Danish Shipping, Identity and Historical Transformations

The narratives we construct about ourselves and our pasts are an important part of our collective and individual identities. Photo: A Mærsk container ship in the Oresund, Colourbox.

Making sense of transformed maritime cultures

Globalization and automation have transformed international trade and upended maritime cultures and traditions. One of the fundamental changes brought about by globalization has been the worldwide presence of shipping companies. In the case of the Danish shipping company Maersk, one of the world’s largest container companies, the company went from having offices in five countries in 1973 to offices in 325 cities across 125 countries in 2007, according to Chris Jephson and Henning Morgen. Maersk is undergoing a transition from being first and foremost a shipping company to primarily a global logistics company, with shipping being just one way of connecting the world.

Oral sources are narrative sources particularly suited for studying the meaning of past events. Photo: Mark König, unsplash.

Individual life stories connect personal experience to larger historical developments and dominant cultural narratives. Exploring seafarers' identity and their relation to their past can help us understand and analyse the changes in international shipping the past fifty years. This article draws on several interviews with Danish seafarers conducted for my PhD, zooming in on identity and uses-of-the-past in relation to Maersk, the company they have worked for and represented.

Feelings of loyalty and fears of marginalization

Business transformations are not only important for the economy and industry, but are also crucial in terms of identity, affecting people’s sense of belonging. This is best illustrated by the following quote from a retired Maersk captain, who laments how, with time, it became less clear to him what it meant to be a ‘Maersk-man':

"To me it faded because, at the beginning, Maersk was in Copenhagen, it was all in Copenhagen. When I retired two years ago, I mean, technical support was a bit in Copenhagen, a bit in Rotterdam, a bit in Glasgow, a bit in Bombay, a bit in Singapore and… it was everywhere! Crewing was placed in Manila. Wages were paid out from Isle of Man… I mean, it was not unified. It was no longer Maersk. Not in my opinion." (Interview in August 2019)

"It was no longer Maersk. Not in my opinion."

In his narrative the captain paints a picture of a small family firm – where everybody knew each other, and you could stop by the office for an informal chat – transitioning into a global conglomerate, where you had to phone different parts of the world to get in touch with the department you needed to talk to.

Adding to this feeling of identity dilution was a sense of devaluation, stemming from a lived experience of lost authority onboard the ships. Automation and increased communication between home offices and the ships make it less the captain’s ship in the eyes of some of the retired captains, as their priorities and decisions as seafarers pertaining to route and speed are questioned and second-guessed.

Maersk is one of the world’s largest container companies. It went from having offices in five countries in 1973 to offices in 325 cities across 125 countries in 2007. Photo: One of Mærsk's offices in Copenhagen today, CC-BY-SA-3.0.

Greater distance between ship and office

In the life stories of the seafarers, the combination of these developments becomes a narrative about a greater distance between the ships and the company offices at home. There is a sense that the practical skills, knowledge, and experience of the seafarers have become less valued, particularly as they also fill fewer and fewer of the office positions as well. A sense of marginalization and insecurity about the future of Danish seafarers that - for some - are exacerbated by the company’s greater focus on ‘logistics’ rather than ‘shipping.’ Because where does this transition leave the seafarers?

Phrases like “but what do I know, I am just a seafarer,” become narrative responses, using irony to distance themselves from decisions they disagree with. This exemplifies what Luisa Passerini has termed ‘the mask of the fool,’ in her book Fascism in Popular Memory – The Cultural Experience of the Turin Working Class, illustrating how the “narrative role of the simple man” exposes the perceived “absurdity of the world which crushes the protagonist.” (p. 33).

The feelings of devaluation and fear of marginalization stem from a sense of loyalty and a belief that they, as seafarers, are the true core of the company. Their sense of loyalty arises in conjunction with different aspects of the narratives: Firstly, for the older, retired, seafarers, it is related to their length of service, which was often much longer than in today’s dynamic, changeable labor market. Secondly, there is a sense of pride in representing a world-leading shipping company on some of the world’s largest container ships, and having had their ideas actively welcomed by such a company. Thirdly, a deep respect for the long-time CEO Mærsk Mc-Kinney Møller.

