Images of the Nordic welfare model : Historical layers and ambiguities

Abstract

Throughout the twentieth century, the Nordic welfare model has been attributed different characteristics and connotations. The notion of a Nordic model was constructed during the gradual transformation of the five Nordic nation states into welfare states. We argue that this can be described as a 'modelization' process driven by national and regional interests articulated in an international context. We focus on four historical phases: the formative phase of modern social policy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the interwar period, the Cold War period, and the ongoing post-Cold War era. In the concluding discussion, we explain the stickiness of the image of a Nordic model by highlighting several dualisms in the uses of the concept that allowed not only for the settling of conflicting interests but also for the continuation over a century of both continuities and discontinuities. ; Peer reviewed