Danish Social Democrats shaken after heavy losses in municipal elections
Substantial wins for the Danish left, and for the hard-right, as the reigning Social Democrats hand over the keys to the capital for the first time in a hundred years.
The governing Social Democrats (SD) took a massive beating in Denmark’s municipal elections on November 18, losing 5.2 percent support nation-wide. While still the party with the highest overall vote (23.2 percent), it took losses in many municipalities, and saw its support halved in some key strongholds, losing 18 mayors across the country and failing to achieve representation in every council nationwide for the first time since 2007. Driven by discontent with the central government and unresolved structural inequalities, the results point to deeper cracks in Denmark’s once-stable political landscape as the country heads towards next year’s general elections.
Winners and losers in a divided electorate
Many of the SD losses were picked up by the left-wing Socialist People’s Party (SF) – most notably in larger cities and in the greater Copenhagen area – which won 11.1 percent (an increase of 3.4 percent), as well as by the ultraright Danish People’s Party (DF) (5.9 percent, a gain of 1.8 percent). A new right-wing party, the Danish Democrats (DD), saw big wins in rural areas, giving them a countrywide average of 4.7 percent, but the figure was as high as 17 percent or more in several disaffected municipalities. The result reflects both the rising polarisation between cities and rural areas, as well as an election campaign where the extent and quality of welfare services and NIMBY objections to the green transition played a prominent role.
The radical left Red-Green Alliance (Enhedslisten, EL) retained a steady but unimpressive representation in most of the country, going slightly backwards from 7.4 percent to 7.1 percent nationwide, and the Social-Liberal Party (RV) also lost 0.2 percent. Centre-right parties Venstre (V) (17.9 percent) and the Conservatives (C) (12.7 percent) both lost votes, dropping 3.3 and 2.5 percent respectively. The right-wing libertarian Liberal Alliance (LA) won 5.5 percent (up by 4.1 percent) of votes cast, while the new Moderates (M) party – founded by former Prime Minster Lars Løkke Rasmussen and part of Denmark’s ruling coalition – could only muster 1.3 percent support.
Since 2007, Denmark has also elected regional councils to five administrative regions (funded exclusively by government transfers) at the same time as the municipal vote. In these regions – which from 2027 will be reduced to four – the overall results largely reflected those of the municipal elections.
Battle for the capital
The election campaign in Copenhagen was marked by a widespread wish to see the SDlose the post of Lord Mayor, which it has held for more than 100 years. The party has exercised power by driving the development and “modernisation” of the city, but this change has come at the expense of affordable housing and living conditions for lower middle-income households, students, and social pensioners. The EL candidate for Lord Mayor, Line Barfod, led her party to an impressive result in 2021, when it became the city’s largest, but was sidelined by the other parties during negotiations for the top job. In this election, Barfod allied herself with SF in makingan end toSD control of Copenhagen Town Hall a goal in itself. While the campaign – the dirtiest in memory – was dominated by the battle between the SD and EL, mainly on the issues of housing and parking, – it was SF who walked away with the role of Lord Mayor, benefiting from the widespread desire to remove SD from the office, and a reluctance of more right-wing parties to allow EL to assume the role.
Although remarkable, the shift of Copenhagen away from SD has been long in the making. After a miserable performance in the European elections in 2024, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen made what was widely seen as an arrogant power grab, asking reigning Lord Mayor Sophie Hæstorp-Andersen to switch positions with Pernille Rosenkrantz-Theil, Minister of Social Affairs and Housing, and a personal friend of the Prime Minister (they even co-own a summer house). Rosenkrantz-Theil obediently quit government to become SD’s Lord Mayoral candidate, while a technocratic Social Democrat replaced the Lord Mayor on an interim basis. Rosenkrantz-Theil had been an MP for the EL in her youth, and SD apparently hoped to win over left-leaning voters through her candidacy. However, despite her undoubted qualifications, the Copenhagen electorate was left with the impression that the increasingly unpopular Prime Minister was trying to impose her close friend and ally as a proxy to govern the capital on her behalf. Rosenkrantz-Theil’s attitude during the campaign, widely viewed as arrogant and entitled, didn’t help matters either.
The red menace
The attempt to use Rosenkrantz-Theil to swing voters to SD proved fruitless, not least because the increasingly desperate party adopted many of its key issues from the right wing (for example, trying to make urban parking spaces a main theme of the election). At the same time, it had a paucity of responses to more genuine problems, such as the housing crisis where it pinned its hopes almost entirely on the highly questionable Lynetteholm project, a landfill island in Copenhagen’s harbour that will supposedly accommodate 50,000 residents – by 2070.
