Jette Møllerhøj
email: jette@brillebo.dk

On unsafe ground: the practices and institutionalization

Keywords: Denmark, folk psychology, medicine, professionalization, psychiatry, scientificism, specialisms, 19th century

The aim of this paper is to characterize the efforts of late nineteenth-century Danish psychiatrists to have their fi eld recognized as a discipline in its own right, and their fi ght to be accepted as practitioners of science, following common scientifi c standards of exactness and proof. This struggle took place on two fronts: with colleagues in the somatic branches of medicine, and also with lay people and the general public. According to the psychiatrists, laymen persistently contested psychiatry's legitimacy in diagnosing and treating mentally ill patients. Criticism of its scientifi c objectivity made it diffi cult for psychiatry to gain respect on an equal footing with other branches of medicine.

The fi rst asylum in Denmark was established around 1800 outside Copenhagen. It accommodated not only the mentally ill, but also poor people suffering from somatic diseases as well as people suffering from venereal diseases. Between the mid-nineteenth century and 1915, fi ve asylums exclusively for the mentally ill were established throughout the country. In 1875 a combined psychiatric and neurological ward was set up in one of the main hospitals in Copenhagen. A number of small local institutions -without any psychiatric inspection -took care of incurable and chronic cases of mental disorder, and many mentally ill individuals were still taken care of in the private households if possible. However, the asylums played a major role in the establishment and institutionalization of psychiatry as a special branch of medicine, not least because they provided clinical material from which experience could be obtained and theories developed. Medical textbooks were published in the Danish language from the late 1880s, and at the University of Copenhagen a readership in psychiatry was established around 1890, which became a chair in 1916. Before these developments, which are often regarded as important signs of a developing medical speciality, there were several decades when doctors in the asylums were trying to unravel, explain, classify and treat mental disorders. As pointed out in a number of studies, the mentally ill were hospitalized and treated long before there was a special branch of medicine called psychiatry (see, e.g., Qvarsell, 1985: 96;Skålevåg, 2000: 368). The clinical work in the asylums played a crucial and fundamental role in the long and complex process of establishing psychiatry.

My studies have been carried out from the psychiatrist's point of view, and the aim has been a hermeneutic focus on how Danish psychiatrists saw themselves and perceived their science and practice. Below, I will take a closer look at the concept of mental illness as well as the practices of explaining and classifying mental illness, and the troubles that psychiatrists faced in their efforts to follow certain scientifi c standards. I will argue that focusing on psychiatric theory as represented in medical textbooks and published lectures, as well as psychiatric clinical practice as represented in annual reports, 1 enables us to get a closer and far more detailed picture of some of the ambiguities and discrepancies in the work of the psychiatrists. 2 Furthermore, I will address how psychiatry as a scientifi c enterprise was in some ways special and different, no matter how much the psychiatrists attempted to look and work like their colleagues in the somatic branches of medicine. These specifi c characteristics of psychiatry and its practices were, in a peculiar way, both the strong and the vulnerable points of psychiatry. Most of the attempts to become fully recognized as a scientifi c branch of medicine took place on an internal battlefi eld with other medical practitioners. However, according to the psychiatrists themselves, they also had to fi ght on an external battlefi eld to try to convince lay people that psychiatrists were the best and only qualifi ed experts to judge the sane from insane. I will argue that this relationship with the general public played rather a signifi cant role in the recognition of psychiatry as a special branch of medicine, as well as in its reputation.

The internal battlefi eld

In Denmark, as elsewhere, nineteenth-century psychiatrists aspired to have their fi eld of work recognized as a part of medical science, and also as a discipline in its own right. They wanted to emulate their colleagues in the somatic fi elds. 3 This eagerness to be like the others was shown especially in the psychiatrists' concept of disease and their interest in anatomical pathology, as well as in their discussions about classifi cation and causality.

Concept of disease

The psychiatrists insisted that psychiatric disease was comparable with any other somatic disorder, that it had similar causes and conditions and therefore should be perceived as literally the same kind of thing. This strong somatic orientation among psychiatrists became very explicit in their concept of mental disease as a disease of the brain, as stated by the psychiatrist Christian Geill (1860-1938): 'A mental disease is a disease of the brain, in exactly the same way as pneumonia is a disease of the lungs' 4 (Geill, 1899: 10). At the same time, anything to do with mind or mentality was defi nitely excluded. The concept of disease was described in a mechanical and materialistic language. It was not the soul itself that was suffering but the 'bodily instruments of the activity of the soul', as Harald Selmer (1814[START_REF] Selmer | Statistiske Meddelelser og Undersøgelser fra Sindssygeanstalten ved Aarhus i dens første 25 Aar, 1852-1877[END_REF], consultant of the fi rst new-build asylum (1852), maintained. When a person suffered from mental illness it was 'the material organ of the soul' that suffered and had become incompetent (Selmer, 1846: 15). Matters relating to the psyche or the soul were, in any case, outside the psychiatrists' fi eld. Consultant Knud Pontoppidan (1853Pontoppidan ( -1916) ) held that mental symptoms were only of interest as long as they were expressing a disturbance of the brain. The object of interest was the physical body, as Pontoppidan pointed out with reference to his British colleague John Hughlings-Jackson (1835-1911):

What we are to deal with, in our capacity of medical doctors, is the body. If there is such a thing as illness of the soul, we cannot deal with it. ... Mental symptoms are only expressions of what is going on and what is not going on in the higher nerve centres. (Pontoppidan, 1891: 3) The establishment of mental illness as a disease completely similar to any other physical or organic disease was an essential part of the profi ling of psychiatry as a medical and scientific enterprise. The definition of mental disorder as a biological abnormality implied that psychiatry was a biological psychiatry, and therefore theoretically a discipline with exactly the same research methodology and pathological fi ndings as the somatic branches of medicine. As a consequence, psychiatrists wanted to work towards similar specifi c scientifi c standards of objectivity, exactness and proof.

However, these idealistic ways of working and looking at things did not correspond very well with the actual material that psychiatrists had to deal with in clinical practice. The pathological picture was, in many cases, different from that in somatic conditions because of a large number of emotional expressions and symptoms. Psychiatrists very often had to deal with mental symptoms, or descriptions of symptoms and behaviours that had been seen before admission to the asylum. Far from being able to view the symptoms and conditions themselves, they often had to rely on descriptions from the patients, relatives or other members of the local community. 5 Such subjective information did not fi t in well with standards of objectivity, and the psychiatrists complained that they were not able to see and observe cases themselves (Pontoppidan, 1891: 4-5;[START_REF] Schrøder | Anmeldelse af A. Wimmer: Sct. Hans Hospital 1816-1916[END_REF]Schrøder, : 1271)).

Pathological anatomy

The lack of evidence was another problem that psychiatrists had to deal with. It turned out to be rather diffi cult to identify where exactly the insanity was located in the brain, and what had caused it. The psychiatrists had great confi dence in pathological anatomy as being the fi eld that could provide psychiatry with certain and exact knowledge. The increasingly detailed accounts of dissection results in annual reports of mental asylums indicate how eagerly psychiatrists were trying to locate pathological anatomical changes in the organs of mentally ill patients. 6 However, psychiatrists had to admit that their results from the dissecting room were still insuffi cient, and that their pathological anatomical knowledge was rather limited [START_REF] Friedenreich | Kortfattet, speciel Psykiatri [A Short Introduction to Psychiatry[END_REF]. Although they had an undaunted confi dence in the possibility of one day being able to locate specifi c pathological anatomical changes somewhere in the brain, they admitted that it was not possible for the time being.

Classifi cation

The diffi culties in pointing to and proving specifi c pathological anatomical changes considerably infl uenced attempts to establish psychiatric classifications and to develop a psychiatric disease nomenclature. As a consequence, psychiatrists could not set up classifi cations based on pathological anatomical fi ndings, but had to continue using classifi cation schemes based, to a large extent, on symptoms. Discussions on classifi cation and its principles were an important topic in the psychiatric literature, as the ability to classify was essential to a fi eld trying to establish itself as scientifi c.

These attempts to classify are characterized by the fact that classifi cations changed remarkably over time and by the great variety of ways that almost all psychiatrists chose to distinguish and classify. Psychiatrists clearly regretted their inability to classify according to a pathological anatomical division and complained about the arbitrariness and subjectivity involved in their attempts to establish categories and classifi cations. A symptoms-based classifi cation scheme would prove, if not unscientifi c, then simply not good enough according to a number of psychiatrists (Beretning, 1871: 13;[START_REF] Friedenreich | Kortfattet, speciel Psykiatri [A Short Introduction to Psychiatry[END_REF]Hallager, 1906: 144;Pontoppidan, 1891: 5;1901b: 536). Furthermore, they complained that almost every psychiatrist and every medical textbook used a different classifi cation scheme, which made comparisons almost impossible (Helweg, 1886: 201;Pontoppidan, 1901a: 686).

