding up a mirror to the things that are unhealthy in a culture. And WaspVille is such a mirror!38

Following this, Norton, in his relatively complex presenta-tion of the city’s structure, draws heavily on his grandfa-ther’s Technostalgia (pre-industrial city planning pared with post-industrial information technology), and with the aid of Lawless-inspired wordplays, talks of how among other things ikea furniture must be banned since ikea to him represents the utmost White American-Scandinavian Paranoia. WaspVille is to be nothing more and nothing less than “a kind of Wipeout the Angst of the Salaryman-Place.”

He also suggests a plaque be mounted on city hall bearing the inscription:


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Blackie Lawless 1958 – ? Homme Politique

He then leaves the board meeting in anger over F. Barton Harvey iii’s interruption.

The rejectionOn the board meeting of 9 January 2002 The Enterprise Foundation rejects Edward Norton’s proposal to invest in the project WaspVille.

1 The Enterprise Foundation Board of Trustees, Press release June 2,

2000. www.enterprisefoundation.org/press/archives/news218.asp.2 It is claimed that Victor Gruen beat rouse at the finishing line in

constructing the first mall (Alex Marshall, Metropolis Magazine, April

7, 1997), but Jim rouse has nevertheless remained the “inventor” of

this “America’s new downtown.”3 Alex Marshall, “Columbia, Maryland,” Metropolis Magazine, April 7

1997.4 In addition to planned cities like Columbia, reston in Virginia,

Irvine and Clear Lake City in Houston, The rouse Company (for-

merly Moss-rouse) were involved in several downtown-projects in

great American cities: South Street Seaport in New York; The Gal-

lery on Market East in Philadelphia; Harborplace and The Gallery at

Harborplace in Baltimore; Bayside Marketplace in Miami; Westlake

Center in Seattle; and Pioneer Place in Portland.5 Craig McLean, The Face, December 1999.6 Catherine Hyde, “Edward Norton on Communities, Planned and

Perverse, and Why New York is Better Than la,” Horizon Magazine,

1998.

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7 Tyler McLeod, “Actor Shook Off His Jitters,” Toronto Sun, February

1997.8 Catherine Hyde, “Edward Norton on Communities, Planned and

Perverse, and Why New York is Better Than la,” Horizon Magazine,

1998.9 ibid.10 ibid.11 ibid.12 realPlayer-snippet from round Table-discussion on American

History X on www.hollywood.com.13 ibid.14 Gretchen Swimmer, Film & Theory, December 1998.15 Johanna Schneller, Premiere Magazine, August 1999.16 Graham Fuller, “Fighting Talk,” Interview Magazine, November

1999.17 Johanna Schneller, Premiere Magazine, August 1999.18 ibid.19 John Brodie: “Ed Norton Just Wants it Perfect,” gq Magazine,

March 2001.20 Johanna Schneller, Premiere Magazine, August 1999.21 Graham Fuller, “Fighting Talk,” Interview Magazine, November

1999.22 Edward Norton, “A Diary of Conflict,” Celluloid Magazine, July

2000. 23 John Brodie, “Ed Norton Just Wants it Perfect,” gq Magazine,

March 2001.24 Jonathan Franzen, “Perchance to Dream: In the Age Of Images, A

reason To Write Novels,” Harper’s Magazine, April 1996.25 ibid.26 Edward Norton, “Communities for the Alienated,” Cache Magazine,

June 2001.27 ibid.28 Brian Cole, Electric Basement, February 26 2000. www.electricbase-

ment.com.29 Deb, Metalflakes, May 2001.


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30 Edward Norton, “Communities for the Alienated,” Cache Magazine,

June 2001.31 Brian Cole, Electric Basement, February 26, 2000. www.electricbase-

ment.com.32 Graham Fuller, “Fighting Talk,” Interview Magazine, November

1999.33 Brian Cole, Electric Basement, February 26, 2000. www.electricbase-

ment.com.34 The Enterprise Foundation Board of Trustees, Newsletter, January

9th 2002.35 Brian Cole, Electric Basement, February 26, 2000. www.electricbase-

ment.com.36 Deb, Metalflakes, May 2001.37 The Enterprise Foundation Board of Trustees, Newsletter, January

9th 2002.38 Graham Fuller, “Fighting Talk,” Interview Magazine, November 1999.

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DAS BECKWErK

translated from the Danish by Gaye Kynoch

The Democracy —Destination: Iraq

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Borders THE DEMoCrACy

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January 2003

1. The work: “the parliament”

A fiction. In a world like ours, one fine day a famous archi-tect has this idea: to build a world parliament, a space with access for everyone, from all sides, at all times.

Act 1: A theatre. Das Beckwerk — the reactor in Buddinge, Copenhagen, Denmark. 5 actors, 30 repetitions, January 11 to February 15 2003.

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“… hold … the mirror up to nature”

The work of art as utopia or prophecy


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the architect

Thisis the primary diagram of dialogueit is in balanceharmoniousand yet it contains its own contradictionOut of this simple diagramthe parliament will risea building that will make everyone feel at homewith those they thought they didn’t understandthe despised, the hated, the enemyThe diagram is very simpleso obviousthat no one would notice itand without having to know morethan what you have already learntit willas a matter of courseform the life that is liveddialoguede de democracy

e x p l o s i o n

the contractor

As mentioned, even in the perfect architect’s drawing there will be a point you’ve overlooked. The spot where you your-self are standing.

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January – February 2003

2. A state of emergency: the Parliament in Buddinge/Iraq

“Will the United Nations serve the purpose of its founding, or will it be irrelevant? … will its words mean anything? … will the words have merit and weight?” — George W. Bush

The Parliament in Buddinge/Iraq is not a mirror, buta borderlanda both-and

and simultaneouslyan either-or

a state of emergency between reality andfiction

Act 2: 7 parliamentary sessions in Das Beckwerk, January 25 – February 15 2003. Delegates as themselves: staff from the theatre, audience, invited experts.


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chairman nielsen, January 29 2003to the audienceI am the People. Wir sind Das Volk. And this is Our Parlia-ment. An historic opportunity to create the real, the true democracy, a completely new world order. Until a few days ago this was the Parliament in Buddinge, the first world parliament in history, but since Wednesday night, when Das Beckwerk was declared Iraqi territory, this is the Parliament in Iraq, the touchstone for the new world, a potential model for future democracies. But time is short. The old world is impatient. We still have a few weeks, on evenings like this, to prove that democracy and dialogue — not war — is the only tenable route leading into a future.