The desperation was particularly palpable towards the end of the campaign, when multiple SD MPs began to weigh into the campaign, issuing dark warnings about what might ensue should EL or SF take control of the council. Rosenkrantz-Theil herself sent a personal letter to Copenhagen’s residents – at a cost of some 500,000 DKK (65,000 EUR) – also warning against the supposed menace of the left and urging a vote for (social democratic) stability. Unsurprisingly, the tabloid press backed up this rhetoric with old-fashioned anti-communist red-bashing. On the last day of the campaign, Rosenkrantz-Theil started courting non-left parties of all stripes with the promise of additional lower-level mayoral posts in return for backing her for the top job.
In the end, the SD’s deep coffers, all the red scare language they could muster, and even the bizarre offer of municipal support for delivering young children to preschool in cargo bikes, weren’t enough to either buy or scare off the electorate. Despite a small drop in support, EL held its place as the largest party with 22.1 percent of the vote, losing 2.5 percent, while SF landed as a secure second with 17.9 percent – an increase of 6.9 percent on the 2021 vote. SD were reduced to a mere 12.7 percent, leaving them in a distant third place. Despite the impressive EL and SF results, even with the support for left-green party The Alternative, they fell short of a “red” majority, and SF took the Lord Mayor role with the support of a broad coalition from EL to the far-right (but excluding SD, who stood to one side in a huff).
Mere implementing agencies?
Election turnout was around 70 percent, demonstrating the importance of the municipal level of government in Denmark. The Danish local government system is a mix of delegated state powers and local autonomy, with practically all ‘citizen-oriented service tasks’ devolved to the municipal level as part of the 2007 local government reform. Democratically-elected municipal councils oversee the administration of education and social institutions, a number of social pensions and benefits, local infrastructure, and most services that citizens can expect from government.
As these services are still determined at a national level, however, spending and scope for action by local government is significantly circumscribed and constrained by national legislation and funding rules, making municipalities, in most respects, mere implementing agencies, rather than masters in their own house. Yet since citizens meet the state through municipalities, it is at this level that they often voice their frustrations and articulate their hopes. Their most significant powers lie in physical planning, environment, leisure and infrastructure areas although their funding is limited. So, while the interest that local elections generate contrasts with the actual power of local authorities, these elections therefore serve as useful opinion polls for national politics, with debates often spilling over into national politics.
The success of SF illustrates this. It has for a long time branded itself as the party of the welfare state, and – as schools and social services everywhere have suffered austerity cuts – the party’s appeal has grown, both at the national and municipal level. So, while it lost its mayoral position on the island of Langeland (one of Denmark’s smallest municipalities), the party managed to appoint four new mayors.
Rural strains and political gains
The widening gap between rural and urban areas is another increasingly important national topic. No less than 31 municipalities are losing population due to low birth rates and youth outmigration, threatening schools and local services. Attempts to counter this by spreading institutions across the country has not helped much as it ignores a central cause: the growth of ever more capital- (and chemical-) intensive pig, cattle, and monocultural farms.
The new right-wing DD party has tapped into this issue by posing as defenders of rural communities, while – absurdly – also defending the interests of the large agrochemical complexes. Perhaps realising this contradiction, DD has tried to deflect attention by launching a fierce attack on what they call ‘iron fields’ – solar photovoltaic energy (PV) parks, a strategy that resonated particularly in rural Western Jutland and Lolland. In Ringkøbing-Skjern, the country’s largest yet most sparsely-populated municipality, 21.7 percent of voters supported DD, almost handing the party its first mayoral position – a reflection of local resentment over large PV parks supplying energy to the national energy network while local services remain underfunded.
Size matters
This gap between cities and rural areas is also structural. The 2007 reform reduced 271 municipalities to just 98, all with the same assignments and funding sources – municipal income taxes, ground rent, a small share of company tax, plus central government block grants and equalisation mechanisms. But the significant differences in size mean that large cities like Copenhagen (667,000), Aarhus (374,000), Aalborg (224,600), and Odense (210,800) are net contributors, bearing a disproportionate burden of social responsibilities. Small municipalities, with fewer resources but similar obligations, struggle to provide quality services, particularly given the higher proportions of elderly and low-income residents. In addition, rising housing costs in the cities and lower cash benefits for the poorest have led to population outflow to distant municipalities, where housing is cheap but services are most stretched, further fuelling discontent and deepening the rural-urban divide.
Urban fragmentation
Inequalities exist not only between rural and urban areas but within cities themselves. Greater Copenhagen, for example, comprises the City of Copenhagen, Frederiksberg, and 18 surrounding municipalities, each socio-economically distinct. In the western and southern suburbs, traditionally social democratic strongholds with many migrant and lower-income families, voters abandoned SD, shifting right rather than to other left parties, and boosting the far-right DF, while its right-wing rival DD benefitted less due to its rural profile.
Mayoral posts, determined by local coalitions rather than vote share, reflected these shifts. While all three parties of the ruling government coalition lost votes nationally, V nonetheless benefited considerably from SD’s losses, gaining 6 mayors, now holding 40, while SD dropped to 26 mayors. The third coalition partner, M, won a paltry 6 council seats across the entire country – a terrible result for the party led by former prime minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen (although he will be relieved that his son is one of them). Centre-right party C added 5 new mayors, increasing their total to 19, boosting their hopes of reviving a traditional cooperation with V at national level.
