The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Political Resistance: Notes on the Political Roots of Egalitarianism in Scandinavia

Abstract

This chapter looks at processes that have contributed to accommodating trust networks into public politics. In Scandinavia, this seems to have happened to a great extent, and the chapter explores some aspects of how this has occurred, and why, and examines some of its implications. In comparative terms, popular political mobilization in Scandinavia was quite successful in influencing the state, not only by forcing it to make concessions, but also by integrating forms of trust, horizontal loyalty, and certain values and interests that became important for developing policy—such as individual autonomy and universalism. Trust networks were not simply absorbed by the hierarchical—and partly clientelistic—logic of the state apparatus. The first section of the chapter discusses the nature of organized popular opposition to state power and its implications. In the second section, dealing with contemporary local politics, how oppositional interests form alliances that challenge routine politics of governance is shown.

The following colleagues have contributed with valuable comments to earlier drafts for this chapter: Mary-Bente Bringslid, Synnøve Bendixsen, Jan Eivind Myhre, Christian Lo, and Maja Hojer Bruun. They all helped substantially in improving my argument, and I am very grateful. Also the critical input provided by the participants in the workshop hosted by the Department of Anthropology, University of Bergen, 24–25 November, 2015, “De-Naturalizing Egalitarianism” has been very useful in the process of developing the chapter.