3 ms·

I find it a bit hard to swallow that "corruption perceptions" is an objective metric. And let's not forget that Norway's wealth - and thus the ease with which t

I find it a bit hard to swallow that "corruption perceptions" is an objective metric. And let's not forget that Norway's wealth - and thus the ease with which the government can improve other factors - is due to its natural resources, i.e. oil. If Switzerland is exemplary, go look up when it allowed women to vote. There's not much to be said against Sweden and Denmark though: one could sum up their success by saying that they simply never went down the road of screwing the population in order to be able to reduce corporation tax, which is all too common nowdays (see Ireland, USA, even Germany).

lkbm 14y ago
Full women's suffrage in Switzerland came mindbogglingly late, but more relevant would be ways in which they still fail today, not twenty years ago. Is the the system that failed to enforce rights nationwide is still in place, or has EU membership changed that?
- halvsjur 14y ago
  Switzerland is not in the EU. They're not even an EEA member.
kalleboo 14y ago
> And let's not forget that Norway's wealth If oil wealth was all you needed to have good government, then the arab world would look drastically different from how it does today. I'd say that natural resource wealth actually makes it HARDER to have a good government, as it'd be a more tempting target to corrupt. > There's not much to be said against Sweden and Denmark though: one could sum up their success by saying that they simply never went down the road of screwing the population in order to be able to reduce corporation tax Sweden actually has a quite low corporation tax.
- berntb 14y ago
  Check the resource curse on Wikipedia, regarding other oil countries. Tl;dr: A country with lots of income from natural resources won't become a democracy -- Norway already was a democracy when the oil money started flowing. It is too lucrative for the politicians to keep the population down, get external enemies etc and steal the money. (Also, too much free money distorts the economy -- this goes for Norway.)
- lazyjones 14y ago
  > If oil wealth was all you needed to have good government, then the arab world would look drastically different It's not all you need. But if good intentions are there, it makes a little difference whether you have a $700b oil fund (for a population of 5 million) or not. In other words, many other countries might be similarly well governed, but lacking financing. > Sweden actually has a quite low corporation tax. It was higher than the EU average until Jan 1st 2013.
  - mongol 14y ago
    Yes so therefore it was lowered.

lkbm 14y ago

Full women's suffrage in Switzerland came mindbogglingly late, but more relevant would be ways in which they still fail today, not twenty years ago. Is the the system that failed to enforce rights nationwide is still in place, or has EU membership changed that?

halvsjur 14y ago
Switzerland is not in the EU. They're not even an EEA member.

kalleboo 14y ago

> And let's not forget that Norway's wealth If oil wealth was all you needed to have good government, then the arab world would look drastically different from how it does today. I'd say that natural resource wealth actually makes it HARDER to have a good government, as it'd be a more tempting target to corrupt. > There's not much to be said against Sweden and Denmark though: one could sum up their success by saying that they simply never went down the road of screwing the population in order to be able to reduce corporation tax Sweden actually has a quite low corporation tax.

berntb 14y ago
Check the resource curse on Wikipedia, regarding other oil countries. Tl;dr: A country with lots of income from natural resources won't become a democracy -- Norway already was a democracy when the oil money started flowing. It is too lucrative for the politicians to keep the population down, get external enemies etc and steal the money. (Also, too much free money distorts the economy -- this goes for Norway.)
lazyjones 14y ago
> If oil wealth was all you needed to have good government, then the arab world would look drastically different It's not all you need. But if good intentions are there, it makes a little difference whether you have a $700b oil fund (for a population of 5 million) or not. In other words, many other countries might be similarly well governed, but lacking financing. > Sweden actually has a quite low corporation tax. It was higher than the EU average until Jan 1st 2013.
- mongol 14y ago
  Yes so therefore it was lowered.