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The bin Nielsen tapes

“When we got here, it is above all to wake up the demo-cratic spirit and try to save the children and the ones who has no power. Once the Germans was here. And then Ameri-can culture arrived. And now we is come.”

bin Nielsen, January 25 2003

(video transcript)

www.binNielsen.com


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“I am the one who stays behindI am the place you never findBe sure my death will be the end‘Of what?’ you say, of you my friend

I am the world behind your backYou wanna call me? say ‘Hi Jack’I am the evil that you needTo be freed”

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3. Staging of the public arena

February – March 2003

A fictionalisation of the real. A realisation of the fiction.

Act 3: The show/the reality takes place in the public arena, which is just as much the media (newspapers, television, radio, and the internet) as it is the geographical locations (Das Beckwerk, Kongens Nytorv, the Kingdom of Den-mark).

Why Iraq?

Geopolitics


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Das Beckwerk declared Iraqi territory!

The night leading into Thursday, January 30, 2003, Das Beckwerk — the reactor in Buddinge — is declared Iraqi territory. Das Beckwerk will henceforth be considered a potential target of American military operations. This will have consequences for the areas bordering on or in the immediate vicinity of Das Beckwerk — principally Bud-dinge, the borough of Gladsaxe, Greater Copenhagen, Sjæl-land and Skåne.

Das Beckwerk is not in the immediate geographic vicinity of the rest of Iraq, but considers itself to be under the jurisdic-tion of the Iraqi Administration. Therefore, Das Beckwerk will henceforward exist under the Iraqi flag. Das Beckwerk considers the incumbent Iraqi President to be its legal, dem-ocratically-elected president. This does not rule out the fact that individuals at Das Beckwerk might want to fight for a completely different man as the President of the Iraqi people. As is the case with the rest of Iraq, Das Beckwerk declares itself open to un military inspections. Das Beckwerk will henceforth handle all Iraqi dealings with Denmark.

On behalf of Das Beckwerk

Nielsen, Foreman

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The Democratic Iraq is proclaimed on Friday February 7, 1400 hrs, on Kongens Nytorv, a central square in Denmark

After the leader of Das Beckwerk, the so-called “Foreman” Nielsen, last week declared Das Beckwerk in Buddinge to be Iraqi territory — behind the backs of almost all the employ-ees, actors and technicians — a minority of the theatre’s actors and staff decided to dissociate themselves from Nielsen and his recognition of Saddam Hussein’s reign of terror.

Every Wednesday and Saturday since January 25, we, in the Parliament in Buddinge, have tried, in dialogue with audi-ence and experts, to reach agreement on an ideal constitu-tion and form of government for the democracy of the future. Such an attempt should, in the nature of this case, take place as a democratic process, but this very democracy has largely been absent throughout the entire process. The self-appointed “Foreman” Nielsen and “Chairman” Nielsen has used Das Beckwerk and the Parliament in Buddinge as a platform for Nielsen’s own ideas and the self-management of his images. Wishing for a real, and not just stage-man-aged, democracy, a minority has therefore decided to pull out of the theatre premises in Buddinge and, going by the name beckvaerk/container, to continue work in the theatre’s container on Kongens Nytorv where tomorrow, Friday at 1400hrs, we will proclaim the Democratic Iraq.

The Democracy - Destination: Iraq

Demokratiet samles i container og sendes til Irak På et 55 minutter langt møde mandag eftermiddag mellem Nielsen og Rasmussen i beckvaerk/container på Kgs. Nytorv blev man enige om: 1. Containeren på Kgs. Nytorv bliver overstatslig enhed beckvaerk/container ændrer status fra "Det Demokratiske Irak" til at være en overstatslig enhed, en transnational og grænseoverskridende container. 2. Demokrati-erfaringer samles i containeren På Das Beckværk i Buddinge har man i lørdags afsluttet en månedlang undersøgelse af demokratiet. Erfaringerne fra den lange proces vil man nu overlade til opbevaring i beckvaerk/container på Kgs. Nytorv. 3. Demokrati-containeren sendes til Irak I de kommende måneder vil beckvaerk/container gennem samtaler med irakere og andre verdensborgere opbygge en model for demokratiet. Til slut vil containeren blive forseglet med sit indhold af demokratisk etik, samtaler, kort og objekter og afsendt mod Irak. 4. De første skridt: Torsdag 20. februar kl. 13:00: Nielsen går gennem Danmark I overmorgen, torsdag d. 20. februar, kl. 13 vil værkfører Nielsen afgå til fods fra Das Beckværk gennem Danmark mod beckvaerk/container på Kgs Nytorv bærende på Demokratiets fane plus det sidste halve års erfaringer med demokratiet i Parlamentet i Buddinge. Fredag 21. februar: Tema-åbning: Uge 1:

Hvem er det irakiske folk? Første samtale: Delavar Ajgi fra KDP (Kurdiske Demokratiske Parti) på vegne af Das Beckværk, beckvaerk/container Nielsen & Rasmussen

beckvaerk/container Kgs. Nytorv

Tlf. 27215598/40599402

mail: [email protected]

[email protected]


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By proclaiming Das Beckwerk as Iraqi territory and not simultaneously dissociating from Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi regime, Nielsen has, in a classic version of anti-Amer-icanism, merely made the fate of the Iraqi people a pawn in the conflict between Europe and the us.

We will in no way become involved in this sham approach and instead want to view the conflict and the struggle for democracy from the perspective of the Iraqi people. The Democratic Iraq dissociates itself from Saddam Hussein’s regime and considers the Democratic Iraq on Kongens Nytorv to be the only legitimate representation of the Iraqi people.

We propose to involve Iraqis living here in a genuine discus-sion about the future of democracy in Iraq, unlike Das Beck-werk, which paradoxically on its “Iraqi territory” has not been in dialogue with a single Iraqi.

Early next week beckvaerk/container will release a plan of the work and actions to be undertaken during the coming weeks, and will brief the public regularly.

For the Democratic Iraq, beckvaerk/container and on behalf of the Iraqi people

Rasmussen, political dramaturgebeckvaerk/container

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Why Iraq?

