Johan Strand Johansen

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Johan Strand Johansen (3 February 1903 – 12 February 1970) was a Norwegian communist politician and journalist. He served as Minister of Labour from 25 June to 5 November 1945 in Einar Gerhardsen’s postwar government. He was a member of the Norwegian Parliament from 1945 to 1957, representing Oslo for the Communist Party.

Born in Aafjord, Søndre Trondheim, when Norway and Sweden were united, Strand Johansen began as a journalist for Ny Tid in 1924. He was secretary of the Young Communist League (1924–1928), edited Hardanger Arbeiderblad in 1930, and from 1931 worked in Oslo for Arbeideren while serving on the Communist Party’s central board. He spoke for the central board at the strike rally that led to the Skirmish of Menstad and was imprisoned for it.

During World War II he was arrested by the Gestapo in 1941 and spent much of the war in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. In 1945 he rose to a senior party post and was elected to the Storting, becoming one of two NKP representatives in the coalition government. He played a key role in the 1945 coalition talks with the Labour Party, which ended without success.

Strand Johansen was a central figure in the 1949 split of the Communist Party, known as the Furubotn purge. He led the faction opposed to party leader Peder Furubotn. On 26 October 1949, he and others removed Furubotn supporters from the party offices and helped form a new central board that excluded Furubotn. Some witnesses later described him as unstable after the purge; in 1953 he was elected deputy chairman of the party but resigned in 1955 after being sent to Moscow for treatment. He remained in Moscow until his death in 1970, and he did not hold political office after 1955.