Finland has gone from being a poor country early in the 20th century to ranking tenth in the world in life expectancy, education, and income.
The common belief is that a country must first become rich, and then it can provide welfare for its people. The history of the Nordic societies tells a different story; here, wealth has been built by building welfare for people.
This success was built on a notion of welfare entirely different from welfare as understood in the United States. In the US “being on welfare” is humiliating, and welfare benefits often depend on the recipient’s relationship to something or someone else. What is radically different about the Finnish system is that here welfare benefits and services are rights that everyone living permanently in the country is individually entitled to. Finnish people have economic, social, and political citizenship.
For women, it has proved particularly important that social benefits and services belong to everyone without distinction as to sex, marital status, employment, race, or nationality. Thus Finnish women are entitled to enjoy their social entitlements whether or not they are married or employed.
This social welfare system is based on a long heritage of democracy, social justice, and equality, and a sense of collective responsibility for the well-being of the people. The workers’ movement has been strong in the Nordic countries since the beginning of the 20th century. But ever since 1906, when Finland became the first country in the world to grant women the vote and full political rights, the most important force in building the welfare system has been Finnish women.
In 1899, when the majority of Finns were living in poverty, a group of women established the Martha Organization to advance the country’s economic and cultural life. The strategy was to mobilize educated women—often teachers and home economists—who volunteered to visit women in their rural homes and teach them about childcare, cooking, housekeeping, handicrafts, raising animals, growing vegetables and fruits, using berries, mushrooms, and wildlife from the forests, and fish from the thousands of lakes.
http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=566
Note: http://www.yesmagazine....
Women, Citizenship, And The End Of Poverty
Posted on Monday, December 26 at 10:16 by DiogenesContributed By
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Thank you for posting this excellent report. It's a powerful tool for
responding to anybody who insists on the various forms of
opprobrium and oppression for any citizen needing help from
the State. Unfortunately, there are way too many of those
hardliners who are confused by the economics of it all. So this
information is most welcome.
I didn't know a lot of the detail which is explained in this story.
It's an especially good feeling to know that honestly helping others
creates wealth ... just as supporting the arts creates wealth ...
thanks again.
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It has always beenmy attention to seek altutatives to the system so many in North America rightly complain of<br />
Van city credit Union has been taking study groups to Italy's Emilia Romagna <a href="http://www.cooperativegrocer.coop/articles/index.php?id=483">http://www.cooperativegrocer.coop/articles/index.php?id=483</a> for about 15 or 20years.<br />
Tome the amazing aspect of the internet is that as a resource tool it is unparalelled.<br />
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<a href="http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/llt/53/br_36.html">http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/llt/53/br_36.html</a> for Mondragopn In the Basque region of Spain/Portugal<br />
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There are models aplenty if one is open enough to seek them<br />
<p>---<br>Your mantra has been your opinions are stifled due to their contrary nature, when they are actually stifled for being without perceivable foundation
off the coast of British Columbia. It retains threads of its origins as
a Finnish experiment in transplanting the working, communal
ideals to the new world. Last I heard, two new co-operatives
were opened, one of them for wild foods gathered from the forest;
the other for seafood.
about the battle to increase welfare support in Canada. Diogenes'
report on Women, Citizenship, and the End of Poverty in Finland
was very much appreciated on the Tyee Web-site.
commentor: 4gen8posted: 1 Day Ago (29 Dec 05)
With thanks to the "Welfare State" between the 50's and 70's the
gap between the rich and the poor closed for the first time in
history, and North American women achieved more equality and
independance by being freed from subjugation to wage slavery
than they had ever attained before.
This has of course all been reversed now, thanks to Ronald
Rayguns and Mulroney (aka the man who sold Canada). Still it
remains, the point that the story about Finland makes has also
been proven in Canada.
I can never figure out, knowing that, what could possibly motivate
the ordinary citizen who has that information, to continue to argue
for the corporations, the bosses, and financial self-subjugation.
Better to have to work three jobs and never see your kids than to
admit that somehow the capitalist system really has not been set
up for the well being of humans? Who knows what convoluted
emotional process makes folks shill for the overlords?
As for the whole question of providing a helping hand to folks who
need it. I see "lefties" and New Democrats doing that regularly.
I know it is neo-con propoganda to suggest socialists are in it for
the "getting" but in fact most socialists - at least the ones I know are
in it for the giving. And if you really need proof of that, note one
small example from the proportion of the NDP's budget that is paid
for by ordinary citizen's - as compared for example to EITHER of
the right wing parties.
I always find this whole conversation idiotic anyways. It is just too
ironic that folks whose whole paradigm is about hating/blaming the
weak the poor and the marginalised for their plight, defending their
own right to become ever richer no matter how future generations
have to pay for it, and pretending that corporate welfare is a boon
to any country honoured enough to be given the privilege of
handing it out - ironic that those types of folks accuse SOCIALISTS
of selfishness!
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Your mantra has been your opinions are stifled due to their contrary nature, when they are actually stifled for being without perceivable foundation