Domestic policy


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TV-Danmark 2, local news, February 6 2003

newsreader

A political play, intended to show the way to a more demo-cratic Iraq, has split the theatre company Das Beckwerk at Gladsaxe Theatre. A breakaway faction now accuses the play’s leader of being dictatorial.cut to Kongens Nytorv and beckvaerk/container, reporter Gunnar Blaschke appears from behind the container

reporter gunnar blaschke

This is the container at the centre of the dispute. As of tomorrow, it will be launched as the territory of a demo-cratic Iraq, and this has, in fact, split the Das Beckwerk the-atre company in two.

”project manager” rasmussen

on location, Kongens NytorvWe’re going to try to make the democracy in here on the square in relation to people at eye level, because the audience that comes out there in Buddinge and the discussion out there is very elitist, and, maybe, somewhat academic.

”theatre manager” nielsen

telephone interview, from Das BeckwerkAs this is all about democracy, then I say that he or they must have the right to do what they’re doing, unless they’re just using it to go up against me in some way or other.

reporter For the last two years Das Beckwerk has been the studio the-atre connected to Gladsaxe Theatre, under the management of Claus Beck-Nielsen, seen here in a photograph from one of the productions.

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rasmussen

He’s difficult to work with because he stage-manages himself so much and so sometimes you don’t know where you’ve got him. And you try to have an important dialogue or an important talk with him and then he goes straight out and stage-manages something new and that makes it difficult to have dealings with him.

reporter How would you characterise him in terms of a democratic perspective?

rasmussen

He’s a bit dictatorial.

nielsen telephone interviewWell now, I wouldn’t say I’m particularly dictatorial, I’m maybe just very full of ideas, and er … and er … and very hard-working.

reporter

Nielsen carries on talking while the reporter asks his questionAnd perhaps that could make you seem like a bit of a steam-roller too?abrupt silence

nielsen

Yes, that may be so.

newsreader

The two factions of Das Beckwerk have yet to make a final decision as to how the future will unfold for the theatre company.


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nielsen

Well then, maybe it’ll turn out that we’re actually sort of working along the same line, just separately, and so then at some point or other, it’ll join up again, right?

rasmussen Well, if I had a big cash box I’d declare my own theatre. Er, but, yes, we’re still financed by the Beckwerk, and we still haven’t looked at that at all in the light of the split yet.

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THE DEMoCrACy

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“The people, and the people alone, are the motive force in the making of world history.” — Chairman Mao

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Information Press Society!

Envoy from Iraq walks through Denmark

Monday, February 17, 2003, 1200hrs. Foreman Nielsen, as the representative of the Iraqi people, sets off on foot from Das Beckwerk — the Iraqi territory in Buddinge — in the direction of Kongens Nytorv and the so-called “Democratic Iraq” in beckvaerk/container.

Inside the container on Kongens Nytorv he will meet up with rasmussen — representative of “the Democratic Iraq” — and, through dialogue, attempt to reach reconciliation and an agreement on a common goal for the future, democracy and the people of Iraq.

Das Beckwerk

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Why Iraq?

The Iraqi people

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Tuesday February 18 2003

The Democracy — Destination: Iraq

The Democracy to be assembled in container and sent to Iraq

A 55-minute meeting held on Monday afternoon, between Nielsen and rasmussen in beckvaerk/container on Kongens Nytorv, resulted in the following agreement:

1. The container on Kongens Nytorv becomes a supranational unitbeckvaerk/container changes status from being “the Demo-cratic Iraq” to being a supranational unit, a trans-national and frontier-crossing container.

2. Experiences of democracy to be assembled in the containerLast Saturday, at Das Beckwerk in Buddinge, a month-long study of democracy was completed. Experiences from this long process will now be handed over for safekeeping in beckvaerk/container on Kongens Nytorv.

3. The Democracy-container sent to IraqIn the coming months, through dialogue with Iraqis and


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other citizens of the world, beckvaerk/container will con-struct a model for democracy. Finally, the container will be sealed with the contents of democratic ethics, dialogues, maps, and items and dispatched in the direction of Iraq.

4. The first steps:Thursday February 20, 1300hrs: Nielsen walks through DenmarkThe day after tomorrow, February 20, 1300hrs, Foreman Nielsen will depart on foot from Das Beckwerk, walking through Denmark towards beckvaerk/container on Kongens Nytorv, carrying the flag of the Democracy plus the past six months’ experiences of democracy from the Parliament in Buddinge.

Friday February 21: Theme for Week 1:

who are the Iraqi people?

First dialogue: Delavar Ajgi from kdp (Kurdistan Democratic Party).

On behalf of Das Beckwerk, beckvaerk/container

Nielsen & Rasmussen

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September 2003


Das Beckwerk reduces the Democracy to the absolute essen-tials.

It has proven impossible to import the Democracy in its current form into Iraq. The Democracy in its current form does not conform to existing international standards. The blue Altima-container, the Democracy — Destination: Iraq,


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which was in situ on Kongens Nytorv from February 15 until March 15, is a bit bigger than a standard shipping-con-tainer; just a little too elevated and a little too long, so that in practice it would take up the space needed for 3 standard containers. The cost for freight of 1 standard shipping-con-tainer Denmark-Iraq amounts to min. dkk 39,000. The cost for the Democracy would be min. dkk 117,000. So, the cost of importing the Democracy in its current form into Iraq will be three times larger than anticipated.

Therefore Das Beckwerk is compelled to recast the Democ-racy and condense it to an absolute minimum. The aim is to make the Democracy hyper-mobile, portable and as good as weightless. In the future it will be possible simply to take hold of and lift up the Democracy when there is sudden need of work to be done in Iran, North Korea, Syria, Italy or the us.

Transforming the Democracy will take place in public at:

altima in Greve on Friday september 12, 1200hrs

The transformation will be undertaken by Chairman Nielsen and the political dramaturge rasmussen. Das Beck-werk invites the news media, the Danish people and the international public to witness the event.

After the transformation, the Democracy will be ready for dispatch to Kuwait City. From there Nielsen & rasmussen will import the Democracy into Iraq by foot.

On behalf of Das Beckwerk and the Democracy

Nielsen & Rasmussen

December 2003

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Europe takes over the mission

Tuesday December 30 2003 — exactly 288 days after Amer-ican troops crossed the border between Kuwait and Iraq — Europe follows with The Democracy.