From around 1890, psychiatrists seemed more reticent about outlining a single diagnosis or describing cases. Rather than considering single and distinct types of diseases, they attached more importance to the course and the stages of a disease. In a lecture, Pontoppidan (1891: 9) emphasized to his students the importance of analysing conditions rather than working towards specifi c diagnoses: 'Neither should you expect [the lecture] to attach weight to the making of specifi c diagnostics, which plays a major role in the other medical branches. ... it is far more important to understand how the pathological process in each case has developed than to name a disease.' The infl uence of Emil Kraepelin is clear, but the Danish psychiatrists had not yet given up the possibility of identifying the causes of specifi c diseases. Around the turn of the century Alexander [START_REF] Friedenreich | Kortfattet, speciel Psykiatri [A Short Introduction to Psychiatry[END_REF] stated in his medical textbook that 'for the time being psychiatry works on various forms of courses of diseases meanwhile waiting for pathological anatomical and aetiological examinations to establish for us a more secure foundation'. Theoretically and ideally, psychiatrists wanted to classify mental diseases in accordance with their causes and based on pathological anatomical fi ndings. In practice, they had to classify, to a large extent, according to the appearance and symptoms of mental diseases -that is, classifi cation based on symptoms. In 1918 the psychiatrist, and later consultant, August Wimmer (1872Wimmer ( -1937) ) reported that, with a few exceptions, all medical textbooks opened with complaints and regrets about the incomplete aetiological knowledge and therefore imperfect and insuffi cient classifi cations and nomenclatures (Wimmer, 1918: 18). Over time the nomenclature of the medical textbooks expanded, and the number of diagnoses and classifications rose significantly towards the end of the nineteenth century. Part of the expansion was due to the addition of nervous and neurotic disorders to the working fi eld of psychiatry, especially the categories of hysteria and neurasthenia. 7 A similar increase in diagnoses is found in annual reports. In the early twentieth century, these reports consisted of a detailed and differentiated system of classifi cation, indicating that asylum psychiatrists had twice as many diagnoses and categories to use compared with the number available around 1850. There were, however, notable differences between the classifi cations outlined in the medical textbooks and the classifi cations used in the annual reports. Whereas the former varied from author to author, the latter consisted of relatively few categories (around six) for several decades at the end of the nineteenth century. Based on symptoms and behaviour, these categories -mania, melancholia, confusion, stupor, etc. -remained relatively constant in the annual reports until 1905. At this time the categories were expanded to include a number of new diseases, such as psychoses related to alcohol or morphine, the so-called circular psychosis -dementia praecox, hysteria, neurasthenia, traumatic neurosis -as well as the category 'other mental diseases', in which asylum psychiatrists could place cases that did not fi t in elsewhere. The categories represent a mixture of symptom-based and aetiological distinctions, and the open category of 'other mental diseases' did not contribute to uniform classifi cations. To a certain extent each psychiatrist was left to classify his clinical material as he wished. The most obvious explanation of the differences between the classifi cations in the medical textbooks and the annual reports is the fact that psychiatrists working in clinical practice could not wait for an ideal classifi cation scheme to be established, but had to continue to classify their actual empirical material. Even if the classifi cation schemes were inferior (and this was also discussed by asylum psychiatrists), they were seen as central scientifi c working tools and an important way to sort things out (Beretning, 1871: 13-15;Beretninger, 1895: 8-9;[START_REF] Hallager | Anmeldelse af Beretninger om St. Hans Hospital og Statens Sindssygeanstalter [Review of annual reports from St. Hans and other hospitals[END_REF]).

Causality

A last example of the discrepancy between what was outlined in the medical textbooks and what actually went on in clinical practice was the problem of the aetiology of mental disorders. Another important issue for psychiatrists was their ability to explain mental diseases; claiming specifi c causality was an essential part of legitimizing psychiatry as a distinct part of medical science.

According to the medical textbooks, a mental disease was most likely to be due to an inherited disposition or for some physical reasons. In a person with such a disposition, occasional conditions could eventually cause a mental illness. These conditions could be of physical or psychological nature, or what we call today psycho-social causes, for example, poverty. Towards the end of the nineteenth century the focus on heredity and disposition was intensifi ed. There was an unambiguous distinction between hereditary and occasional causal factors, with the latter inferior to the former. This view on heredity was emphasized in the thesis by the consultant Frederik Lange (1842Lange ( -1907)), The Infl uence of Heredity on Mental Diseases (1883). According to Lange (1883: 20), during the period of a generation, the importance of heredity had become clear and acknowledged, and a number of studies had shown that the frequency of hereditary disposition was 52.5%. Lange's (1883: 27-8) defi nition of hereditary disposition consisted of insanity established in fi rst-degree relatives (parents) and also in collateral branches, as well as cases of insanity and other 'abnormal illness' in the family.

In general, the psychiatrists were eager to point out the exact frequency of the hereditary disposition. However, the way it was calculated differed, and the frequencies reported varied signifi cantly (Koch, 1905: 77;Reisz, 1894: 339-40). Furthermore, the defi nition of a hereditary disposition differed from one psychiatrist to another. Hereditary disposition was a rather open concept framing heredity in a narrow sense as well as theories of degeneration, i.e., gradual decline through generations. The concept of hereditary disposition was ambiguous and seems to have covered mental illness due to heredity without degeneration, as well as so-called degenerative conditions. An ordinary hereditary disposition was far less fatal and determinate than degeneration. People with a hereditary disposition would not necessarily develop a mental disease, and this would depend on living conditions and the kinds of occasional causes that he or she eventually experienced (Geill, 1899: 37). A hereditary or degenerative disposition was primarily identifi ed as a physical or moral condition, very often based on appearance or behaviour -for instance, eyebrows that joined (Koch, 1996: 31). The newly established theories about heredity and genes (phenotype/genotype) had not yet found their way into the psychiatric understanding of heredity and predisposition (Geill, 1916: 125;Koch, 1905: 97-98). In a book on children and degeneration, [START_REF] Wimmer | Degenererede Børn. Studier over sjaelelige Udartningstilstande i Barnealderen [Children and Degeneration[END_REF] admitted that psychiatrists were facing diffi culties in defi ning what actually constituted a hereditary disposition, as well as in detecting it. The psychiatric concept was still, according to Wimmer (1909: 9-10, original italics), a clinical concept and consisted of demonstrating abnormalities in the father or mother of the insane child and 'the supposition that this was the reason for the mental disturbances in the child'. Before World War I psychiatrists' assumptions of predisposition and heredity had a rather hypothetical and presumptive character.

In Danish clinical practice, as represented in the annual reports and their specifi cation of aetiology, there was no hierarchy between hereditary and occasional causal factors. The concept of occasional causes did not fi gure in the schemes of aetiology. Instead, physical, psychological/mental as well as hereditary causes were listed side by side (Møllerhøj, 2006: 120). Typical physical causes were masturbation, headache or physical disorders of different kinds, whereas psychological causes could be grief, unhappy marriage, fi nancial diffi culties or disappointments. (Masturbation could also fi gure as a psychological cause dependent on whether the moral guilt or physical damage was pointed out as the main problem). Furthermore, the list of causal factors in the annual reports included a number of more spectacular and infrequent causal factors such as political agitation, Mormonism, travelling to America, being a bookworm, etc. (Møllerhøj, 2006: 128, 145). The variety of causal factors in the annual reports refl ects an aetiological practice marked by multi-causality. Furthermore, the variety illustrates that hereditary disposition was not identifi ed as often and as synonymously as prescribed in the medical textbooks. Towards the turn of the century, the frequency of mental/psychological and psycho-social causes declined, but it continued to appear in the specifi cations on a smaller scale. Also, there were marked differences between the asylums and between psychiatrists in their assessment of the infl uence of mental causes. Two of the asylums (Århus and Vordingborg) tended to give more weight to psychological and mental causes, whereas others (Sct. Hans Hospital and Middelfart) had a very strong somatic orientation in their aetiology. Some of these differences may be ascribed to variations in patient populations, but the psychiatrists themselves noticed the heterogeneity and considered it a matter of subjectivity and different opinions on the role of mental causes [START_REF] Krarup | Anmeldelse af Beretninger om St. Hans Hospital og Statens Sindssygeanstalter i[END_REF]Selmer, 1879: 102). The discrepancies between the aetiology prescribed in medical textbooks and that of clinical practice illustrates an ambivalent and unclear view of the meaning and importance of vague psychological factors. Psychiatrists probably saw a great variety of causes, some of which were extremely diffi cult to justify because they tended to be diffi cult to measure, and therefore did not fi t in well with the scientifi c standards.

