Sweden: Paradise in Trouble

For over 40 years, ever since Marquis Childs wrote that best-selling book, Sweden has been known as the land of the Middle Way, which was slowly but consistently moving from a backward state toward its present position as the most developed of all welfare societies. Praised by progressive liberals, at least outside Sweden itself, its gradually achieved social reforms have been discussed contemptuously by dogmatic revolutionaries who profess to be true Marxists. However “pure” this Marxist criticism may be, armed as it is with the powerful if not flawless analytic tools of historical materialism, the “purer” fact remains that these critics simply bungle the whole story.

Even when critics have got the facts s...