Wednesday, October 20, 2004

Globally Competitive Socialist Welfare States

World Economic Forum released the Global Competitiveness Report [download pdf summary] last week.

The report which rankscovers 120+ countries ranked the following as the top 10 globally competitive countries:

  1. Finland
  2. USA
  3. Sweden
  4. Taiwan
  5. Denmark
  6. Norway
  7. Singapore
  8. Switzerland
  9. Japan
  10. Iceland
What is interesting about this ranking is that 5 of these countries (Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Iceland) are the Scandinavian/Nordic countries, and can be broadly described as Socialist Welfare States. These countries have been in this league since last 3-4 years, and also feature in the top slot on HDI - Human Development Index).

Of course, in the recent times, the "Socialist Welfare" Economic Model has become somewhat unfashionable in the metropolitan conversations of business-leaders/ strategy-makers (except as a target for bashing). But in its basic meaning, Socialism - i.e., people's control over the means of production - is worth a thought and consideration. And these
FAQs on the Scandenavian Model[1] describe why and how this economic model works.
[1]:
http://www.lysator.liu.se/nordic/scn/faq28.html#top

1 comment:

Anurag said...

For me, Taiwan is a surprisE!