Such ambivalence was present in one of [START_REF] Pontoppidan | Kasuistiske Meddelelser fra Kommunehospitalets 6te Afdeling [Casuistry from the psychiatric ward of Copenhagen Community Hospital[END_REF] cases. A female patient, with no established hereditary disposition, had witnessed the huge fi re at Christiansborg Castle in Copenhagen in 1884 and thereafter developed a depression. 8 The case interested Pontoppidan because it was 'an example of how a mental emotion could be the original cause of the development of a psychosis'. However, he was not going to describe the experience of the fi re as monocausal. Even though he could not, for the time being, point out other obvious causes, he maintained that one should be very careful in accepting mental causes as the only cause. The patient in question was pregnant and had a record of nervousness and some sort of mental disturbances during pregnancy. The aetiological role of pregnancy in relation to mental disorders was very well known and, according to Pontoppidan, one would therefore have to await the birth and 'lying-in' before a conclusion of the causality of this case could be fi nally established (Pontoppidan, 1885: 107). The case clearly illustrates how Pontoppidan, in accordance with his own doctrines, accentuated somatic factors as the decisive cause (the pregnancy). At the same time it is obvious how tempting and simple it seemed to him to point out the experience of the fi re as the trigger point. Mental experiences and feelings, however, did not fi t in well with a somatic and biologically orientated psychiatric science, focusing on what could be observed and measured. It obviously proved hard for psychiatrists to abandon these causes, because they were so often confronted with them in the single cases of mental disease in clinical practice, not least because the patients themselves or their relatives often pointed out these kinds of causes (Beretninger, 1885: 10). Some psychiatrists attempted to reduce the importance as well as the extent of mental and psychological causes, but could not ignore them completely. Mental and psychological factors kept appearing in clinical practice and could not always be reduced to occasional and unimportant causes. The efforts of psychiatrists to establish not just any aetiology but a certain type of aetiology, similar to that of the somatic branches of medicine, illustrates their keeness to work within the current frameworks and standards of medical science.

The two faces of psychiatry

Although standards on scientifi c classifi cations and causal explanations had been established and outlined at a theoretical level, in practice they were proved diffi cult to meet. The psychiatrists referred metaphorically to their fi eld as a 'ship', a ship without a rudder, a ship that should take a more pathological course, go ashore and become connected with the mainland, i.e., medical science in general (Beretning, 1871: 27;Pontoppidan, 1889: 326;Steenberg, 1873: 182). In one of his lectures to medical students, Pontoppidan (1896: 464) described 'the psychiatric laboratory' as part of the 'big workshop of natural sciences'. The use of these specifi c concepts and metaphors illustrates that there was absolutely no doubt among psychiatrists as to where their ship was heading.

In reality, however, psychiatry and its practices had serious problems in meeting the scientifi c standards of exactness and proof, and in being recognized as 'scientifi c' (Beretning, 1871: 13-17;Krarup, 1909: 283;Pontoppidan, 1891: 4-5;Schrøder, 1917: 380-2). Colleagues in the somatic branches of medicine, especially neurologists, constantly criticized psychiatrists for being subjective, vague and unscientifi c in their approach (Christiansen, 1906a: 82;Krarup, 1907: 29-30). The critique did not address the therapeutic nihilism in psychiatric practice or the increasing lack of accommodation in the asylums due to the large number of chronic and incurable patients. Rather, attention was focused on psychiatry as a scientifi c enterprise. While the legitimacy of psychiatry as an independent fi eld dealing with mental disorders was not questioned, its procedures were criticized. Although it might have been recognized as a defi nite fi eld working with a specifi c group of diseases, it was not considered to be practising real science in accordance with common scientifi c standards of exactness and proof.

On the other hand, there were also signs of a growing awareness among psychiatrists about the specifi c characteristics of psychiatry and their ownership of these. One example was the way psychiatrists talked about normality; another was their awareness of the infl uence of time and place on their concepts, and the realization that mental disorders were changing in form and content, as well as prevalence over time.

Normality

Around the middle of the nineteenth century, psychiatrists insisted that there were defi nite distinctions between what was normal and what was pathological in relation to mental disorders, but the next generation of psychiatrists seemed more reserved about making absolute defi nitions (Selmer, 1847: 407). 9 In a lecture, Pontoppidan (1889: 327) remarked that 'the conventional wisdom that we are all more or less insane is, as far as it goes, true if none of us are completely mentally healthy nor physically sound. Absolute health is an abstraction, an ideal, which no human being achieves'. Some other psychiatrists said how diffi cult it was to diagnose mental diseases, and that no defi nite criteria could be established for what constituted sound mental health versus pathological mental health (Christiansen, 1906a: 282;Gaedeken, 1895: 27-8;Geill, 1899: 67). Such a distinction was diffi cult to make because of the character of the mental disorders. It was most often characterized by strange behaviour or abnormal psychological symptoms. Vague psychological symptoms could not be measured with an average model of behaviour, reason or rationality but, according to Pontoppidan (1891: 6-7;1893: 13), should be understood in relation to the individual patients and themselves as they used to be, prior to the outbreak of mental disease. This point of view differed radically from medical science in general, where the focus had changed from the individual patient towards an average based on generalizations for larger groups of patients (Bynum, Hardy, Jacyna, Lawrence and Tansey, 2006: 78;Porter, 2006, 82: 154).

The Achilles' heel

Another sign of a growing awareness among psychiatrists about the speciality of their fi eld was their acknowledgement that time and space and the surrounding society affected and infl uenced their practice and concepts. The consultant of one of the provincial asylums, Fr. Lange, stated in his medical textbook (1894) that it was well known that the form and content of mental disorders varied. The reasons for this were complex, but one important factor, according to Lange, was the psychiatrists themselves; he admitted that the categorization of a certain condition by one psychiatrist could easily differ considerably from that of another psychiatrist. Some of his colleagues also described how disorders might change and sometimes disappear and how new disorders came into play, and he admitted that this also depended on the judgements of the psychiatrists themselves (Geill, 1899: 43;Lange, 1894: 16;Poulsen, 1899: 251). 10 This seems to imply that psychiatrists were well aware that diagnoses and classifi cations were not fi xed refl ections of reality and real conditions, but ways of sorting out such conditions. There seems to have been a high degree of discussion and awareness among the psychiatrists about their practices and the consequent implications. At the beginning of the twentieth century there also seems to have been a stronger emphasis that the main task of psychiatric science was to make detailed descriptions of psychiatric conditions. To counter the view about the scientifi c inferiority of psychiatry, Wimmer emphasized that careful anamneses and observations were the best diagnostic tools of the psychiatrist. Furthermore, he stressed that this approach was not 'a psychological or metaphysical speculation' but 'an objective scrutiny and description of the insane' (Wimmer, 1918: 24-5;original italics).

While such statements underlined the fact that the objects of psychiatry were somewhat different from those of somatic medicine and therefore had to be dealt with in different ways, this was simultaneously the Achilles' heel of psychiatry. The psychiatrists' discussions and moderate statements confi rmed the assumptions of the neurologists that psychiatry was vague and subjective and, in the words of Christiansen (1906a: 82;1906b: 361), one of the most critical neurologists, it was far more a guessing game than a scientifi c practice. In addition to such criticism from fellow medical practitioners, the psychiatrists and their practices were also watched attentively by lay people; this also caused psychiatrists a considerable amount of concern.

The external battlefi eld

Psychiatry has a long record of being a scapegoat. The scientifi c authority and self-perception of psychiatrists was questioned by the outside world in a number of settings during the nineteenth century. Probably the best-known Danish example of lay people criticizing and interfering in psychiatric practice is the 1894 controversy about the psychiatric ward in Copenhagen and its consultant Pontoppidan. The affair involved the admission of the Danish-Norwegian author Amalie Skram (1846Skram ( -1905) ) who later published two autobiographical novels describing her admission and treatment by the consultant as far from pleasant (Skram, 1895a(Skram, , 1895b)). The novels contain a strong focus on the power relations between the female patient and the male consultant.

