The Nordic Welfare State in Finland

Historical overviews of the development of the welfare state tend to be fixated on various forms of reductionism. Two variants merit particular attention here. The older, functionalistic one derives social reforms and regulations from the needs or problems of industrial modernization, and is tightly committed to modernization as the horizon of expectation. The newer variant also associates the welfare state with modernization, but takes a critical distance from this framework by discussing the welfare state as a “project” of modernity, often pointing out the confidence in scientific social knowledge and rationalization as a basic characteristic of this project. Both approaches result in linear images of continuity. True, the latter variant questions the present and future continuity of this project, yet through the very emphasis on a current epochal transition, a linear image of the past tends to be accentuated. Finland seems to be a good case for criticizing these two types of reductionism in historical welfare state overviews. In a particular fashion, both of them have been actualized, as Finland has been assessed as a “Nordic welfare state”, or, to be more exact, as an (or the) exception among the Nordic welfare states. Apparently, it has been easy to find evidence of Finland being the Nordic latecomer in welfare state development as well as to give plausible explanations for this phenomenon. An easy explanation has followed the functionalistic line, referring to the fact that in Finland, even in intra-Nordic comparison, industrial take-off occurred late and the social structure long remained predominantly agrarian and rural. Another line of argumentation has focused on showing that the welfare state as a project has been politically and ideologically weaker in Finland than, especially, in Sweden, owing to particular features of the Finnish political