The operation is a classic pincer manoeuvre: on December 13, an advance unit — the Iraqi refugee Adnan Alshamari* — was sent into Iraq from Jordan in the west. Now, 17 days later, Nielsen & rasmussen follow suit, but from the south, in the Americans’ footsteps, from Kuwait. They take The Democracy with them into Iraq. In southern Iraq they join forces with the exile-Iraqi advance unit, and the three of them head north with The Democracy. The plan is to spread The Democracy from the south. The first stop is Basra. Later, The Democracy will enter Baghdad.

The operation will be carried out through dialogue and the

4. Utopia as reality-show:



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building up of a network. The essence of The Democracy is infiltration. The operation is low-tech and, among other things, makes use of the Nomadic Parliament, a lightweight parliament that can be pitched with great precision on densely-populated sites such as marketplaces, universities and schools.

Follow the operation and The Democracy’s whereabouts: www.thedemocracy.dk.

*The name is an alias for the sake of the security of the advance unit. The advance unit is travelling illegally. His official status is “refugee,” and as such he is not entitled to leave Denmark in order to participate in the implementation of The Democracy in his home-land.

Why Iraq?

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The anti-democratic forces?

During a stopover in London, the cradle of parliamentarism, The Democracy is detained. A world on heightened terror alert. Following 2 days with no explanation (British Guanta-namo?), The Democracy is sent out of Europe. In Kuwait, it is taken up again by Nielsen & rasmussen.

January 2004

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suicide mission?

On January 1 2004 Nielsen & rasmussen — on foot, wear-ing bullet-proof ties, carrying The Democracy — cross the no-man’s desert between Kuwait and Iraq. On the Iraqi side of the border, they meet their Iraqi counterparts, Adnan Alshamari and his cousin Emir, and in a black Mercedes the four men drive northwards, through British, Danish, Polish, Lithuanian, Iraqi, and American checkpoints, with The Democracy in the car boot.

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January 1 – 17 2004

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The theatre on the world stage:

The nomadic Parliament in Iraq

Act 4: During the period January 1 - 17 2004, Nielsen & rasmussen and Alshamari unfold the Nomadic Parliament 13 times in squares, universities, writers’ clubs, and women’s associations in Basra, Amara, and Baghdad. Iraq is declared the Cradle of The Democracy and in collaboration with local students, artists, lawyers, doctors, politicians, journalists, women and children, 13 parliamentary assemblies are held. At the centre of every single assembly is the container with the big question: The Democracy. What ought to be done: produce a universal model together and make a boundless network of dialogue as the basis for a new form of democ-racy.

Why Iraq?

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utopia:

From Iraq, The Democracy will disseminate and spread to all inhabited continents, word for word, step by step …


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DAS BECKWErK

translated from the Danish by Gaye Kynoch

The Democracy —Destination: USA

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According to the script, Nielsen & rasmussen would, sooner or later, let go of The Democracy and leave it with the Iraqi people, as they were not the main players in his-tory. They were “rosencrantz and Guildenstern,” a couple of transitional figures, heroes of the retreat. On January 16 2004 the retreat begins. The day before, the container and The Nomadic Parliament had been handed over to a group of students at the Academy of Fine Arts in Baghdad, as rep-resentatives of the Iraqi people.

“The end of History?”wrote the American Francis Fukuyama in 1989. But His-tory continued. For The Democracy to take firm root in Iraq, the European presence would be necessary for many years to come.

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March – April 2004

The Parallel Action

At the beginning of March 2004, the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs gives Nielsen & rasmussen a verbal com-mitment of dkk 1.9 million, from the Finance Committee’s account ear-marked for Iraq, to fund Parallel Action, the set-ting up of a democracy and community centre in Baghdad. The future looks bright for democracy in Iraq.

But then something goes wrong. At the end of April 2004, the American forces publish photographs of their special treatment of Iraqi detainees in Abu Ghraib prison in Bagh-dad. And then heads begin to roll on tv and computer screens all over the world.


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-----Original Message-----

From: Frederiksen, Ulla Schiøtt

[mailto:[email protected]]

Sent: 30 April 2004 11:13

To: [email protected]; [email protected]

Cc: Nordam, Jette

Subject: Project application, Parallel

Action, for Das Beckværk

Dear Mister Rasmussen

This email is to inform you of the situation

re Danish-funded projects in Iraq. As you

know the Ministry of Foreign Affair’s travel

guidelines for Iraq were tightened up over

Easter, all travel was advised against and

Danes in Iraq were urged to leave the coun-

try. The tightening-up was due to the drastic

deterioration of the security situation.

Due to the change in travel guidelines, the

Ministry of Foreign Affairs has reviewed

Danish-funded projects in Iraq and assessed

the individual activities in the light of the

security of Danish delegates.

As regards Das Beckwerk, the assessment con-

cludes that, even though the delegation is

being sent out by the theatre (and not by

the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and will be

travelling at own risk, it would be contrary

to the advice contained in the Travel Guide-

lines if the trip took place.

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It is therefore the intention of the Ministry

for Foreign Affairs to conclude the paperwork

concerning the application, but a contract

will not be signed by this party – and the

project will not be able to commence – before

there is an improvement in the security situ-

ation, and the Travel Guidelines are again

relaxed.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has made

equivalent assessments for a number of other

projects and applications involving trips/

postings from Denmark.

With best wishes,

Ulla (Frederiksen)

Middle East Department


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The Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs decides to with-draw the dkk 1.9 million awarded to Parallel Action for an indefinite period. As a result of the growing mistrust of the American concept of democracy, Nielsen & rasmus-sen suddenly find themselves in a situation in which they are kept off the world stage, they no longer have access to The Democracy and they cannot continue their work. What now? For those kept off the world stage and out of the media’s spotlight on that stage, there is only one place where you can speak and be seen:

For the first time in history, Nielsen & rasmussen go live on the internet, that so-called “virtual” parallel world which has developed its own non-hierarchical, level world stage where history’s marginalised move out and fight back:

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September 2 2004

To the people of America

On September 2 2004, from a room at www.thedemocracy.dk, Nielsen & rasmussen, on behalf of the world community, speak to the American people and their elected representa-tives.


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September 2nd 2004

To the President of the United States of America, to the us Senate and House of Representatives, to the people of America

The time has come for the international community to engage in a concerted effort to intervene in the domes-tic affairs of another fellow state. The time has come to suspend the right of a people to self-determination and national sovereignty as it is stipulated in international public law. The time has come for an action, which is not to be understood as a simple show of force on behalf of the global society, but rather as a universally human offer to help a fellow people to regain its unique position among the nations of the world. Within recent years, and in particular within the last year, the behaviour of the United States on the world scene has been the centre of attention of all nations. From Denmark to Bhutan, from France to Iraq, the peoples, and their gov-ernments have watched the American problems outside and within its borders. And now we cannot wait any longer, the time has come to act.

