Hello Comrades, I have many questions.
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How did the Nordic model work, how did they acquire the wealth to do a welfare state, especially Finland and Iceland?
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What is the happiness index and why the hell is Finland and other northern european countries usually ranked high?
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Additionally, wanted to know about post-colonial Ireland and its relation to rest of europe today. Vague question, I am aware. I wanted to know how they slot into the EU fold knowing they were under the british colonial oppression for a long ass time.
Would also like some book recommendations regarding this topic.
Thank you for your help comrades!
There is an old Revolutionary Left Radio episode about this: Riding the Wave: Sweden’s Integration into the Imperialist World System
The guest wrote a book on the topic which is mentioned in the show notes. The book title is same as that of the episode.
Thank you comrade <3
- HW Edward’s - Labour Aristocracy, Mass base for social democracy (there’s also a chapter specific for scandinavia)
- Torkil Lauesen - Unequal Exchange (comes from a scandinavian focus)
These are not Finland specific though. There’s Jan Andersson’s Studies in the Theory of Unequal Exchange Between Nations which apparently has a Finnish focus (not read it personally).
For Ireland, there is Austen Morgan, Labour and Partition: The Belfast Working Class 1905–23 (which I have now added to my reading list).
Thank you for the recommendations, comrade.
I was also wondering what the whole “happiness index shite” is about, I am assuming it is some right wing think-tank bullshit, but I would like some pointers on how to approach this topic. Especially in case someone bring up Nordic Model and happiness index as a “legitimate” example of it “working well”.
There are different ways to tackle this such as considering WEIRD bias or analysing whether the happiness considers alienation and individualism, or what the ideological purposes of these indicies are for, or how are they considered historically, or what positivist bourgeoisie axioms they rely on etc.
But I would consider a different approach; lean into it ie a sort of immanent critique - they are “happy” but at whose cost is their happiness maintained? How is their class as a westerner produced and reproduced? What do we understand about modern Herrenvolk democracies (https://redsails.org/lenin-and-herrenvolk-democracy/)? What is the basis for liberalism here (https://redsails.org/between-liberty-and-slavery/)?
This is where understanding labour aristocracy and unequal exchange becomes more important and I would consider HW Edward’s book as an excellent primer (in fact if you read only one thing I would read this book). If you wanted a more technical grounding then Amin’s Law of Worlwide Value is a worthwhile reference.
for ireland, the goal for oppressed europeans is to assimilate into whiteness unfortunately. we dont even think about how historically significant oppression of different european gorups is because the groups themselves often dont want to bring attention to that and just want to get along with the west except for russia. slavs were enslaved so much that its related to the word ”slave” but the fruits of siding with EU/NATO imperialism are too sweet for them to care. even if slavs suffered immensely under nazism the governments dont care and still collaborate with western institutions even if they have the same ideology. in the united states many black people have irish origin last names. sometimes individuals definetly loved each other and had interracial marriages, but sometimes it was slavery. nobody will refuse to join the EU and have some of the fruits of imperialism for themselves…