Their life stories are marked by this inherent tension between loyalty and pride on the one hand, and a sense of identity loss on the other. Their stories are not simply cases of nostalgia, a longing for the good old days, but testaments to the ongoing negotiation with the past, which is often prevalent in orally narrated life stories. Conflicting feelings create persistent tensions, as the seafarers aim to construct coherent narratives about their lives.

The myth of Mc-Kinney

In their accounts, the seafarers use the myth of Mærsk Mc-Kinney Møller to reestablish themselves as the core of the company and the main characters in their own life stories. Mærsk Mc-Kinney Møller (1913-2012) was the long-time CEO of Mærsk. Mc-Kinney was the son of the company’s founder and saw it as his life's work to carry out his father’s visions. He often referenced his father’s wishes in speeches and interviews, and the frequent use of his father’s sayings had the purpose of creating legitimacy and a sense of continuity with the past. He also often used maritime images and metaphors when talking about himself and the company. In 2003, for example, he held a speech at his home a month after his resignation as chairman of the board and used the metaphor of a captain leaving his bridge in talking about his retirement.

The 'myth' of Mærsk Mc-Kinney Møller (1913-2012), the longtime CEO of Maersk, including walking up five flights of stairs to work even in his 90s can be used by seafarers in their own identity constructiong. Photo: coloubox.

Guided by the ghostly presence of his father, Mc-Kinney came to personify the company ethos – loyal, hardworking, humble and ambitious – his own sayings were lifted to the level of eternal truths to be applied in any given historical context. In this sense, Mc-Kinney was the company. The following quote from Rose George in her portrayal of Mc-Kinney from her book on containerization is illustrative of how his self-representation became the dominant cultural narrative.

"a pleasingly eccentric patriarch who worked until he died in 2012 at ninety-eight. Mr. Møller was known for his firm control of his firm; for walking up five flights of stairs to his office, although when he reached ninety-four, he allowed his driver to carry his briefcase…"(p.6)

This representation of Mc-Kinney is probably well known by many Danes who would recognize the image of a stern, hardworking patriarch who, until the end, set the tone for the company culture he wanted.

The story of Mc-Kinney always taking the stairs finds its way into some of the seafarers’ life stories, representing how cultural and personal memories intersect in the construction of coherent narratives. They can use the status and authority of Mc-Kinney for their own identity-constructing purposes; the image of Mc-Kinney walking up the stairs becomes a useful metaphor for the seafarers as they position themselves as the true heirs of Mc-Kinney. They are willing to take the stairs too – the stairs becoming a metaphor for ‘going the extra mile’, and a symbol of ‘giving back.’

Narrating how Mc-Kinney ‘was all about the seafarers’, the narrators also include anecdotes about personal meetings with Mc-Kinney in which he compliments their skills and values – acknowledging their lived experience as seafarers. Aligning themselves with Mc-Kinney and his values have the narrative function of repositioning the seafarers as the core of the company, an important piece of their narrative identity. It may be that the company has changed from shipping to logistics, and that the seafarers have lost some of their status in the process, but in their life stories, the seafarers and Mc-Kinney are portrayed as ‘fixed identities,’ forever embodying the same, traditional values. In this sense, the myth of Mc-Kinney provides authority and a clear identity to the narrators as they portray the seafarer as representing the continuity of the company, the link between past, present and the future.

Large historical transformations force identities to be renegotiated

We all use the past when we construct stories about ourselves and the lives we have lived. Identity is a matter of one’s sense of place in the world, and the life stories of the seafarers show how historical developments can challenge a clear sense of belonging. The Danish seafarers – and by extension other Nordic seafarers – represent a fascinating case of how great historical transformations such as globalization and containerization can force a renegotiation of narratives and identities.

This article is based on research undertaken as part of the author's PhD,"At få sjælen med – en narrativ analyse af danske containersøfolks erindringer, fortidsbrug og identitetskonstruktioner" [Staying true to who you are - a narrative analysis of Danish container seafarers' memories, uses-of-the-past and identity constructions], from Copenhagen Business School 2024.