With or without the cooperation of the American people and its representative government, we will, through a multilateral intervention, implant The Democracy in the United States. This is not a warning, but an offer to col-laborate and an announcement: At any time after October 14th at dawn, the mission “The Democracy — Destination: usa” will commence. A mission born out of a moral imper-ative. It is our intention to democratize the usa without

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any collateral damage or loss of American lives. It will be a short and peaceful intervention.

And thus, from a free and truly democratic usa, The Democracy can and will spread to all countries throughout the world. On behalf of the world community

Nielsen & rasmussen


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October 14 – November 3 2004

Boomerang: The Democracy — Destination: usa

On Thursday October 14 Nielsen & rasmussen leave Europe, bound for Arabia. “Our plan is to change the course of history,” writes Nielsen in one of his reports for Scandinavian newspapers.* “For decades, humankind’s dreams of itself and the future stemmed from the us and moved out into the world. Since 2001 this historical fact has also been the American government’s declared objec-tive: the President and his men have decided to export Freedom and Democracy to the rest of the world. And so far it’s going well. Democracy is, according to the us President, already in Iraq. But there is something not quite right with the commodity. The Iraqis and the rest of the world have no confidence in it; indeed, a large proportion of Iraqis just want the American dream off their soil as soon as possible. Someone has to do something! we think. But what? The President’s decision cannot be changed. The world must be democratised! But perhaps we — Europeans and Arabs together — can influence the kind of democracy that has been moving from the us and out into the world in recent decades. In a word, we have a mission: our assign-ment is to fetch The Democracy from its cradle in Iraq and take it back to the us homeland in an improved version, which all the people of the world find acceptable and can live with. We have to start afresh and totally idealistically.”

* Morgenbladet, Norway: October 22, 29; November 5, 12 2004. Weekendavisen, Denmark: October 29; November 5, 12 2004.

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On Friday November 15 2004, Nielsen & rasmussen and Adnan Alshamari cross the border into Iraq. Emir Abu Ali comes from the opposite side. The Iraqi has driven the long route from Baghdad through the desert past Falluja and ramadi with The Democracy in the boot of the car. Since the end of January 2004, The Democracy has been a fact in Baghdad. Emir Abu Ali — on behalf of the Iraqi people — now hands over The Democracy temporarily to the Euro-pean delegation.

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Iraq/Jordan October 14 – 22 2004

Project for a New Democratic Millennium — the European-Arab coalition

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On Tuesday 20 October 2004, for the first time in history, The Nomadic Parliament is pitched on Jordanian soil, out-side the university in the centre of the capital Amman. And during the period October 16-22 the three democrats hold a series of meetings — with Jordanian and Middle Eastern artists, students, intellectuals, doctors, lawyers, politicians and citizens — in The Nomadic Parliament, in and around Amman. Jointly, a charter for Project for a New Demo-cratic Millennium is signed, a European-Middle Eastern response to the American think-tank Project for a New American Century. The charter outlines a revised plan for the democratisation of the world, for which the Americans have taken the initiative and which the whole world will now implement together.

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Project for a New Democratic Millennium

October, 2004

American foreign and security policy is

adrift. Even conservatives have criticized

the incoherent policies of the Bush Admin-

istration. They have resisted isolationist

impulses from within their own ranks, but

conservatives have not confidently enacted

their vision of America’s role in the world.

They have set forth guiding principles for

American foreign policy, but they have also

allowed torture and other uncivilized, bar-

barous acts to obscure potential agreement on

democratic objectives. And they have failed

to utilize the defence budget of the us in

order to increase world security and advance

democratic interests in the new century.

We aim to change this. We aim to make the

case and improve the basis for American

global leadership.


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As the 20th century drew to a close, the

United States stood as the world’s pre-emi-

nent power. Having led the West to victory in

the Cold War, America faced an opportunity

and a challenge: Did the United States have

the vision to build upon the achievements of

past decades? Did the United States have the

resolve to shape a new century favorable to

universal principles of democracy and free-

dom?

The United States are in danger of squander-

ing the opportunity and failing the chal-

lenge. They are living off the moral capi-

tal — accumulated through human sacrifice and

remarkable democratic progress — achieved by

democracies of yore. Through its disregard of

international law and universal human rights,

through its snubbing of voices of opposition,

and its wavering, contingent leadership, the

American Administration is making it increas-

ingly difficult to support American influence

around the world. The promise of short-term

commercial benefits threatens to override dem-

ocratic considerations. As a consequence, the

United States are jeopardizing the world’s

ability to handle present problems and to

deal with potentially greater challenges that

lie ahead.

The United States seem to have forgotten the

essential elements of the American constitu-

tion: a democracy that is strong and ready to

meet both present and future challenges; a

foreign policy that boldly and purposefully

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promotes universal principles of democracy

and freedom; and national leadership that

accepts the United States’ global responsi-

bilities.

Of course, the United States must be pru-

dent in how it exercises its power. But they

cannot avoid the responsibilities of global

leadership or the costs that are associ-

ated with its exercise. America has a vital

role in maintaining peace and security in

Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. If they

shirk their responsibilities, they invite

challenges to our fundamental principles.

The history of the 20th century should have

taught us that it is important to act in

accordance with universal principles when

crises emerge, and to meet problems before

they become dire. The history of this century

should have taught the United States to enact

American leadership in accordance with uni-

versal principles of democracy and freedom.

Our aim is to remind Americans of these les-

sons and to draw their consequences for

today. Here are three consequences:

• The United States need to increase demo-

cratic, nation building and humanitarian aid

spending significantly if they are to carry

out their global responsibilities today and

modernize the world’s democratic forces for

the future;


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• The United States need to strengthen their

ties to democratic allies and to challenge

inner American forces hostile to democratic

and universally human values and interests;

• The United States need to promote the cause

of democratic and basic human ethics and

political and economic freedom in The United

States and abroad.

Such a universal policy of democratic

strength and moral clarity may not be fash-

ionable today. But it is necessary if the

United States is to rebuild American trust-

worthiness and to ensure world security and

world democracy in the new millennium.

