Paper short abstract:

This paper ethnographically explores how the demand to perform a green transitioning within the Danish Folk Church evokes the twin nightmare of there being at once too many and too few leaders to ever get anything done.

Paper long abstract:

It was an unnamed bureaucrat, the myth goes, who originally formulated the now common designation of the Danish Folk Church as being a “well-ordered anarchy”. This nickname, which unknowingly echoes Evans-Pritchard’s description of Nuer society, is meant to highlight the Church’s proud tradition of being ruled “from below”, i.e. not by the state or by its bishops, but by local parish councils operating as self-governing units (although the Folk Church is financed through taxes and has the Queen as its formal governor). Based on fieldwork among different church actors working to reduce carbon emissions, I explore how the Church seems to currently be caught between two nightmares that persistently haunts its egalitarian ethos: that of being governed by the state and that of never getting anything done. To pursue its ambition of being green frontrunners, the Danish government has recently put pressure on the Church to get going with a green transitioning if it wants to avoid government interference. This threat, I argue, calls forth another rendition of the before mentioned nickname: it is also used to designate an experienced “leadership vacuum” within the church. A vacuum which, according to some, leads to utter chaos and deadlock as projects become dominated by the conviction that all collaboration entails the risk of losing sovereignty. As such, the looming nightmare of a state implemented green transition confronts the church with its twin egalitarian nightmare: there is at once too many and too few leaders and decision-makers to get anything done.