Nordic Economies after the Crisis

FEPS is delighted to invite you to the launch of the book “Rethinking Social Risks in the Nordics” at FEPS office at 6 pm (time tbc).

This book, edited by Antti Alaja (Kalevi Sorsa Foundation)and Ville-Pekka Sorsa (University of Helsinki) is part of the Nordic Economies after the Crisis project, started by FEPS in 2010 with the support of the Finnish Kalevi Sorsa Foundation, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Joint Committee of the Nordic Social Democratic Labour Movement (SAMAK), Economic Council of the Labour Movement in Denmark and Swedish Arbetarrörelsens Tankesmedja.

The Nordic welfare regimes have been for long characterised by effective management of social risk, which has led to high levels economic competitiveness, social cohesion and well-being in all Nordic countries. This success is primarily caused by high degree of universalism in state-led social protection common to all Nordic countries.

The new book Rethinking social risk in the Nordics questions this view. While there is some truth in the success story, it is not the whole story. Instead of a public approach common to all countries, the Nordic approaches have been characterised by a great variety of public, occupational and private solutions for assessing, sharing and managing social risks. The idea of a homogenous Nordic model in the politics of social risks is also false. Even though few common developments and some family resemblance can be found, all Nordic countries have differed in their approaches to social risk and opted for different political trajectories at different points of time. While all countries have become increasingly individualised and workfare-based in their distribution of social risks, some countries have now opted much more strongly for the financialisation and privatisation of welfare provision than others.

This volume sheds light over the Nordic approaches to social risk and over the politics of social risk more generally. It also provides new insights to and critiques of the contemporary Nordic politics of social risk. It is essential reading for all international political actors and scholars interested in the Nordic public policies and politics of social risks. In the launch event, the editor and one key contributor of the book discuss the new approaches to and observations concerning the contemporary politics of social risk in the Nordic countries.

Table of contents:

1. Introduction (Ville-Pekka Sorsa)
2. Lack of education as a social risk – the Danish case (Erik Bjørsted)
3. Are financialisation, privatisation and individualisation the same thing? The Swedish experience (Anne-Marie Lindgren)
4. Markets: source of efficiency or costs? An analysis on the production of public services in Finland (Joonas Rahkola)
5. Subversive neoliberalism and the financialisation of Swedish pensions: failure or opportunity? (Claes Belfrage)
6. Tripartite political exchange and the Finnish social model (Antti Alaja)
7. Contingency in risk management: the case of pension funds in Sweden and Finland (Ville-Pekka Sorsa & Antonios Roumpakis)
8. Nordic social risk management and the challenge of EU regulation: labour market parity at risk (Theo Papadopoulos & Antonios Roumpakis

The authors:

Antti Alaja is coordinator for the project Towards a Sustainable Growth Model at the Finnish social democratic think tank Kalevi Sorsa Foundation. Claes Belfrage, PhD, is Lecturer in International Politics at Queen Mary, University of London. Erik Bjørsted is Labour Market Economist with the Economic Council of the Labour Movement (ECLM) in Copenhagen.

Anne-Marie Lindgren is Chief Analyst at Arbetarrörelsens Tankesmedja (The Swedish Labour Movement Think Tank).

Theo Papadopoulos, DPhil, is Lecturer in Social Policy at the University of Bath and visiting Professor at the Graduate School of Governance at Maastricht University. Joonas Rahkola is economist at the Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions (SAK). Antonios Roumpakis, PhD, is a Visiting Fellow at the Centre for the Analysis of Social Policy (CASP), at the University of Bath.

Ville-Pekka Sorsa, DPhil, is University Lecturer in Political Science at University of Helsinki.