We accept responsibility for America’s unique

role in preserving and extending an inter-

national order friendly to world security,

world prosperity, and universal principles of

democracy.

Nielsen & Rasmussen, Chairmen

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The Project for a New Democratic Millennium is a non-profit educational organisation dedicated to a few fundamental proposi-tions: that American leadership should be good both for America and for the world; that such leadership requires philosophical strength, diplomatic energy and commitment to moral principle; and that too few political leaders today are making a case for global responsibility.

The Project for a New Democratic Millennium intends, through issue briefs, research papers, advocacy journalism, conferences, seminars and democratic events, to explain what American world leadership entails. It will also strive to rally support for a vigorous and principled policy of international involvement and to stimulate useful public debate on the democracy and America’s role in the world.

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In the Addenda the individual participants in The Nomadic Parliament can enter their personal vision for the European envoys to take across the Atlantic.

On the whole, Jordanians and especially Jordanian-Palestin-ians found it hard to step out of the victim role that most were, if not born to, then at least brought up in. It was as if the ability to think in terms of ideas and innovations was getting lost.

There will be no democracy in this world while there is

still American support for Israel.

some students in Jordan University from different colleges

The parliament in Jordan — 5th assembly University of Jordan, october 20 2004

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The democracy they [the Americans] claim is kind of

fake, because you can’t implement the democracy over a

nation without their own will.

students at Amman University

But occasionally there was a hint of a vision or at least a proposal for an improvement to the prevailing world order:

American soldiers and Israel solders in Iraq they must

stop the killing of people, because these people do not

drive this war. The Americans drive this war to occupa-

tion the oil in Iraq. There will be revolution, if the situa-

tion stays the same!

young Jordanian

The parliament in Jordan — 6th assembly The Artists’ Centre, Amman, october 20 2004

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Proposal: Have non-political parties address local popula-

tion in order to translate their ideas into political solu-

tions and positive understandable steps for the legal

system. Then address that to the higher political parties

and elected politicians who have power and ability to

change the system.

Susan Qawas, 20 years old, it-student

The most visionary of the young Arabs’ proposals is made by a 20-year-old woman. Susan Qawas’ proposal for a democratic social order is hardly distinguishable from the Frenchman Tocqueville’s nearly 200-year-old description in Democracy in America. The delegate representing the young Arabia is not demanding anything new of the Americans

The parliament in Jordan — 7th assembly Jordan Writers Society, october 20 2004

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but, on the contrary, a return to the ‘original’ democratic virtues, the American Utopia.

The parliament in Jordan — 9th assembly — Nadi El Wahadad, the community centre in the palestinian refugee ghetto, october 21 2004

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October 22 – November 3 2004

Mission Democracy — USA

On Friday October 22 2004 shortly before dawn, Nielsen & rasmussen & The Democracy leave Jordan and fly via London to John F. Kennedy Airport in New York. Wear-ing their suits and with their classic Western bearing the two Europeans get in without any great difficulty. But The Democracy is denied access to the us. Presumably because of the heightened terror alert, the box is detained for two days by Customs in John F. Kennedy Airport, and then the Americans send The Democracy back to Europe.


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currenT THreaT leVel

August 1, 2004 — raised from Yellow to Orange, specifi-cally for the financial services sectors in New York City, Northern New Jersey, and Washington, dc.

Homeland Security Advisory System

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The status of the Europeans is inextricably linked with The Democracy. Without The Democracy, Nielsen & rasmus-sen are no longer the universal specimens they were in Iraq. The unexpected situation requires an adjustment to the strategy. Nielsen & rasmussen take the charter and assume a temporary role as diplomatic envoys for the international community. They go from the airport straight into the American presidential election campaign. As if from thin air, the very next morning they step up on stage in the middle of a Democratic Party election meeting — a so-called “Kerry Victory rally” — on the corner of Broadway and 106th Street.

“Democratic victory” on Broadway and 106th

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Can’t we put them on at the end? I’m afraid we might

lose the audience!

manager of the Democrats’ election rally, speaking of the

possibility of an appearance by the international community

The organisers are not prepared and clearly nervous, but before they put a stop to the multilateral intervention, Nielsen & rasmussen have taken the microphone and thereby the word. Face-to-face with the American people, they repeat their speech from the internet and in so doing announce the arrival of The Democracy in the us.

Following on from the unilateral certainty, the many buzz-words and slogans in Senator Charles B. rangel’s speech, the audience finds the multilateral ambiguity puzzling. Are they with us or are they against us? But representatives of the arts scene and Euro-minded intellectuals immediately recognise themselves in Nielsen & rasmussen and wel-come them with open arms:

You guys are just so cool!

You look like Gilbert & George!

Are you guys some kinda artists?

If I throw a party one of these days, would you then bring

your Democracy-box?

New Yorkers reacting to Nielsen & Rasmussen’s

arrival in The Big Apple

So-called “progressive” New Yorkers are delighted by the sight, but right away more sceptical about the universal content, which the two Europeans claim to represent:

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progressive liberal female academic

The Iraqis aren’t ready for democracy yet. They might

elect someone like Al Sadr!

nielsen

Maybe they want Al Sadr as president?

progressive liberal female academic

It just proves they aren’t ready for democracy yet!

Paul Bremer? Who is Paul Bremer?

2 young female academics in dialogue with

Nielsen & Rasmussen

We’ll all go to Canada!

New Yorkers a few days before the presidential election

Before they know it, Nielsen & rasmussen have the status of a kind of objets trouvés, cultural hostages, sent on tour in the New York arts scene with great success, from the small clubs on Lower East Side to the galleries in Chelsea and on to 42nd Street.

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Nielsen & rasmussen are a success. But what about The Democracy?

On Monday October 25 during a break between two shows, Nielsen is phoned up by a “Johansen” from Copen-hagen Airport. Johansen informs Nielsen that on the floor in front of him in his office at Scandinavian Airlines, he has a box containing a tent.

The European connection now makes yet another attempt to export The Democracy to the us. At the same time, Nielsen & rasmussen manage to flee the arts scene and on the evening of October 15 2004 they arrive — minus

The Democratic Fathers in New york

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The Democracy contra “public security,” Georgetown University, Washington dc.

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The Democracy — in the American capital Washington dc. They take up residence in a classic wooden house in Pentagon City a few kilometres from the White House and right next door to the Department of Defense. As a kind of vanguard, a democratic avant-garde, they spend the waiting time exploring the area, liasing with the American locals and preparing the people for the arrival of The Democracy.

