After the war ended in May 1945, the Labour Party continued to reject the Communists, even after the merger negotiations had begun. At the first post-war meeting of the council of the Federation of Trade Unions, Labour Party delegates opposed a proposal by Communist delegates that representatives with NKP backgrounds should be included in the Federation's leadership. The reason Tranmæl gave (29) was that politics did not belong there -- which was odd, considering the Labour Party's age-long political domination of the Federation.

Given the Labour Party leadership's political practice towards the end of the war and just after, the NKP had little reason to believe that the communists would be regarded as equal partners in a united party. Neither the war nor the immediate post-war period had created any confidence between the two party leaderships -- as the leaders in both camps were well aware. It was the enormous urge for unity at the grass roots of the labour movement which nevertheless drove them into the merger negotiations. Anyone outwardly opposed to unification would have ruled himself out of political life. In the liberation summer of 1945, the whole of the Norwegian labour movement at shop floor level was in flux. In many places of work, the earlier divisions between Social Democrats and Communists had almost been wiped out. Both party leaderships had a lot to gain. Tactics and choices of words could decide who was to win the sympathy of the labour movement.

Furubotn' s contribution

Furubotn tried to swing the merger negotiations in the direction of co-operation rather than organisational unification. He argued against the emphasis on the structural approach:(30)

The question of unity in the Norwegian labour movement has been stood on its head. The choice now before us is either conflict between the two parties, division, or else a wedding. Either marriage or a fight to the death. This may correspond to Norwegian marriage conventions, but there is no future in it for Norwegian politics....

He soon had to concede that the majority of NKP members were opposed to his views in this regard; in 1945 he admitted that 80-90 per cent of the party members were in favour of the Labour Party's organisational approach.(31) Many of the old NKP leaders were among them. Some of the most prominent, including Strand Johansen, Alf Pettersen and Jørgen Vogt, had committed themselves to supporting the Labour Party's unification plans at the end of the war.(32) The Labour Party exploited this disagreement within the NKP, referring to ``Furubotn and his group'' as the main obstacle to unification.(33) Furubotn's arguments failed to convince those NKP members who were opposed to him on the question of unification. He could therefore see no other way of saving the NKP from dissolution than by provoking a break in the merger negotiations. The method he chose was clumsy. He had the so-called Møllersen report printed in Friheten on 18 August 1945. Its publication was meant to show that the Labour Party leaders were less than sincere in their wish to unite with the NKP. Besides, it might provoke the Labour Party into refusing to take part in further negotiations, relieving the NKP of the onus of making the first formal break.

The publication of the report was a two-edged sword which harmed the NKP; Furubotn was criticised for it on several occasions. He defended himself with the argument that NKP people had mainly been preoccupied with the organisational side of the question, and had lost sight of the political premises for unification. That was why he had felt obliged to make the Møllersen report known. (34) Furubotn never departed from this view. In 1971, he pointed out that it was political inequality which prevented an organisational merger: (35)

For Tranmæl the important point was not what was in the programme, but that we should accept being a minority. The majority would decide policy. It was an organisational strategy. So we would be eliminated. What mattered to him was applying formal democracy with us as a minority. That would have meant playing into their hands. There can never be a union where a minority has to authorise the majority to determine policy. What that amounts to effectively is approval of majority policy. That's what it all boils down to. It would be just like saying yes, I want that girl for my wife, but then having to let her have her head -- for instance, freedom to go about with anyone she chose. I would be in the minority. She would have the majority.

If one sees it like that, it is obviously sheer lunacy. We Communists would be castrating ourselves politically. There was not a great deal of insight on our wing. Their understanding of democracy was formalistic. Even if I had had to stand completely alone, I would NEVER have agreed to such an authorisation. And when I tried to explain, they wouldn't listen! Ignored it. The main guideline was the widespread vision of democracy in the abstract. It did not extend to the contents of democracy, which is what it is all about. Such a view is not always a source of strength in politics when you get down to realities.