Scandinavia == Socialist was hard for my Eastern European brain to process.
Also Moldbuggians (there are bound to be a few considering so many LWers read Unqualified Reservations) will be saddened one can’t put Jacobite / neocamerialist / restorationist / reactionary in there.
Scandinavian countries (+ UK and Netherlands, which seem to cluster closer with them than with the rest of EU) top most indexes of “economic freedom” / “ease of doing business” etc. And they still have monarchies over there, with state-church separation happening only recently, or not yet. And Sweden has large private school system etc.
Or they have huge taxes, very comprehensive welfare state system, allow gay marriage or some other type, have a lot of out of wedlock marriage, extremely high rate of women participation in workforce etc.
Depending on which features you focus on, you can make them appear “extremely liberal”, or “extremely conservative” by US metric. It will be stupid categorization either way.
Scandinavian countries top the indexes on metrics other than taxation, government spending and “labour freedom” while the monarchs (and arguably, the churches) are mainly if not solely symbolic. If labels are ignored I think “socially permissive, high taxes, major redistribution of wealth” describes these countries very well.
Scandinavia == Socialist was hard for my Eastern European brain to process.
Also Moldbuggians (there are bound to be a few considering so many LWers read Unqualified Reservations) will be saddened one can’t put Jacobite / neocamerialist / restorationist / reactionary in there.
Scandinavian countries (+ UK and Netherlands, which seem to cluster closer with them than with the rest of EU) top most indexes of “economic freedom” / “ease of doing business” etc. And they still have monarchies over there, with state-church separation happening only recently, or not yet. And Sweden has large private school system etc.
Or they have huge taxes, very comprehensive welfare state system, allow gay marriage or some other type, have a lot of out of wedlock marriage, extremely high rate of women participation in workforce etc.
Depending on which features you focus on, you can make them appear “extremely liberal”, or “extremely conservative” by US metric. It will be stupid categorization either way.
“Out of wedlock marriage” would be a neat trick. :-)
That, or typical, depending on just how you cut things...
Scandinavian countries top the indexes on metrics other than taxation, government spending and “labour freedom” while the monarchs (and arguably, the churches) are mainly if not solely symbolic. If labels are ignored I think “socially permissive, high taxes, major redistribution of wealth” describes these countries very well.