Finally, on the night of Thursday October 27, The Democ-racy arrives by express courier, sent from Dulles Airport to Pentagon City, and the European-Middle Eastern Opera-tion Democracy can get underway. During the weeks lead-ing up to the American presidential election, the European idealists try to engage the American people and their repre-sentatives in dialogue in The Nomadic Parliament, involve them in a discourse on the status and future of democracy in the us and the rest of the world. The strategy is the same as that which in January 2004 lead to the introduction of The Democracy in Iraq: a day in advance the Europeans make an appointment with a group of locals — Meth-odists, Second World War veterans, students — to hold a parliamentary sitting. Or they just simply turn up, plant The Democracy on the ground and unfold The Nomadic Parliament. From their experience in Iraq they are used to being welcomed with open arms, as heroes, but this time, in the declared homeland of democracy, America, things do not go quite as expected. rather than cheers and waving flags, The Democracy’s vanguard is met with scepticism and timorous silence.

We visited your homepage, and it proves that you haven’t

come here with an open mind, on the contrary you have

come to the us to promote anti-war opinions!

at the last moment, Reverend Hassmer cancels

the planned Nomadic Parliament outside the

Methodist church in Pentagon City

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We want to avoid any discussions about politics!

a group of Second World War veterans cancel another planned

meeting in The Nomadic Parliament in Pentagon City

You have a permission to do this? … Then I have to ask

you to leave immediately!

security guard at American University, just as Nielsen & Ras-

mussen finish erecting The Nomadic Parliament on campus

What’s that?

police officer on a bicycle inspects The Democracy

in front of the White House

Have you had time to visit other embassies?

us Secret Service officers when Nielsen & Rasmussen

set up The Democracy in front of the Iraqi Embassy

Several groups of citizens cancel an agreed-upon meet-ing at the last moment. And when Nielsen & rasmussen spontaneously display The Nomadic Parliament in the public arena instead — for example on university cam-puses — quite a few sidestep dialogue. Most are afraid of a potential polarisation of American society, afraid of meet-ing the absolute other in their neighbor. Instead they make do with promoting their preferred party with the aid of a lapel badge, a car sticker or a poster planted in the lawn or hanging in the window facing the street and the public arena, through which they hurry in silence. Left in The Nomadic Parliament are despairing intellectuals, artists and frustrated students. The Nomadic Parliament seems to work for them as a kind of refuge: The Democracy’s confessional or therapy where — after the oppressive silence in the public arena — the Americans can at long last blurt out the absolute truth or their anger and feelings of having been unjustly treated and deceived by their fellow citizens or their government.

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In December 2001, when I returned from my year in the

Emirates, students here at the university asked me: where

did your park your camel and your Kalashnikov?

an American of Jordanian origin in The Nomadic

Parliament at Georgetown University

The Bible says I belong to the chosen people, and the

Bible says that there will always be a war between my

people and the Palestinians.

female Israeli student in The Nomadic Parliament

at Georgetown University

The parliament in the us — 1st Assembly — Georgetown University, Washington dc, october 27 2004

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The democracy must be based on the Sharia!

Lebanese student, wearing suit and tie, in The Nomadic

Parliament at Georgetown University

George Bush is an evil man! If he is elected, he will start

throwing small nuclear bombs all over the world!

debonair elderly artist in The Nomadic

Parliament in Gallery moca

I have no power, I feel, no possibility to influence the

society I live in. I mean, in other countries people climb

over the fences and into the government buildings!

Ginny, 21-year-old student of Peace &

Justice at Georgetown University

Via The Nomadic Parliament, Nielsen & rasmussen pose a crucial question on American soil: where is the public arena in America?

The parliament in the us — 5th Assembly — Museum of Contemporary Art, Washington dc, November 1 2004

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The Nomadic parliament at American University, Washington dc


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Nielsen & rasmussen conclude that:

1. The public arena in the Western world has shrunk and dialogue has retreated into the private sphere and the formal arts arena.

2. Democratic visions no longer emerge under open skies in the Agora, but in special think-tanks. Therefore, in the last few days running up to the presiden-tial election, the Europeans totally reorganise their strategy. They leave the (retreated) public arena and instead penetrate right into the private sphere and into the think-tanks. Meet-ings are held in Project for the New American Century and other think tankers, and The Democracy is placed centrally in the homes of exemplary American families and ditto communes. And it is here that the last remnants or the first tender inclination of and to a democratic dialogue are found.

Don’t forget to vote the second Vote the second Vote the

second Just five days left Just five days left!

Jay Marx, rapping candidate for The Green Party, on the

pa-system of his electioneering bus rolling

down Massachusetts Avenue, dc

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The parliament in the us — 4th and 5th Assembly —

at the roth family home in Virginia and in the

Freegan commune in Georgetown, october 30 2004

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On Wednesday 3 November — synchronous with the reinstatement of the interim President in the White House — Nielsen & rasmussen put The Democracy in the fore-ground. They then exit the picture and begin the retreat in the direction of Europe.

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to be continued:

The parallel world history Part iii:Mission Iran— a preemptive strike —(2006)

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THE DEMoCrACy

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Contributors

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Borders CoNTrIBUTorS

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In her three books and several magazine contributions, ida börjel (born 1975, lives in Sweden) has been working with conceptual poetry using writing methods such as literary paraphrase gone astray (for instance in a catastrophe theory reading of Gertrude Stein’s Ida in “Stein versus Ida versus Ida versus Stein”), and computerized text (as in the infected inventory of “A Love Story A Crash”). Her work also uses communication technology: the telephone (a series of phonecalls made to different state authorities trying to find an answer to the question of why we walk in circles when we are lost) and radio (as in the book length poem Skåneradio). In her poetical investigations and field works, humor stretches its hand towards darkness and what seems to be a movement towards an encounter not infre-quently turns into collision course.

“European Waistmeasures” consists of national portraits, one for each member of the European Union (there were thirteen at the time the work was written). The poems are constructed around generalizations, trifles, and prejudices, as the characters define what he or she is not. Stupid, reprehensible, xenophobic? We are, Börjel argues, in our biological constitution, politically incorrect. Our brain would collapse if we didn’t reject information, if we didn’t generalize. We’re not capable of grasping the whole picture. Furthermore, due to the mental debris our brains are filled with, it is hardly possible for us to think clearly, or to go to Austria. We’ve already been there.

