What Sweden are we talking about? Sweden has been beset by liberal reforms for more than a decade. Changes in the health care system are very much towards a more quasi market system and exhibit the same penchant for privatization cost-offloading through user fees etc.etc as other regimes. The Sweden of the Third Way is long gone, the old social democratic paradigm with an extensive welfare state and co-opeative planning between labor industry and government is gone swept away in the neo-liberal tide. That is why Canada is looking towards Sweden for reform of our health care system. People still think of the Swedish system as progressive when in actuality the progressive features have been flushed down the sewer for the most part.
Cheers, Ken Hanly ----- Original Message ----- From: "Doug Henwood" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, August 20, 2002 8:56 AM Subject: [PEN-L:29660] Re: RE: Re: PK endorses populism? > Max B. Sawicky wrote: > > >Sweden is the liberal mainstream ideal because it is > >viewed as a place with relatively little market-distorting > >policy and a reliance on tax and transfer mechanisms to > >uphold social welfare. > > But they seriously interefere(d) with the labor market and created > one of the most egalitarian societies in the world. A high-wage > policy forced companies to invest more than they would have > otherwise. The ideology was one of solidarity and decommodification. > That's all well beyond standard-issue liberalism, no? > > Doug >