Until 1938 when a detailed law about admissions to psychiatric hospitals was formulated, admissions and committals were carried out according to different regulations and statutory instruments for each asylum. However, the law in relation to the psychiatric ward in Copenhagen was uncertain, and the question of whether a patient should be admitted and confi ned was to a large extent decided by the consultant. The 1894 controversy was complex; it was partly about the insuffi cient regulations on admissions and committals to this specifi c psychiatric ward, partly about psychiatric judgements in general and the scientifi c authority of Knud Pontoppidan in particular. Thanks to the newspapers, the controversy had considerable publicity and it highlighted the question of who were and should be capable of determining whether a person was insane or not. The judgements and scientifi c approach of Pontoppidan were questioned; for example, one headline during the debate asked 'isn't the professor himself insane?', and the whole affair resulted in the consultant resigning his post (Kelstrup, 1983: 157). The controversy is often represented as the fi rst antipsychiatry movement in Denmark, and as a forerunner of the antipsychiatry of the 1960s and 1970s; however, this is misleading and rather anachronistic since at that time no alternative explanations of mental illness had been set out, and there was no explicit agenda aimed at abolishing psychiatry as a science. 11 It seems more reasonable to consider the affair as criticism by lay people or as part of a more general relationship with the public that psychiatrists had a long record of dealing with (Fogt 1998: 86-8;Møllerhøj, 2007a: 72). I will not go into further detail about this case, but make the point that this was one of a number of examples of lay people being critical or sceptical of psychiatry, psychiatrists and their practice. The 1894 controversy was probably the most aggressive and widespread, because it was articulated through the Copenhagen newspapers, but previously the relationship with lay people had been discussed in some psychiatric texts.

First, the psychiatrists complained about the prejudices and ignorance of the families of the mentally ill, who often, according to the psychiatrists, obstructed admission to an asylum. Lay people were afraid of the mental institutions, did not want to leave their relatives there and did not understand that it was an institution of intervention and rehabilitation (Geill, 1895: 43;1899: 1;Gjersing, 1847: 186;Selmer, 1846: 3;Steenberg, 1881: 545;Wimmer, 1916: 80). Pontoppidan (1891: 13) complained about the 'deeply rooted prejudices against the asylums' and argued that this often caused mistrust of the psychiatrists. In their opinion, the prejudice and ignorance often went hand in hand with a tendency among lay people to claim that they themselves could determine whether their relative was insane or not. This annoyed psychiatrists, probably because the specifi c knowledge of the profession, as well as its monopoly in defi ning and explaining mental diseases, were being questioned. Psychiatrists also asserted that the authorities interfered in psychiatric practice and questioned psychiatric judgements. The fact that those in authority also deemed themselves capable of determining whether or not people were insane excused, to some extent, the ignorance of lay people, as Pontoppidan (1891: 16) explained to his students in a lecture: 'when authorities can take up this kind of attitude towards an empirical science, the foolishness of the lay people is excusable. Therefore you will have to accept the fact that old aunts of the patients appear, not to hear our opinion on the patient but to inform us about their own view.'

Although the ideas of lay people were constantly warded off by pleading the legitimacy and authority of scientifi c psychiatric knowledge, it is obvious that the situation bothered the psychiatrists. The interference of lay people was even mentioned in textbooks written for medical students, which shows how seriously the problem was taken. The consultant of Sct. Hans Hospital outside Copenhagen stated in an annual report for 1887 that: everybody, except the doctors of insanity, seems to assume it is an easy matter to judge, whether a person is insane or not. This is an indication of the low scientifi c standard of psychiatry, compared to other branches of medicine. For the less a disease is scientifi cally explored, the more likely people are to think they know its diagnosis, cause and treatment in and out. (Beretninger, 1887: 19) Thus, it seems as if psychiatry, more than any of the other special branches of medicine, was questioned and constantly had to legitimize its scientifi c authority and its monopoly in judging sane from insane. In this sense, psychiatry had a rather chronic, if not incurable, problem with an interfering general public.

Concluding remarks

The aim of the study has been to throw light on the practices of explaining and classifying mental disorders, and to show how these practices played a major role in efforts to establish psychiatry as a special branch of medicine. Psychiatrists explicitly aimed at becoming part of the mainstream of scientifi c medicine, and they struggled to be accepted as practitioners of science in accordance with common scientifi c standards of exactness and proof. This battle was with colleagues in the somatic branches of medicine, especially neurologists, as well as with lay people and the general public. According to the psychiatrists, laymen persistently contested psychiatry's legitimacy in diagnosing and treating mentally ill patients. The criticism of scientifi c objectivity, as well as lay people's attention to psychiatric practices, caused diffi culties in gaining respect on an equal footing with the other branches of medicine. Furthermore, the psychiatrists had to face a number of discrepancies between their theoretical and clinical practice. When following Ackerknecht's urge to look at what was done in medical practice, in addition to what was thought and written, it becomes clear that psychiatrists were struggling with inconsistency between what they could actually do and what they would have liked to be able to do. As a consequence, psychiatry remained on unsafe ground.

Psychiatry has a long record of being a scapegoat -for more than 150 years it has been subject to criticism and interference. This continuity may help to explain why, even today, despite a strong biological and genetic orientation and notable treatment successes, thanks to psychoactive drugs, psychiatry in Denmark and elsewhere is still at the very lower end of the hierarchy of medical specialities, and is accorded very little prestige. Notes 1. Annual reports from each asylum were made on the basis of patient fi les; in my study they are considered to be representations of clinical practice. In the annual reports the asylum psychiatrists gave an account of a number of topics, especially patient population, work therapy, aetiology and classifi cation. The inclusion of discussions about the value of the reports, how they should be made, and how to establish comparisons between the institutions and their practices, all emphasize the scientifi c ambitions and specifi c agendas of the asylum psychiatrists. See also [START_REF] Møllerhøj | På gyngende grund. Psykiatriens praksisser og institutionalisering i Danmark 1850-1920[END_REF]: 220-2. 2. As Erwin Ackerknecht (1967: 214) has maintained, it is important to have a look at 'what doctors did in addition to what they thought and wrote'. Suzuki (2006: 42) has likewise emphasized the importance of dealing with medical science and knowledge as well as medical practice in the history of psychiatry. 3. For a closer examination, see also [START_REF] Jönsson | Det terapeutiske rummet. Rum og kropp i svensk sinnessjukvård 1850-1970[END_REF][START_REF] Qvarsell | Locked up or put to bed: psychiatry and the treatment of the mentally ill in Sweden[END_REF]. Somatic medicine was not necessarily a uniform whole at this time, but the point is that it worked as a homogenous ideal for psychiatrists and represented desirable exactness and esteem. 4. All translations are by the author. 5. The role of the family and local community in the labelling and judgement of insanity has attracted much attention in recent studies; see also: [START_REF] Bartlett | Outside the Walls of the Asylum. The History of Care in the Community 1750-2000[END_REF][START_REF] Macdonald | Madness, suicide and the computer[END_REF]Porter & Wright, 2003;[START_REF] Prestwich | Family strategies and medical power: "voluntary" committal in a Parisian asylum, 1876-1914[END_REF]Suzuki, 2006. 6. The section of autopsy results in the annual reports expanded remarkably during the second half of the nineteenth century. From 1872 it consisted of a 'list of fi ndings', which illustrates that psychiatrists were looking for specifi c changes in the brain. From 1907 the paragraph became more detailed: each deceased patient was listed separately along with his/her results. 7. This expansion has been described as an addition of the 'half-mad' to the working fi eld of psychiatry (Goldstein, 1993(Goldstein, : 1364)), but it also included pathological sexual behaviour, neurosyphilis and alcohol psychoses. See, for instance, Shorter, 1997: 48-64. 8. Pontoppidan used the concept 'depression' to describe the condition, but it was not a separate category at that time. However, the case notes do not give the patient's exact diagnosis. 9. See also Goldstein, 1993Goldstein, : 1364. 10. 10. One example of the rise and fall of psychiatric categories is the category of puerperal insanity, which was established at the beginning of the nineteenth century and phased out around 1900. See also [START_REF] Marland | Dangerous Motherhood. Insanity and Childbirth in Victorian Britain[END_REF]Møllerhøj, 2007b. 11. Antipsychiatry has a number of meanings and connotations. In this case, I stress that the aim of antipsychiatry was to reject a medical understanding of mental disorders as well as psychiatry as a special branch of medicine. See also Wulff, Pedersen and Rosenberg, 1999: 119, 134-5.