Publications: Sond (oei editör, 2004), Skåneradio (oei editör, 2006), Kon-sumentköplagen: juris lyrik (oei editör, 2008). www.oei.nu

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matias faldbakken’s (born 1973, lives in Norway) art and literary texts take as their points of departure popular culture, subcultures, escapism, and negation as social phe-nomena. Both as a visual artist and a writer, Faldbakken continuously puts the audience in the awkward position of laughing at things for which they feel guilty. Ideas and rhetoric from the entertainment industry are combined with influences from the historical avant-gardes, anarchism, and contemporary subcultures. Faldbakken’s black humour looks to porn, capitalism, critical theory, and anti-insti-tutional art, and reveals the failed sense of security in the social-democratic Scandinavian countries.

“Edward Norton’s Waspville” is a fictitious article with genre precedents in Poe and Borges that also employs appro-priation strategies more common in contemporary art. A dialectic common to Faldbakken’s work is the demand for change on the one hand and resignation on the other. His work shows how the most radical gestures may end up as escapist activities and how the most speculative, commer-cially based entertainment products potentially can cause lasting change.

Faldbakken’s novels have been translated into Danish, Finn-ish and German, and are forthcoming in Spanish, Italian and russian. His latest, Unfun, will be published in 2008 by Cappelen Damm.

Recent publication: Kaldt produkt, a play in three acts (Kagge Forlag, 2006).

Recent solo shows:“New works,” Simon Lee Gallery, London.“Empty Glass,” Galerie Giti Nourbakhsch, Berlin.


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“Nothing Doing,” standard (oslo), Oslo.“I Don’t Think So,” Midway Contemporary Art, Minne-apolis.“A Hideous Disease,” Statements, Art Basel 38, Basel.

Recent group shows:“Continental Drift,” Art Vue, Bermuda.“revolutions - Forms That Turn,” The Sydney Biennial 2008, Sydney.“records Played Backward,” Modern Institute, Glasgow.“Paintings, Props and Problems (Still Unresolved),” stan-dard (oslo), Oslo.“Memorial to the Iraq War,” Institute of Contemporary Arts (ica), London.“Defamation of Character,” ps1 moma, New York.“Dislocations (Don’t Try Popping Them Back Into Place),” Arco, Madrid.“Fade Away and radiate,” Cohan and Leslie, New York.

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In 2001 the Danish author, artist, performer, and musi-cian Claus Beck-Nielsen (born 1963), was declared dead. In 2002 das beckwerk, a theatre and arts house, was opened in his name in a former reactor on the outskirts of Copenhagen. Since then Das Beckwerk has become a trans-national company, governing and developing the life and works of Claus Beck-Nielsen (1963-2001). The gesamt Beckwerk includes novels, poems, journals, plays, one-man shows, performances, photography, installations, concerts, records, videos, Internet events, and interventions on the world stages in Iraq, Jordan, the usa, Iran etc. All of the Beckworks examine possible links between life and world politics — they try to define a new role for the average European on the world stage.

At the beginning of 2003 Das Beckwerk inaugurated a parallel world history, a European alternative to the American led attempt to “introduce Democracy and Freedom in every part of the world.” The parallel action opened in Copenhagen January 18th with the play The Parliament, a vision about building a world parliament. But soon after the boundaries between fiction and reality went into meltdown; two representatives of Das Beckwerk, the consummate Europeans Nielsen & rasmussen, first left the theatre and then left Denmark and Europe in order to introduce The Democracy in Iraq. On January 1st, 2004, the two men crossed the Iraqi border. Dressed in suits and ties, carrying a metal case with the inscription “The Democracy destination Iraq,” the two men wandered through the desert into the state of emergency.


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The Democracy — Destination: Iraq and The Democracy — Destination: usa tell the first two chapters of this parallel world history.

Other Beckworks: The Last European — a terror musical (2005); The Suicide Mission — a novel (2005); The European Dream Scream — a music cd (2006); Mission Iran — a pre-emptive strike into Iran, October-December 2006; The Return of The Democracy — a retrospective exhibition of the history of The Democracy, Copenhagen and Vienna 2007.www.dasbeckwerk.comnielseninafghanistan.blogspot.comwww.lettertoiran.commyspace.com/clausbecknielsenmemorialthomasandclaus.blogspot.com

The History of The Democracy is a collaboration between Das Beckwerk and the Parallel Action, London.www.parallelaction.com

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Translators

Linda Haverty rugg is an Associate Professor in the Scandi-navian Department at the University of California, Berkeley.

Gardar Eide Einarsson is a visual artist living in New York. His works have been shown at The Whitney Biennale, Frankfurter Kunstverein and The Istanbul Biennale.

Gaye Kynoch is British. She lives and works in Copenhagen.


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Editors

Susanne Christensen, born 1969 in Copenhagen. Co-editor of the literary review Vagant, co-arranger of the poetry festival Audiatur, previously co-editor of the small press Gasspedal, critic in the Norwegian daily Klassekampen. Lives in Bergen, Norway.

Audun Lindholm, born 1980 in Oslo. runs the small press Gasspedal, chief editor of Vagant, co-arranger of Audiatur. Lives in Bergen, Norway.

gasspedal.orgwww.vagant.nowww.audiatur.no

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ChainLinks is a spinoff project of the journal Chain. The goal is to produce books that might change people’s minds, might agitate for (thought) reform, might shift perspectives. This project also continues Chain’s desire to provide space for work that slips through genre cracks and falls outside of disciplinary boundaries. The series editors are Jena Osman and Juliana Spahr; each individual volume is put together by guest editors. For more on how to submit a volume pro-posal, see www.chainarts.org. This book is made possible with monetary support from ‘A ‘A Arts, Chain Arts, and generous contributions from individuals and subscribers.

CHAINLINKS (current and forthcoming volumes)

Intersection: Sidewalks and Public Space Marci Nelligan & Nicole Mauro, eds.

Refuge/Refugee Jena Osman, ed.

Distributed by small press distribution

1341 Seventh StreetBerkeley, California 94710www.spdbooks.organdaudiatur Balaklava 181513 Moss, Norwaywww.audiatur.no

Borders, edited by Susanne Christensen and Audun Lindholm

Documents

Transcript of Borders, edited by Susanne Christensen and Audun Lindholm