Why Do We Expect More from Politics at a Time When It Is Supposedly Able to Do Less? Comparing Interwar Crisis Economics and Post-War Welfare Politics

Looming crisis, public discontent with privatization, and widening inequalities are factors which have historically set the electorate in favour of social democratic welfare policies. Today, however, these concerns rather appear to support new right-wing populist countermovements, even in the traditionally progressive Nordic countries. This article asks why there is not more explicit support of progressive policies, despite the presence of socio-economic factors which would normally favour such a policy shift , at least not just yet. In response to this query, the article first analyses the comparisons between the present crisis and the crisis of the 1930s with regard to alleged political inertia. It then reinterprets the contemporary political consequences of crisis by revisiting three classical social theorists who took pains at analysing the political responses to the economic crisis of the 1930s: Karl Popper, Gunnar Myrdal, and Karl Polanyi. On the basis of this revisitation of these three classics, the article argues that the combined effects of distrust in politics and the persistence of admittedly rolled-back welfare systems mutes the progressive reform potential of the present crisis.

REFERENCES:

• Almqvist K., Linklater A. (eds.), Images of Sweden, Stockholm 2011.
• Andersson J., Mellan tillväxt och trygghet: Idéer om produktiv socialpolitik i socialdemokratisk socialpolitisk ideologi under efterkrigstiden [Between Growth and Security: Ideas on Productive Social Policy in Social Democratic Social Policy Ideology During the Post-War Years], Uppsala 2003.
• Bauman Z., In Search of Politics, Cambridge 1999.
• Beck U., Beck-Gernsheim E., Individualization: Institutionalized Individualism and Its Social and Political Consequences, London 2002.
• Bergh A., Den kapitalistiska välfärdsstaten [The Capitalist Welfare State], Stockholm 2009.
• Bjereld U., Demker M., Den nödvändiga politiken: Makt och motstånd i en individualiserad tid [The Necessary Politics: Power and Resistance in an Age of Individualization], Stockholm 2011.
• Block F., Polanyi’s Double Movement and the Reconstruction of Critical Theory, “Revue Interventions économiques” 2008, http://interventionseconomiques.revues.org/274 [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Brandeis L., Other People’s Money – and How Bankers Use It, New York 1967 [1914].
• Clayton R., Pontusson J., Welfare-State Retrenchment Revisited: Entitlement Cuts, Public Sector Restructuring, and Inegalitarian Trends in Advanced Capitalist Societies, “World Politics” 1998, No. 1, Vol. 51.
• Dawson M., Late Modernity, Individualization and Socialism: An Associational Critique of Neoliberalism, New York 2013.
• Eliaeson S., Gunnar Myrdal som en Weberiansk offentlig intellektuell: Arvet efter Max Weber [Gunnar Myrdal as a Weberian Public Intellectual: The Heritage of Max Weber], “Statsvetenskaplig Tidskrift ” 2009, No. 3, Vol. 111.
• Eriksson G., Slaget om Norden [The Battle of Norden], “Svenska Dagbladet” 2012.
• Ferguson N., The End of Prosperity, “Time Magazine” 2008, http://www.time.com/time/ magazine/article/0,9171,1846792,00.html [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Fraser N., Can Societies Be Commodities All the Way Down? Polanyian Reflections on Capitalist Crisis, Fondation Maison des sciences de l’homme, Working Paper Series, No. 18, 2012 http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/72/50/60/PDF/FMSH-WP-2012 – 18_ Fraser2.pdf [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Gemzell C.A., Om politikens förvetenskapligande och vetenskapens politisering: Kring välfärdsstatens uppkomst i England [The Scientification of Politics and the Politicization of Science: On the Rise of the Welfare State in England], 3 Vols., København 1989 – 1993.
• Global Utmaning, Shared Norms for the New Reality: The Nordic Way/World Economic Forum, Davos 2011, http://www.globalutmaning.se/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Davos-The-nordic-way-final.pdf, 2011 [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Greve B., Kvist J., Has the Nordic Welfare Model Been Transformed?, “Social Policy and Administration” 2011, No. 2, Vol. 45.
• Hayek F. von, The Road to Serfdom, London 1944.
• Hilson M., The Nordic Model: Scandinavia Since 1945, London 2008.
• Ingebritsen C., Learning from Lilliput: Small States and EU Expansion, “Scandinavian Studies” 2004, No. 3, Vol. 76.
• Judt T., Ill Fares the Land, London 2011.
• Kangas O., Palme J. (eds.), Social Policy and Economic Development in the Nordic Countries, Basingstoke 2005.
• Kettunen P., Petersen K. (eds.) Beyond Welfare State Models: Transnational Historical Perspectives on Social Policy, Cheltenham 2011.
• Korpi W., Palme J. The Paradox of Redistribution and Strategies of Equality: Welfare State Institutions, Inequality, and Poverty in the Western Countries [in:] Welfare States: Construction, Deconstruction, Reconstruction, Vol. 3, Legitimation, Achievement and Integration, S. Liebfried, S. Mau (eds.), Cheltenham 2008.
