It started with arguing

Fortunately, the blockchain-winning people, says historian Ulf Arnesen, who has written his thesis on the start of Orientering.

- Had it not been for the Evang wing's coup Orientering December 1952, probably the newspaper had been gone for a long time, says Ulf Arnesen.

In 1968, Arnesen wrote the thesis “The start of Orientering”. It is ten years since he resigned from the AKP. Still, he is crystal clear:

- The controversy over Orientering in December 1952 and January 1953 ended in the best possible way. Had ex-communists Langseth and Friis retained control of the newspaper, it would probably have remained marginalized. Orientering was viable because it criticized both power blocks, not just the United States. Langseth and Friis did not have what it takes, says Arnesen.

Why a new newspaper?

A considerable opposition in the Labor Party – with health director Karl Evang as one of the most prominent – was appalled that the party leadership had joined Norway in NATO. At the same time, it was almost impossible for the opposition to speak in Arbeiderbladet.

A number of people in the mentioned opposition therefore took the initiative to start a new newspaper. The newspaper name became as it was after former Labor Prime Minister Christopher Hornsrud proposed to change “Neworientering"To simply"Orientering".

Friis and Langseth were responsible for the trial number of the new newspaper. Friis was 69 years old, Langseth 64 years and Hornsrud was 92 years old. In other words, it did not lack youthful motive.

The sample number came in December 1952, but was not to the liking of the Evang wing, who found that they had to "get the wagon out of the ditch", as they said. The battle for Orientering was in progress.

Surprising debut

The winter of 1952-53 contained many dramatic days. It could soon become a miscarriage too Orientering. The sample number of Friis and Langseth, printed at Fremtidens trykkeri in Drammen, hardly resembled a newspaper. Eight pages. Three large and heavy foreign affairs, including one written by Lise Lindbæk. Some notices, some small ads. A leader: "Orientering does not aim to divide, but to gather ”, as it was called. So wrong one could take.

The MP, former journalist and communist Jacob Friis was editor. Engineer Haavard Langseth was the man behind. Former member of NKP. He took out a loan of NOK 10.000 with security in his own house. The sample number was an attempt to vent interest among potential writers and subscribers. But it came as a surprise to many.

- Many of us who had submitted articles were cursed, Finn Lie said afterwards.

Several names were listed "in the editorial office", but no one had attended any meetings.

- This could probably have been lived with, Ulf Arnesen writes in his master's thesis from 1968: Had it not been for the fact that many also disagreed with the editorial line.

The first issue was simply critical of the United States.

In retrospect, it should also be noted that Langseth and Friis were unlucky with the time. The United States had just held elections. Of course there was reason to be critical. But Langseth and Friis were not given the opportunity to establish a "balance in the long run". They simply did not trust.

Then, on December 5, Arbeiderbladet wrote a note that it was Communist Langseth who had been running Orientering forward, they became too much for some. Although that was true.

Karl Evang, Kristen Andersen, Johanne Åmlid and Johan Vogt organized themselves and tried to get Langseth to voluntarily withdraw from the newspaper. He would not. But at a meeting on January 2 in Uranienborgveien 11, with more than 100 people present, Langseth and Friis were expelled. Line was added. The most important thing with Orientering was that it should be just as critical of the Soviet Union as it was of the United States. Journalist and writer Sigurd Evensmo was present and stood out as a natural editor. But he wouldn't. Ap man and health director Karl Evang eventually became desperate and bluffed:

"If you do not want to, Friis will come back," he said.

It worked.

Balanced criticism?

Sigurd Evensmo was the ideal editor and represented a rejuvenation with his cormorant 40 years. He was an opponent of NATO and a committed journalist, and had a few years earlier resigned from both the Labor Party and Arbeiderbladet. He also managed his own working hours. But most important of all: In the autumn of 1952, Evensmo had great success with the radio play "The Peace Prize", which dealt with the bloc policy and its spokesmen. Evensmo had broad confidence. He was famous. And he could write.

But does it work? Became Orientering more balanced in his foreign criticism with Evensmo in the editorial chair?

- It is clear that Friis was unlucky with the sample number, but I have no doubt that the coup was correct. With the Evang wing behind and with Evensmo in the editor's chair, at least the potential was there to pursue balanced criticism. It depended on political events of course. One issue in particular in the autumn of 1956 has been highlighted as exemplary, but then the western invasion of Egypt due to the Suez Canal and the Soviet invasion of Hungary were also the backdrop. The settlement with both blocks was violent, says Arnesen.

Which nevertheless seems clear: In the early 1950s, time was overpowering for a newspaper like that Orientering. There were far too many dissatisfied Communists and Labor members lurking around. The Communists were split and fired by the Storting in 1949 and the Labor Party joined the whole country in NATO. The criticism of deviants was enormous. If one tried to answer for oneself in Arbeiderbladet, the posts were squeezed in between the bathing temperatures and the weather forecast. Haakon Lie had a fit of rage just as it was. "Haakon Lie had lowered the ceiling height so low that you had to be pygmy to fit", as Finn Gustavsen so delicately put it. Orientering became an air duct.

“Should one determine the conditions of freedom of expression in the 1950s Norwegian mass media – understood as real political opposition – belongs Orientering with in the picture. The rest of the press – both the workers' press and the bourgeois press – agreed on a lot and had a common understanding of foreign and security policy. Just Orientering marked themselves as different. And freedom of expression can now most easily be determined on the basis of the possibility of dissenting or oppositional opinions ", as Hans Fredrik Dahl and Henrik G. Bastiansen write in the book on the history of freedom of expression -" How free a country? "

“Higher social strata”

In the 1960s, Ulf Arnesen was loosely connected to the circle Orientering. Was a member of SF and wrote articles for the newspaper. So when the time came to write a master's thesis, the choice was fine. Originally, he wanted to write the whole thing Orienterings story, but it got too violent. The start contained enough drama for a 138-page assignment, with 108 footnotes.

In his thesis, Arnesen counted the number of unit holders in Orientering at the end of 1953. Only a handful had a profession that could be characterized as "working". The rest were academics: journalists, teachers, lawyers, politicians… “Higher social classes dominated”, as Arnesen writes dryly. Of the 148 unit holders, only 25 lived outside Oslo. The core was thus the urban academic.

- This was a problem the newspaper was aware of. Not least because Haakon Lie used it for all it was worth. The circle around orientering were like puzzled academics with a lack of sense of reality, says Arnesen.

Or as Dahl and Bastiansen put it in "How free a country?":

"The newspaper was clearly meant to be read, not skimmed."

Arnesen was not alone in being an avid reader of Orientering in the 1950s and 60s. Just before the SF party was founded in 1961, hopes were high. Avisa had become more and more oriented towards domestic material and a new Norwegian future-oriented party was in the pipeline. Avisa's political joker stated that it was not long before a new name was given to the newspaper: “Orientering. How busy is Arbeiderbladet ”.

That's not how it should go. In 1975, the newspaper changed its name to “Ny Tid. How busy Orientering. "

The quarrel continued.