Acknowledgements

This paper is based on analyses and conclusions from my PhD thesis: 'On unsafe ground. The practices and institutionalization of Danish psychiatry 1850-1920', University of Copenhagen, 2006. An earlier version of the paper was presented at the 'Psychiatric Science and Lay Perspective' workshop at the University of Warwick, 14 December 2006.

I thank Bonnie Evans for valuable comments, and Professor Berrios for his help in improving this paper.


Søren Kaj Andersen

Nordic Metal Trade Unions on the Move: Responses to Globalization and Europeanization

Keywords: Nordic Metal Trade Unions, globalization and Europeanization, metal sector

■ Despite economic globalization, the liberalization of European markets and rapid technological changes, membership density in the trade unions in the metal sector in the Nordic countries remains exceptionally high compared to any other European region. The coverage of collective agreements has also remained intact, and unemployment is low by European standards. Nevertheless, the Nordic metal unions face a number of dilemmas. They all recognize a need to engage more actively in international, and especially European-level, policy-making, including the coordination of bargaining processes. Yet they fear that European regulation may undermine their national bargaining autonomy. They also recognize the need for a common Nordic position with regard to European policies; but differences in industrial structures and traditions of labour market regulation, alongside different national relationships to the European Union and Economic and Monetary Union, represent obstacles to closer cooperation between the Nordic metal federations. Moreover, a lasting problem is the winning of the support of their members for European and global activities.

Introduction

In some respects, globalization is not a new challenge for the Nordic metal industry. Ever since the early days of industrialization, it has been exposed to fierce international competition and cross-national mobility of labour. However, radical changes in the ownership and organizational structures of companies have had a new and significant impact over the past few decades. Workers and their unions have been faced by increased flows of foreign direct investment (FDI), company restructuring, the outsourcing of peripheral activities and relocation of labour-intensive production to low-cost countries.

National Consequences of Globalization and Europeanization

The Nordic metal industries have changed fundamentally over the past two decades. Although exports and investments in South-East Asia have increased, the major part of both metal-related trade and investments go to Europe; in effect, the EU/EEA has become the expanded home market of these industries. In all the Nordic countries, the internationalization of ownership structures as well as of production chains has been accompanied by large-scale processes of restructuring: a narrower focus on 'core business', the introduction of new technology, the outsourcing of support functions, and the relocation of labour-intensive production.

Against this background, trade union representatives from the metal sectors point to a number of effects of globalization and Europeanization. First, fierce international competition and, thereby, a strict focus on costs penetrate all aspects of employment relations at enterprise level. Accordingly, the question of outsourcing or relocation of production is always present. Second, demands related to the qualifications and flexibility of employees have increased. This has enhanced the need for further training and education. At the same time, there is a risk that some groups of metalworkers will become marginalized, as they will not be able to meet these demands. Third, as a consequence of mergers and acquisitions, increasingly across borders, decisions seem to be taken 'somewhere else'. Such changes in ownership structures have made it more difficult for trade union representatives to establish a dialogue with the owners. Fourth, many smaller companies in the Nordic metal industries are subcontractors for larger, often multinational enterprises and are consequently part of cross-national production chains. This means that strikes affect not only the individual company, but all links in the production chain, and thus that the pressure on the strike-bound enterprise is intensified. From the trade union point of view, it becomes important to have well-developed, cross-national contacts. Fifth, the introduction of new technology and restructuring have led to a change in the proportions of blue-and white-collar workers in the metal industries. Because in most Nordic countries these categories are members of separate unions, this changes the relative size and weight of the different unions. Demands for flexible (for example, just-in-time) production have led to the introduction of more flexible working-time schedules, a growth in the number of small subcontractors and, in Finland and Sweden, an increased number of employees on fixed-term contracts. Consequently, job security has been weakened for many metalworkers.

Stability and Change in Collective Bargaining

In spite of the profound changes in the Nordic metal industries, and in contrast to most EU countries, the level of employment remained by and large stable during the 1990s. However, traditional areas of engineering have been substantially restructured or replaced by new types of production, for example, those based on information technology (IT). After the crisis in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the number of employees in the metal industries in all four Nordic countries studied increased between 1993 and 2000, although somewhat more in Sweden and Finland than in Denmark and Norway (OECD, 2002). Moreover, in the past two decades union membership rates have remained, by European standards, exceptionally high. In Sweden, Finland, and Denmark, 85-90 percent of metalworkers are unionized. The figure is somewhat lower in Norway (around 60 percent) and showing signs of decline [START_REF] Bråten | Norge: Nasjonal krise og internasjonal vekst -utfordringer for fagorganisasjonerne[END_REF].

Developments in collective bargaining systems in the metal sector have not been uniform in the Nordic countries, and there have been elements of both divergence and convergence. In all cases, the coverage of agreements remains high despite the restructuring of bargaining systems, especially in Sweden and Denmark. In Denmark, the main industrial affiliates of the central confederation, LO-Danmark, formed a broad bargaining 'cartel', CO-industri, in 1992. This was an enlargement of the sector-specific cartel, CO-Metal, and represented a response to the merger in the previous year between the employers' associations in engineering and in general manufacturing. While the interests of the bargaining parties were centralized within the manufacturing sector at national level, a decentralization of bargaining over primarily pay and working time gained pace throughout the 1990s. Consequently, today around two-thirds of the total of collectively bargained increases in costs (i.e. pay and improved conditions) are negotiated at local level.

A similar development took place in Sweden. Peak-level bargaining was eroded in the 1980s and formally abandoned by the employers in 1990, in favour of sectoral negotiation, while company bargaining grew in importance. Trade unions in manufacturing then began to cooperate increasingly closely, and in 1996 seven of the major federations created a new umbrella organization, Facken inom industrin (unions in industry), encompassing unions from all the Swedish confederations: Landsorganisationene i Sverige (LO Sweden), Tjänstemännens Centralorganisation (TCO or Confederation of Professional Employees), and Sveriges Akademikers Centralorganisation (SACO or Swedish Confederation of Professional Associations). In 1997, they were able to conclude a basic agreement with the employers, which since then has set the framework for decentralized wage negotiations and a procedure for conflict resolution [START_REF] Elvander | The New Swedish Regime for Collective Bargaining and Conflict Resolution: A Comparative Perspective[END_REF].

Trade unions in the metal industries are more fragmented in Norway. The largest private-sector union, Fellesforbundet (United Federation of Trade Unions), was created in 1988 in a merger of five unions representing metalworkers as well as workers in other industries; but there are several other unions in the metal sector. However, in the past decade the collective bargaining system in the metal sector has shown stability, despite a major strike in 1996 and rapid wage increases in the late 1990s.

In Finland, there has been little change to the rather fragmented structure of trade unions. However, in the context of renewed peak-level incomes policies, cooperation between both individual unions and confederations has improved in recent years.

There have thus been trends towards decentralization in the metal sectors of all Nordic countries, but in general, company negotiations have developed further in Denmark and Sweden than in Norway and Finland. In the latter countries, the centralized character of their overall bargaining systems was reinforced during the 1990s, although company representatives are mandated to negotiate certain issues (in Norway, including pay) within the nationally agreed framework. Despite contrasts between countries, all these systems are examples of 'centralized decentralization' [START_REF] Due | The Survival of the Danish Model: A Historical Sociological Analysis of the Danish System of Collective Bargaining[END_REF] or 'organized decentralization' [START_REF] Traxler | Farewell to Labour Market Associations? Organized Versus Disorganized Decentralisation as a Map for Industrial Relations[END_REF]. Centralized control of the bargaining process persists, despite significant national variations with respect to the levels and modes of coordination.

The Nordic economies have followed the general euro-zone pattern, with low inflation and independent central banks. Consequently, trends in wages and costs have become much more important for macroeconomic adaptability. As the pattern-setting first-mover in national bargaining, the metal sector plays a significant role in macro-economic concertation [START_REF] Dølvik | Globalisering og europeisk integrasjonutfordringer for løndannelsen og kollektivavtalerne i de nordiska lande[END_REF]. Finland is part of the eurozone and its metal trade unions have accepted the establishment of a new wage norm, underpinned by buffer funds designed to prevent nominal wage cuts during economic shocks. High nominal wage increases have given way to broad incomes policy solutions. The value of the Danish krone is locked to the euro (making Denmark a shadow member of the euro-zone), but this is not true of the Swedish krona. But in both countries, external pressures and internal reforms have led to moderate wage demands adapted to cost movements in the most important trading partners (first and foremost Germany). In Denmark, a national tripartite agreement in 1987 restricted increases in labour costs to the level in competitor countries. In the Swedish industry sector, a bipartite agreement in 1997 specified that wages should not rise faster than the EU average [START_REF] Elvander | The New Swedish Regime for Collective Bargaining and Conflict Resolution: A Comparative Perspective[END_REF][START_REF] Schulten | On the Way Towards Downward Competition? Collective Bargaining Under the European Monetary Union[END_REF]. Norway (a member of the EEA and thus of the single market) also had moderate wage increases between 1988 and 1996, but inflationary pressure in the oil economy and lack of coordination in bargaining rounds led to much higher wage increases in the late 1990s. This, together with a rise in the value of the Norwegian krone, threatened capital flight and significant job losses, leading to tripartite incomes policy agreements from 1999.

