Nordic welfare states—still standing or changed by the COVID‐19 crisis?

Abstract

Nordic welfare states are known for their universalistic and all‐encompassing approach to welfare and having a long tradition for active labour market policy as tool in economic crises with adverse impact on employment. They have had a long tradition for strong egalitarian approaches and their residents are consistently among the happiest in the world. A key issue is whether a crisis like the COVID‐19 outbreak is changing the Nordic welfare states. This article focuses on providing a description of what instruments the Nordic countries have taken or expect to use as part of dealing with the welfare challenges resulting from rising unemployment and greater social and economic insecurity in the wake of the crisis. The tentative conclusion is that the crisis so far has strengthened key characteristics of the Nordic welfare states by the state taking on a strong central role not only for the functioning of the market but also continued in a path‐dependent way with universal and relatively generous benefits such as for those who become unemployed or have reduced income because of the crisis.

Social policy in the face of a global pandemic: Policy responses to the COVID‐19 crisis

“…In compiling the special issue, we were eager to ensure coverage of a wide range of countries representing a variety of welfare regimes. In total, the papers in this volume cover: Canada and the USA (Béland, Dinan, Rocco, & Waddan, 2021), Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland (Greve, Blomquist, Hvinden, & Gerven, 2021); Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany (Cantillon, Seeleib‐Kaiser, & van der Veen, 2021); the UK and Ireland (Hick and Murphy, 2021); Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain (Moreira, Léon, Coda Moscarola, & Roumpakis, 2021); Hungary, Lithuania, Poland and Slovakia (Aidukaite, Saxonberg, Szelewa, & Szikra, 2021), and China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan (Soon, Chou, & Shi, 2021). In addition to these comparative country case‐studies, there are two additional papers—the first, comparing an initial overview of short‐term social policy responses and comparing these to the responses to the Great Recession (Moreira and Hick, 2021) and the second an examination of the changes in the EU institutions (de la Porte and Jensen, 2021).…”

“…Greve et al (2021), similarly, view policy responses in Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway as reflecting the longer‐term emphasis on state‐guaranteed inclusion in these countries. In this sense, responding to COVID‐19 has not required a major departure in terms of policy orientation, though, as elsewhere, there have been new developments—for example, increased coverage of the risks of the self‐employed and freelancers.…”

How did Sweden Fail the Pandemic?

“…The public health policies have differed across the Nordic countries, but the social policies to protect the population against the socioeconomic effects have not. 35 They have generally been rather extensive and generous which has limited the economic impact compared to the United Kingdom and Spain.…”

Ideological Dilemmas Actualised by the Idea of Living Environmentally Childfree

“…As the present study is restricted to Norway, a few relevant remarks about the Norwegian context must be made. Despite issues related to the health system's geographical and social equity (Ringard et al, 2013), the Norwegian welfare state is generally characterised by universal and equal access to services (Greve et al, 2021). These services include family policies, which scholars argue have kept the declining fertility rates at relatively high levels when the same rates have been declining more rapidly in other Western countries (Comolli et al, 2020).…”