Hassles, back doors and puzzle pieces - with Margrethe Vestager and Sigge Winther Nielsen

"Isn't there a book I can get on my desk?" Anna Ingrisch asks. It's just seconds before she welcomes the many attendees and acts as moderator in a conversation based on the new book 'The Puzzle State'. The speakers are the book's author Sigge Winther Nielsen and former EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager.

It's the latter who reaches into her famous handbag and comes to the host's rescue: "I always have Sigge's book with me in my bag" she says with a smile and hands a copy to Ingrisch. Then we're ready to get started.

"It's up to you to dissect the state of democracy, but I can reveal in advance that it doesn't look good," says the host, who is known from DR's Genstart. This is followed by a half-hour debate. 

A few cautious optimists 

In Sigge Winther's book, he argues that when it comes to the wicked problems, democracy struggles to deliver in the supermarket and on the battlefield. In all five Western countries he has studied in his work on the book, including Denmark, the majority view the future gloomily.

We have simply become pessimistic about democracy, "but what about you two?" Anna Ingrisch asks. Sigge starts: "I'm a cautious optimist," he says. "We want our democracy very much and as such it's not threatened. We just want it to work even better."

And Margrethe Vestager adds: "The thing about crises is that it can go both ways. You can die from the fever, but you can also get through it and survive, and maybe even become stronger from it," she says.

You can hear the entire conversation in the Compass podcast, this time recorded live at the release reception for 'The Puzzle State'.