• Korpi W., Palme J., New Politics and Class Politics in the Context of Austerity and Globalization [in:] Welfare States: Construction, Deconstruction, Reconstruction, Vol. 1, Analytical Approaches, S. Liebfried, S. Mau (eds.), Cheltenham 2008.
• Korpi W., The Power Resources Model [in:] The Welfare State Reader, C. Pierson, F.G. Castles (eds.), Cambridge 2006.
• Korpi W., Welfare-state Regress in Western Europe: Politics, Institutions, Globalization, and Europeanization [in:] The Welfare State Reader, C. Pierson, F.G. Castles (eds.), Cambridge 2006.
• Lindvall J., Rothstein B., Vägar till välstånd: Sambandet mellan demokrati och marknadsekonomi [Ways to Wealth: The Correlation Between Democracy and Market Economy], Stockholm 2010.
• Lindvall J., Rueda D., The Insider-Outsider Dilemma, “British Journal of Political Science” 2013, http://users.ox.ac.uk/~polf0050/Lindvall%20Rueda%20BJPS.pdf [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Lindvall J., The Political Consequences of the Great Depression and the Great Recession: Remarkably Similar, “Swiss Political Science Review” 2012, No. 4, Vol. 18.
• Lippmann W., Drift and Mastery: An Attempt to Diagnose the Current Unrest, New York 1914.
• Lönegård C., Propagandaministerns plan [The Plan of the Minister of Propaganda], “Fokus” 2011, http://www.fokus.se/2011/10/propagandaministerns-plan/ [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Lundberg U., Petersen K., Socialdemokratiet og velfærdsstaten i et nyt politisk landskab? Et essay om moderne velfærdspolitik [Social Democracy and the Welfare State in a New Political Landscape? An Essay on Modern Welfare Politics], “Arbejderhistorie” 2005, No. 4.
• Lundberg U., Tydén M. (eds.), Sverigebilder: Det nationellas betydelser i politik och vardag [Images of Sweden: The Importance of the National in Politics and Everyday Life], Stockholm 2008.
• Marklund C., A Swedish Norden or a Nordic Sweden? Image Politics During the Cold War [in:] Communicating the North: Media Structures and Images in the Making of the Nordic Region, J. Harvard, P. Stadius (eds.), Farnham 2013.
• Marklund C., From Promise to Compromise: Nordic Openness in a World of Global Transparency [in:] The Promise of Openness Cultures and Paradoxes, N. Götz, C. Marklund (eds.), Leiden forthcoming 2014.
• Marklund C., Open Skies, Open Minds? Shifting Concepts of Communication and Information in Swedish Public Debate [in:] The Promise of Openness Cultures and Paradoxes, N. Götz, C. Marklund (eds.), Leiden forthcoming 2014.
• Mazower M., The Great Reckoning: Why the European Ideal Is Under Threat, “The New Statesman” 2013, http://www.newstatesman.com/2013/04/great-reckoning [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Mises L. von, Omnipotent Government: The Rise of the Total State and Total War, New Haven 1944.
• Mises L. von, Planning for Freedom, South Holland 1952.
• Mouffe C., On the Political, London 2005.
• Musiał K., Roots of the Scandinavian Model. Images of Progress in the Era of Modernisation, Baden Baden 2002.
• Myrdal G., An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy, New Brunswick 1996 [1944].
• Norris P., Inglehart R., Cosmopolitan Communications: Cultural Diversity in a Globalized World, New York 2009.
• OECD, Crisis squeezes income and puts pressure on inequality and poverty, http://www.oecd. org/els/soc/OECD2013-Inequality-and-Poverty-8p.pdf, 2013 [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Pizzorno A., Politics Unbound [in:] Changing Boundaries of the Political: Essays on the Evolving Balance between the State and Society, Public and Private in Europe, C.S. Maier (ed.), Cambridge 1987.
• Polanyi K., The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time, Boston 2001 [1944].
• Pollitt C., Bouckaert G., Public Management Reform: A Comparative Analysis: New Public Management, Governance, and the Neo-Weberian State, Oxford 2011.
• Popper K., The Open Society and Its Enemies, Vol. 1, The spell of Plato, London 1945 [1971].
• Popper K., The Poverty of Historicism, New York 1964 [1957].
• Power M., The Audit Society: Rituals of Verification, Oxford 1997.
• Seib G.F., In Crisis, Opportunity for Obama, “The Wall Street Journal” 2008, http://online. wsj.com/article/SB122721278056345271.html [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Söderström J., Socialdemokraterna har fått den nordiska modellen varumärkesskyddad [The Social Democrats Have Gotten the Nordic Model Trade Mark Protected], “Aktuellt i politiken” 2012.
• Suszycki A.M. (ed.), Welfare Citizenship and Welfare Nationalism, Helsinki 2011.
• Svensk Opinion, http://svenskopinion.nu/, 2013 [Access date: 23.08.2013].
• Swank D., Globalisation, Domestic Politics, and Welfare State Retrenchment in Capitalist Democracies, “Social Policy and Society” 2005, No. 2, Vol. 4. The Economist,
• The Next Supermodel: Politicians from Both Right and Left Could Learn from the Nordic Countries, http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21571136-politiciansboth-right-and-left-could-learn-nordic-countries-next-supermodel, 2013 [Access date: 23.08.2013]
• Wagner P., Weiss C.H., Wittrock B., Wollmann H. (eds.), Social Sciences and Modern States: National Experiences and Theoretical Crossroads, Cambridge 1991.
• Wilkinson R.G., Pickett K., The Spirit Level – Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better, London 2009.