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How Swedes and Norwegians broke the power of the 1 percent
George Lakey January 25, 2012
While many of us are working to ensure that the Occupy movement will have a lasting impact, its worthwhile to consider other countries where masses of people succeeded in nonviolently bringing about a high degree of democracy and economic justice. Sweden and Norway, for example, both experienced a major power shift in the 1930s after prolonged nonviolent struggle. They fired the top 1 percent of people who set the direction for society and created the basis for something different.
Both countries had a history of horrendous poverty. When the 1 percent was in charge, hundreds of thousands of people emigrated to avoid starvation. Under the leadership of the working class, however, both countries built robust and successful economies that nearly eliminated poverty, expanded free university education, abolished slums, provided excellent health care available to all as a matter of right and created a system of full employment. Unlike the Norwegians, the Swedes didnt find oil, but that didnt stop them from building what the latest CIA World Factbook calls an enviable standard of living.
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https://wagingnonviolence.org/feature/how-swedes-and-norwegians-broke-the-power-of-the-1-percent/
angstlessk
(11,862 posts)if we would ignore our differences and embrace our sameness, we too could live like the Swedes!
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,002 posts)colsohlibgal
(5,275 posts)One great Documentary about this direction involves Iceland but it details how they went after the banksters that were bankrupting them while they got rich rather than propping them up....Inside Job. It contrasts them to us not making any systematic changes after the 2008 crash, instead we rewarded Wall Street and stiffed the people they defrauded.
Michael Moores movie Where To Invade Next is another film to take in.
Right now the corrupt Right is going for the kill. That idiot in the White House would not be there if we were not the only Democracy where the person with 3 million less votes wins.....Only In America.
The B Actor President decades ago said it was Morning In America. It is pushing Midnight right now.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Thus they were able to fund the welfare economy from 1946 to about 1990.
The economic crisis of the early '90s significantly trimmed back the government budget. Various reforms of the economy have resulted in a much greater degree of income inequality in the last two decades. Immigration has further contributed to social tensions and a diminished sense of communal solidarity.
As the article points out, Scandinavian crime novels are a useful window into a more realistic view of their societies, and the picture is not pretty.
safeinOhio
(32,688 posts)Help make your State a Right-To-Vote State.
Fascism can't stand Democracy.