The regions
Results of the regional council elections – held the same day – largely mirror the municipal results, with V taking three chairman positions, a net gain of one. SD had previously presided over both Zealand and Capital regions, but with these now being merged into a single new region of Eastern Denmark, their representation fell to just one. This new region, which also includes the poor southern islands of Lolland and Falster, will represent 2.8 million residents, nearly half of Denmark’s total population of 6 million.
The regions are in charge of hospitals and health facilities as well as medical specialists and general practitioners, and the overall budget for the regions is about a third that of the 98 municipalities. Although health, especially mental health, was a major issue in the elections, public interest in the work of the regions is low, perhaps because their politicians remain mostly out of the public eye (one exception being Pia Kjærsgaard, the former long-time national leader of DF, who won a regional council seat for the first time – a low-effort sweetener for her never-ending gradual retirement from politics).
Post-election battles
A whole new game began immediately after the vote, as each newly-elected council entered negotiations over the political coalitions necessary to appoint a mayor. One reason for SD’s big losses in this regard is that the left-wing parties, SF and EL, have abandoned their traditional quasi-automatic support of SD mayoral candidates, instead building a series of unconventional alliances. For example, in the mid-Zealand town of Sorø, the two EL council members decided that both SD and C were too unwilling to approve social welfare and education improvements, while Venstre and other parties to the right – including DF – were more amenable to their suggestions, and they handed the mayoral post to V.
Such strange bedfellows underscore a reality of politics at the municipal level: a willingness and openness to overlook traditional party alliances in favour of constellations capable of addressing everyday municipal problems has become an important vector for success. The Sorø outcome is illustrative of what happened in other town halls, for example EL is involved in constellations with the hard-right DF and DD in several other municipalities, such as Middelfart (Funen) and Fredericia (Eastern Jutland).
Hopes crushed?
Despite high hopes for EL in Copenhagen, where some opinion polls suggested a “red majority” to the left of social democracy, it was widely expected that the city would get an SF Lord Mayor. A pre-election deal between SF and EL agreed that if such a left majority eventuated, the party with most votes – most likely EL – would get the post, but the numbers didn’t work out. In the negotiations after the votes had been counted, the parties of the centre and right also expressed their preference for the SF contender, and all the parties of the council – except SD and one small left-wing party – then formed a new local government comprising six mayors (two of them from EL) besides the Lord Mayor.
SD’s Rosenkrantz-Theil had announced beforehand that she would only negotiate if she were to be made Lord Mayor, ruling herself and her party out of negotiations. Nonetheless, after the agreement on the distribution of posts, Rosenkrantz-Theil was named mayor in charge of employment, integration and business affairs. She initially accepted the role, but shortly afterwards she announced that she was withdrawing from political life in Denmark altogether! The decisions to parachute Rosenkrantz-Theil in as the leading SD candidate for Copenhagen, and, then to insist she should only accept the top post, have reflected badly on the Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen, significantly weakening her position only months before next year’s national election.
Breaking with the Social Democrats
For years SF has declined the offer from EL to create a progressive alliance, not wanting to challenge SD in the hope of proving themselves worthy of ministerial positions in a future SD-led government. Over time this has led SF to accept the (probably illegal) Ghetto-laws, a clearly racist reform of the cash-benefit system, and the continued export of weapon parts to Israel.
Since last summer, however, Mette Frederiksen and SD have hardened in their resolve to remain in a centrist government, rejecting “bloc” politics of left and right, and casting doubt on SF’s long-term strategy. During the Copenhagen election campaign, multiple high profile SD representatives decried SF as a dangerously “far-left” party, further burning what bridges that still remained. This attitude is matched from the left – albeit not with the same intensity or hostility. Three days after the municipal elections, political leader of EL, Pelle Dragsted publicly warned that SD should no longer count on EL or SF support at the local or national level, underlining the significant shift in the left’s attitude towards SD and the construction of left majorities.
The election, and its fallout, will continue to have wide-ranging consequences, adding to the Prime Minister’s now-building woes. The SD bean-counters are currently dissecting the results, but so far, no leading politician has admitted (at least publicly) that the party’s right-wing social and immigration policies have put them badly out of synch with their traditional election base. Support for the party continues to crumble in its old bastions to the west of Copenhagen, while new and varied anti-SD coalitions are being built in the rest of the country. With a national election due to be held in 2026, pressure is therefore mounting on Prime Minister Frederiksen to come up with a viable response or face serious political consequences for both the party, and for herself as its – until now – all-powerful leader.
Reinout Bosch is a social worker based in Copenhagen. He is one of the initiators of the Institute for Marxist Analysis and the secretary of the left-wing media outlet Solidaritet.dk.
Karen Helveg Petersen is a Copenhagen-based economist. She is a member of the Institute for Marxist Analysis and writer of political-economic analyses.