Thus despite widespread expectations of collapse in the early 1990s, the industrial relations systems in the Nordic metal sectors proved robust and adaptable. They have adopted the hallmark of the traditional German model: an interaction between wage bargaining and the low inflation targets of independent central banks. In general, these systems have displayed the paradigmatic shift seen elsewhere in Europe, from a productivity-oriented collective bargaining policy towards a competition-oriented one [START_REF] Dølvik | Globalisering og europeisk integrasjonutfordringer for løndannelsen og kollektivavtalerne i de nordiska lande[END_REF][START_REF] Schulten | On the Way Towards Downward Competition? Collective Bargaining Under the European Monetary Union[END_REF].

Europeanization and Nordic Scepticism

Virtually all our interviewees emphasized that the dividing lines between national, Nordic and European trade union policies are becoming increasingly blurred. So many aspects of national trade union work are influenced by European economic integration and European policymaking that European issues have become ever more interwoven with national policy-making. Consequently, union representatives in the metal industries have also recognized a growing need for their organizations to have a strong voice at European level. This they seek through a number of different channels [START_REF] Rasmussen | Den europaeiske union[END_REF]: national authorities; national political parties; the European Parliament; the European Commission; their national confederations; their European sectoral organization, the European Metalworkers Federation (EMF); and the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC). It should be added that although global issues are moving up the agenda, European influence and coordination are seen as much more specific, goal oriented, and useful than global cooperation.

Priority is given to the EMF, the function of which has changed from exchanging information on national collective bargaining rounds to more concrete and binding policy-making. It facilitates not only the exchange of information and experience, but also policy learning with regard to European trends and the formulation of mutually binding policies. Benchmarking and peer pressure form an important part of such dynamics. All the Nordic trade unions in the sector share this understanding of the EMF (Andersen et al., 2003: 66;Blomqvist and Murhem, 2003: 170;Bråten and Dølvik, 2003: 117;Sund, 2003: 207).

This consensus on the need to engage in European policies contrasts with the otherwise sceptical attitude towards European integration traditionally found among trade unions in Norway, Denmark and Sweden. However, the unions in the metal sector have had, and still have, a more positive approach towards the EU than the majority of unions in the three countries. In the 1994 Norwegian referendum on EU membership, both Fellesforbundet and NITO (the union of engineers and technologists) recommended a yes vote, while LO i Norge (narrowly) recommended a no vote. In Sweden and Denmark, respectively, Svenska Metall and CO-industri campaigned actively for Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) membership, which was, however, rejected in the referendums in both countries. In contrast, the Finnish labour movement has a far more positive approach. The collapse of the Soviet Union forced Finland to look westward for new markets and political stability, and the economic crisis of the early 1990s was so deep that the unions were prepared to move in new directions. Consequently, the trade unions were anxious to inform themselves and their members about the EU, and the metalworkers' unions took the lead in this process (Sund, 2003: 206).

Among metal trade unionists in the three Scandinavian countries there is scepticism towards EU directives on labour issues. Although it is acknowledged that EU regulations have in several respects improved workers' rights, there is a fear that the spread of individual legal rights may eventually undermine the systems of national collective agreements, threaten the existing autonomy of the trade unions (and their counterparts, the employers' associations), and consequently weaken the power base of both parties. Especially in Denmark, there have been strong attempts to implement EU directives via national collective agreements. This has only been partly successful, as the Commission has pointed out that collective agreements do not cover all employees in the Danish labour market; consequently, it has been necessary to supplement the collective agreements with complementary legislation [START_REF] Andersen | Danmark: Metalindustriens forandring og den faglige europaeisering[END_REF][START_REF] Falkner | Europeanization of Social Partnership in Smaller European Democracies?[END_REF]). An additional dilemma, especially for the Danish and Swedish metal federations, is the fact that agreements reached in peak-level social dialogue tend to strengthen the position of the national confederation at their expense. It is with some ambivalence that the metalworkers' unions see the central confederations play a key role in not only the European inter-sectoral bargaining process, but also in the national processes of implementing European agreements and directives.

There is similar scepticism towards the European Works Councils (EWCs). When the EWC directive was implemented, the Nordic metal trade unions by and large saw them as bodies without substantial competences or potential. Furthermore, the possibility of having non-unionized employee representatives was, and still is, perceived as problematic, since works councils in the Nordic countries are 'exclusively union mechanisms' (Kjellberg, 1998: 76). At least in the early years of the EWCs, Danish representatives seem to have functioned more or less in isolation from the trade unions, even though the vast majority of the representatives were union members [START_REF] Knudsen | Multinationale lønmodtagereerfaringer med europaeiske samarbejdsudvalg[END_REF]. However, scepticism is slowly giving way to the view that the EWCs might become useful bodies if closely linked to the national systems of joint influence and codetermination. The metal unions today recognize that at least some EWCs function relatively well and are discussing issues that are close to the core collective bargaining agenda. At the same time, this provokes concern that cross-national, enterprise-based agreements might conflict with the national collective bargaining system.

It emerges as at least partly paradoxical that the Nordic metal unions are, on the one hand, convinced that they need to engage more strongly in European policy-making, above all via the EMF, while on the other hand (with the exception of the Finnish unions), they remain sceptical about important aspects of European labour policies. At the heart of this ambiguity is the fear that the national collective bargaining systems can be threatened. Coming from strong positions based on the high rate of unionization and encompassing coverage of collective agreements, the Nordic metal trade unions (especially in Sweden and Denmark) are key players in the political and economic arena. Any interference that might diminish the importance of collective agreements is a potential threat to their position.

There is also a fairly strong belief within the metal-sector organizations, unions as well as employers' associations, that Nordic labour market regulation is well functioning -a view which is confirmed by key indicators such as unemployment and competitiveness. In other words, there is a fear that European regulation might disrupt existing national bargaining systems or restrict the scope for nationally agreed changesthough so far there is little evidence that European directives have had such an effect.

The Nordic unions are also sceptical that EMF policy-making seems to assume that it is 'possible to pursue a common policy at sectoral level in every European country' (Nilsson, 2001: 278), whereas in several European countries there is no effective sector-level bargaining system. Thus they have tended to adopt a defensive approach to the work of the EMF, giving priority to safeguarding the future existence of the Nordic bargaining systems. Thus the Nordic organizations (which together comprise around a fifth of EMF membership) are often viewed as a brake on the enlargement of the authority of the EMF. Nordic representatives are aware of this and have started discussions about how to develop more proactive European approaches, but they also believe that their unions are respected by the other EMF members because of their strong positions in their home countries, and feel that they do contribute constructively to EMF activities (Bråten and Dølvik, 2003: 116).

The EU and the Revitalization of Nordiska Metall

Nordiska Metall, established in 1970 by the metalworkers' unions in Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland and Iceland, is the longest-established federation for regional cross-border cooperation in the metal sector in Europe [START_REF] Löhman | Defending of Interests in Europe[END_REF]. Its activities gained new impetus in the 1990s, especially after Sweden and Finland joined the EU in 1995. From then on its main focus has been on broader European developments, and in particular on activities within the EMF. In this sense, Nordiska Metall has become a regional body for the coordination of European policies, or more specifically, for consolidating influence at EU level (especially within the EMF) of the Nordic metal unions. However, it does not formally represent the Nordic metal unions, merely coordinating the positions and viewpoints of the different unions.

Today, Nordiska Metall consists of 14 unions (including white-collar staff, engineers, and other professionals) from the five countries, representing almost one million employees. It has a secretariat of three fulltime employees in Stockholm. One of its key activities is to coordinate information among the Nordic unions on their collective bargaining demands, strategies, and outcomes. These activities are closely linked to the 1999 EMF 'coordination rule' governing collective bargaining by its affiliates [START_REF] Gollbach | Cross-Border Collective Bargaining Networks in Europe[END_REF]. Nordiska Metall formulates annual action programmes for collective bargaining, and has established a select working party on collective bargaining which meets approximately four times a year. There are also frequent informal contacts between the Nordic representatives.

