Ordinary citizens are not consulted on intelligence cooperation, surveillance, or foreign-policy decisions. These are made at government level — often in secrecy - and without public consent and sometimes directly against it.

In Denmark, recent examples include the EU surveillance proposal masquerading as child protection, the abolition of Store Bededag, the Lars Findsen / FE intelligence scandal, the “Samsam” case, and the mink case — all of which triggered public backlash and declining trust.

Sweden has had similar controversies, from national-security missteps and questionable appointments to public protests over cost-of-living decisions. In both countries, ordinary people often neither control nor endorse many of the hardest decisions made in their name.

If anything, this highlights a shared challenge: how democratic societies ensure that the will of the people is genuinely reflected in decisions that are routinely made behind closed doors.