Best Party Besti flokkurinn | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Chairperson | Jón Gnarr |
| Vice-chairperson | Heiða Kristín Helgadóttir |
| Founder | Jón Gnarr |
| Founded | 16 November 2009 |
| Dissolved | 16 June 2014 |
| Headquarters | Laugavegur 40a,Reykjavík |
| National affiliation | Bright Future (2014) |
| International affiliation | Pirate Parties International (observer) |
| Colours | Blue /Pink |
TheBest Party (Icelandic:Besti flokkurinn) was anIcelandicpolitical party founded byJón Gnarr on 16 November 2009.[1] The party contested the2010 city council election inReykjavík and won aplurality on theReykjavík City Council, receiving 34.7% of the vote, defeating theIndependence Party which received 33.6%.[2][3][4] It was an observer member of theInternational Pirate Party, but not associated with thePirate Party Iceland.[5] Jón Gnarr announced that the party was to be dissolved after he stepped down as mayor after the upcoming local elections in May 2014. Many of the Best Party's members joinedBright Future, while Jón himself stopped political participation.
The founder and chairman of the party was the formerMayor of ReykjavíkJón Gnarr.[6] The party was founded several months after theIcelandic parliamentary election in 2009, and was closely related to the national Bright Future party, led by MP and Best Party Vice PresidentHeiða Kristín Helgadóttir.
The party's initial success is seen as a backlash against establishment parties in the wake ofIceland's 2008–2011 financial crisis.[7]
The Best Party was founded in late 2009 by Jón Gnarr, an Icelandic actor, comedian and writer. Originally ajoke party, it stated from the beginning that it would not honour any of its election promises.[8] It claimed all other parties were secretly corrupt, and promised to be openly corrupt. Among its original goals was to satirize common themes inIcelandic politics, partly by mimicking the standard phrases, idioms andjargon used by Icelandic politicians.
After its electoral success inReykjavík in 2010, the Best Party became more serious. It began to show a genuine interest in governing, and took aleft-wing stance on many issues. Jón Gnarr identifies as ananarchist, but the party as a whole was closer to thecentre-left.[9]
Since its founding, the Best Party developed into a full-grown political party with its own independentagenda. The theme song of the Best Party wasThe Best, byTina Turner. Prior to the 2010 election, the party published a new version of the song with new, Iceland-specific lyrics. Amusic video was also made, featuringÁgústa Eva Erlendsdóttir.[8]
In late 2012 the party foundedBright Future, with independent MPGuðmundur Steingrímsson, in order to contest the2013 national parliamentary election. Jón Gnarr, by thenMayor of Reykjavík, andÓttarr Proppé, aReykjavík City Councilman, were candidates for the new party in that election.[5] The Best Party's Managing DirectorHeiða Kristín Helgadóttir is also the chairwoman of Bright Future.[5]
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The party's first endeavor in politics was to present a list of candidates for the local election in Reykjavík in 2010. Its platform included free towels in all city swimming pools, apolar bear for the city zoo, aDisneyland at Vatnsmýri park, and a drug-free national parliament (Althing) by 2020. The party won six of the 15 seats on the Reykjavík City Council,[4] and governed the city alongside theSocial Democratic Alliance as the senior coalition partner.