So far there has been only limited experience of the operation of the coordination rule, as collective agreements in the Nordic countries are in some cases renewed only every third or fourth year. However, over the winter of 2003/04 there were more or less parallel sequences of bargaining in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Germany. This triggered a number of meetings. The defeat suffered by IG Metall in 2003 over its demand for a 35-hour week in eastern Germany caused anxieties among the Nordic unions as a bad omen for the German wage negotiations scheduled for early 2004. The Danish CO-industri and Swedish Metall have for a number of years held regular meetings with officials from the adjacent region of IG Metall (Bezirk Küste) to exchange information and discuss strategies. In advance of the 2004 pay negotiations in Germany and Denmark, IG Metall Vice-President Bertold Huber together with EMF Deputy General Secretary Bart Samyn met in Copenhagen for discussions. Later, the collective bargaining group of Nordiska Metall, with representatives from all four countries, met Huber at the IG Metall headquarters in Frankfurt to discuss progress. According to CO-industri representatives, these meetings demonstrated that cross-border information and coordination had been taken to 'a new level'.

Over the same period, meetings of Nordic representatives were convened in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway to discuss national priorities in the forthcoming negotiations. Occupational pensions were high on the bargaining agenda in Norway; in Sweden, the key issue was working time; while in Denmark the main focus was on 'softer' issues such as parental leave. Even though it is difficult to evaluate the impact of such cross-national meetings and informal contacts, it should at least be emphasized that these have today become more than the traditional exercises of merely exchanging information on bargaining outcomes; these sequences of contacts take place before and during the negotiation process in each country.

The much-debated, cost-cutting deals concluded over the summer and throughout the second half of 2004 in Germany constituted an unpleasant challenge for the Nordic metal trade unions. The size of the German economy means that the Nordic countries are directly affected by developmental trends in Germany. Accordingly, German concession bargaining may well shape the outcome of agreements to be concluded in the Nordic countries. Developments in Germany also demonstrated the need for steady flows of information concerning not only sectoral multi-employer bargaining, but also company agreements, with deals on cost cutting and job security at major firms such as Siemens, Daimler-Chrysler, and Volkswagen attracting considerable media attention.

Nordic union representatives complain that they were not informed early enough about many of these agreements, for example, that at Siemens in July 2004. However, there was a more effective exchange of information, and eventually coordination of action, in the case of GM Europe's plan to dismiss some 12,000 workers, the majority of them in Germany. The General Motors (GM) restructuring plan posed a particular problem for cross-national trade union cooperation, since the company announced that only one plant would assemble the next generation of SAAB 9.3s and Opel Vectras. Management intended to negotiate separately with union representatives at Opel Rüsselheim (Germany) and SAAB Trollhättan (Sweden) before deciding where to assemble the cars in the future. Leaders of the German and Swedish unions and the EMF issued a joint declaration in October 2004, with demands including the negotiation of a restructuring framework at European level, no interference with collective bargaining arrangements, and no plant closures [START_REF] Emf | Copenhagen Declaration by Trade Union Leaders from IG-Metall, Svenska Metall, SIF, CF and EMF in Respect of the GM Europe Restructuring[END_REF]. This was followed by a call from the GM EWC and the EMF for a European day of action. According to trade union sources, more than 50,000 employees at the 13 GM locations in Europe, as well as employees at the three plants in Brazil, took part. Eventually, in December 2004 an agreement was signed whereby GM Europe would negotiate the implementation of the restructuring plan [START_REF] Eiro | Agreement on Restructuring and Cost-Cutting at GM Germany[END_REF].

Consequently, GM's decision on where to assemble the future models would be based on bids from Rüsselheim and Trollhättan, a process in which the German and Swedish metalworkers' unions have been deeply involved. This so-called 'beauty contest' illustrates the dilemma faced by the Swedish and German trade unions: they are competing for jobs, yet also claim that they are jointly fighting against any plant closures. Such a 'contest' can easily degenerate into sheer regime competition. In March 2005, GM decided that both the Opel Vectra and the SAAB 9.3 would in future be assembled in Rüsselheim, following an agreement approved by the works council there. In order to safeguard production at the plant, the works council made a number of concessions, among them that up to 2010 the collectively agreed pay increases for the sector will be reduced by 1 percent [START_REF] Eiro | Agreement on Restructuring and Cost-Cutting at GM Germany[END_REF]. As noted above, the joint declaration issued by the Swedish and German trade unions and the EMF had insisted that the restructuring process should not lead to any violations of collective agreements, and some Swedish trade unionists saw these concessions as a breach of the declaration. However, official representatives of Metall in Sweden maintain that overall the cross-border coordination in this case has been satisfactory and that the EMF has succeeded in playing a positive role in the process.

The Nordic unions perceive the EMF's coordination of national bargaining processes as increasingly binding in character, while the evaluation of national outcomes undertaken by its collective bargaining committee has a real impact. If a national union fails to meet the criteria of the coordination rule, it is a rather unpleasant task to present the results to the committee. Accordingly, the Nordic unions consider that the wage coordination rule and peer pressure provide an important brake on downward wage competition in Europe. Yet it seems clear that the wage coordination rule is not directly present at the bargaining table, rather, it is 'somewhere in the background'. In other words, the 'rule' is not explicitly mentioned in the bargaining process, but the unions seek to conclude agreements broadly complying with it over the business cycle as a whole (Löhman, 2002: 18).

Apart from pay bargaining, Nordiska Metall seeks to coordinate the policies of its affiliates on a number of other issues, such as industrial policy, health and safety, strengthened relations to trade unions in the Baltic region, and at the global level initiatives to promote global framework agreements. Hence European integration has intensified Nordic cooperation within the metal sector, but there also seem to be limits to how far the coordination and integration of policies can be taken.

Natural Born Allies?

There have been several occasions in recent years when the Nordic metalworkers' unions have failed to reach common positions on questions regarding European policy, including within the framework of the EMF. Although broad similarities in the systems of labour market regulation across the Nordic countries have often been analysed [START_REF] Bruun | Den nordiske modellen[END_REF][START_REF] Kjellberg | Sweden: Restoring the Model?[END_REF], there are also important differences in the characteristics of the national industrial relations systems, including those of the metal industries, which can hinder closer cross-national cooperation between the metal unions.

The metal industry itself displays significant differences between the Nordic countries. The larger part of the Danish metal industry consists of small and medium-sized companies that produce specialist machinery, tools, and instruments. A large proportion of firms are engaged in business-to-business production, with the supply chain often extending beyond the national border [START_REF] Andersen | Danmark: Metalindustriens forandring og den faglige europaeisering[END_REF].

By contrast, the Swedish metal industry has traditionally been dominated by large firms, in basic metals and the car industry, for example. Its ownership structures are concentrated, with the major banks and the famous 'ten families' controlling the most important companies [START_REF] Blomqvist | Sverige: Globalisering och fackligt samarbete inom svensk metalindustri[END_REF]. Today, enterprises based on information technology have also become prominent, with the mobile-phone producer Ericsson being the major example.

The driving force in the metal industry in Norway, and in particular the workshop-based firms where around two-thirds of metalworkers are employed, is the oil industry that has grown rapidly since the 1970s. A contentious issue among trade unionists in the metal sector is the impact on investment and competitiveness of Norwegian non-membership of the EU. This also means that most channels for political influence at the EU level are blocked. Accordingly, coordination at the Nordic level becomes all the more important for the Norwegian unions [START_REF] Bråten | Norge: Nasjonal krise og internasjonal vekst -utfordringer for fagorganisasjonerne[END_REF].

The Finnish metal industry provided metal products, machinery, and ships as a contribution to war indemnities to the Soviet Union in the aftermath of the Second World War. Later, this was transformed into a trading relationship, with the larger part of Finnish metal production being exported eastward. The collapse of the Soviet Union resulted in a subsequent economic recession in the early 1990s, but the Finnish economy recovered, and growth in the IT sector in particular boosted exports and jobs, with Nokia being the prime example. Nokia also illustrates the importance of state research and development policies and the influence of foreign investment, with 90 percent of its shares owned by foreign investors [START_REF] Sund | Finland: Internationall facklig politik i metalbranschen[END_REF].

Even though there is consensus among the Nordic metal unions on the need to safeguard the autonomy of their collective bargaining systems, significant cross-national differences in the balance between legislation and collective agreements can be identified. The Danish industrial relations system is strongly voluntaristic: only the laws concerning the industrial court and the public conciliator constrain the bargaining parties and the relations between them. A key element in understanding the autonomy gained by trade unions and employers' associations is the fact that Denmark has been ruled by coalition governments for more than half a century. For example, in recent times governments led by the social democrats have usually included centrist parties. Consequently, there has been little space for one-sided alliances between governments and either employers or trade unions. On the contrary, the consensus on safeguarding the autonomy of the social partners has been, and still is, shared by virtually all political parties. The strength of self-regulation distinguishes the Danish system from those of other Nordic countries (Due et al., 2000;[START_REF] Scheuer | Denmark: A Less Regulated Model[END_REF][START_REF] Skulason | Regional Cooperation Within the Nordic Council of Trade Unions Across the Baltic Sea[END_REF]. However, it should be added that the law on the public conciliator (somewhat paradoxically, given the voluntary nature of the Danish industrial relations system) enables state intervention in the process of collective bargaining if the parties fail to reach agreement (Stokke, 2002: 681-2).

In Sweden, social-democratic governments were the precondition for the erosion of the principle of self-regulation and the introduction of extensive labour legislation, first and foremost in the 1970s. Prominent examples were laws on job security, union workplace representatives, and codetermination (Kjellberg, 1998: 82). When the social democrats lost power in 1976, after 44 consecutive years in office, the employers abandoned peak-level collective bargaining and pursued a radical decentralization of the bargaining system. One interpretation suggests that the Swedish industrial relations system has become regime dependent, whereas the Danish remains regime independent (Due and Madsen, 2000); but this has been disputed by Nycander (2002: 90), who argues that the role of the public conciliator and experience of government intervention in industrial disputes demonstrate that social partner autonomy in the Danish system is limited. An alternative formulation might be that in both countries the scope for self-regulation is high, but that in specific areas, which differ between the two systems, state intervention does occur. Within the metal sectors in particular, the similarities have been enhanced over the past decade, following the conclusion of the basic agreement in Swedish manufacturing (discussed above), which reaffirmed and enhanced sectoral collective bargaining.

The political environment of Norwegian industrial relations has been similar to that in Denmark, with the social democrats dominant for more than half a century, but normally ruling at the head of coalition governments. However, the absence of a powerful capitalist class in the early 20th century and economic dependence on natural resources and oil revenues help explain why the Norwegian state has played a more active role in industrial and employment policies than in Denmark and Sweden. Consequently, even in more recent years Norwegian employers, in contrast to Danish and Swedish employers, have seen advantages in state intervention in order to maintain stable economic conditions. The experience of decentralized bargaining in the 1980s and again in the late 1990s, leading to wage drift and economic instability, seems to have convinced Norwegian employers that centralized bargaining within the framework of state-initiated incomes policies is preferable [START_REF] Bråten | Norge: Nasjonal krise og internasjonal vekst -utfordringer for fagorganisasjonerne[END_REF][START_REF] Dølvik | Norway: Revival of Centralised Concertation[END_REF]Dølvik and Vartiainen, 2002: 69-94).

The most encompassing legislative regulation of the labour market is found in Finland. This is illustrated by the presence of a legally based erga omnes procedure that generalizes the coverage of collective agreements. Strong tripartite relations have also formed the basis for a number of peaklevel agreements during the past three decades. Typically, the state has paved the way for these agreements by linking tax reforms, increased social security, and changes in labour laws to agreements reached by the bargaining parties on wages and conditions. The political background in Finland is also distinctive in that the Social Democratic Party has not had the dominant role traditional in the other Nordic countries. In recent years, Finnish governments have been coalitions consisting of both socialist and non-socialist parties (Dølvik and Vartiainen, 2002: 59-64;[START_REF] Lilja | Finland: Continuity and Modest Moves Towards Company-Level Corporatism[END_REF].

In summary, there are important differences between the metal sectors in the Nordic countries, reflecting distinctive historical processes of industrialization, the contemporary structure of the industries, and the typical size of enterprises and patterns of ownership, despite the impact of economic globalization. The variations in the balance between legislation and agreements help explain why the Nordic metalworkers' unions have failed at times to reach shared views on how, and to what extent, European regulation might interfere with the Nordic collective bargaining systems. This also explains differences in the preferred means of implementing EU directives, as for instance with the application of those on part-time and fixed-term work [START_REF] Andersen | Danmark: Metalindustriens forandring og den faglige europaeisering[END_REF].

Despite occasional disagreements, the Nordic metalworkers' unions are more than ever committed to extending and strengthening their policy coordination and cooperation. These attempts are linked to a strong Nordic tradition of intergovernmental information exchange and cooperation in many policy fields, including labour market regulation. Likewise, social partner contacts, formal as well as informal, are well developed across Nordic borders. Consequently, the search for common 'Nordic positions and opinions' often appears to be the obvious strategy when it comes to European, if not global, issues.

Nevertheless, a narrow focus on Nordic cooperation might present an obstacle to the development of new alliances and new solutions to the challenges caused by Europeanization and globalization, and hence impede their influence on European-level policy-making. The Nordic countries, or the unions in the metal sector, might not be 'natural born allies' after all. In view of EU enlargement, new challenges arise (for example, with regard to relocation), and there is an obvious need for deepened cooperation and alliance building with unions across the Baltic Sea. Furthermore, over the years the Nordic metalworkers' unions have to varying degrees developed bilateral contacts with unions in other European countries. Probably because Denmark joined the European Community more than two decades earlier than Sweden and Finland, the Danish unions seem to have the most developed formal and informal contacts with unions in the 'old' member states.

Challenges for the Trade Unions in the Nordic Metal Sector

It can be argued that European integration has brought the Nordic metal unions to a crossroads: will they continue to meet in order to celebrate Nordic brotherhood or will they be able to coordinate common European policy initiatives? Will they continue acting as a 'brake' on European regulation or develop new alliances in the European context (for example, within the framework of the EMF), and will they thereby be able to counterbalance the otherwise dominant influence of IG Metall?

Europeanization and globalization present a number of challenges for the Nordic trade unions, given their organizational structures and membership base. Whereas these unions have traditionally had their stronghold at national level, the European and workplace levels are becoming increasingly important in policy terms. Moreover, various expressions of discontent with the way international activities are organized can be identified in all the Nordic unions. This includes disagreement between sectoral unions and confederations on who should have the primary responsibility for EU-related issues, and between local branches, national unions, and confederations on who should have the primary responsibility for supporting EWCs (Blomqvist, 2003: 223). Consequently, as international trade union work becomes ever more complex, which in turn increases demand for new competences among trade union representatives, there is also a growing need to prioritize and pool scarce resources and to coordinate policies across traditional demarcation lines.

In spite of existing differences, a major concern of the Nordic metalworkers' unions has been the fate of their national collective bargaining systems in a more Europeanized and globalized economy. This concern is linked to the deep-seated understanding that these systems make up the power base of the Nordic unions. Nevertheless, over the past decade the bargaining systems in the Nordic metal sectors have shown a surprising resilience and capacity to adjust to significant structural changes. These changes include deepened European integration, but also divergent trajectories in Nordic labour market regulation, illustrated by striking variations in the scope and depth of processes of decentralization of the bargaining systems and in the implementation of EU directives. Yet in view of their fear of European interference, it could be asked whether the Nordic metalworkers' unions lack belief in the adaptability and robustness of their national collective bargaining systems in their encounter with European regulation. Finally, the most fundamental challenge for the unions in the metal sector is how to increase their knowledge of and the mobilization behind international and especially European trade union activities. The vague and hesitant support of metalworkers for European integration in general, and an evolved European social dialogue in particular, is still widespread in all Nordic countries except Finland. One illustration of this is a survey carried out for the Swedish LO in 2002, in which union members were asked to specify the most important issues for trade union activities: European trade union cooperation came sixteenth among the 20 core issues listed (Blomqvist and Murhem, 2003: 171). Reflecting the strength and legacy of national unionism in the Nordic countries, securing membership support for European and eventually global trade union work is probably the most tricky challenge facing unions in the Nordic metal sector in the years to come.

European Journal of Industrial Relations 12(1)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author wishes to thank Jon Erik Dølvik, Steen E. Navrbjerg and the two anonymous referees for their helpful remarks and advice on earlier versions of this article.

Fafo (Fagbevegelsens senter for forskning or Institute for Labour and Social Research, Norway), FAOS (