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On Defense, France Bites the Bullet, But Avoids Strategic Insolvency May 7, 2013
Iceland’s Recovery Saga Presents Opportunities for Brussels, Washington—and Beijing May 6, 2013
Which Way Forward for Europe’s Hybrid Regimes? May 2, 2013
The Arab Revolts and the Liberal Order May 2, 2013
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GMF celebrates its 40 year history and Founder and Chairman, Dr. Guido Goldman at Gala Dinner May 09, 2013 / Washington, DCGMF held a celebratory gala dinner at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, Wednesday May 8.
In this podcast, GMF Vice President of Programs Ivan Vejvoda discusses last month's historic agreement to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia.
Anchor Elaine Reyes speaks with Andrew Small, Transatlantic Fellow of the Asia Program for the German Marshall Fund, about Beijing's potential role in brokering peace between Israel and Palestine
Why Nordic Nations are a Role Model for Us All
February 11, 2013 / Fabrizio Tassinari
CNN
This op-ed was originally published by Fareed Zakaria GPS on CNN.com. Click here to read the complete article.
CNN -- Scandinavia is officially hot. In a recent issue, The Economist crowned the Nordic economic experience as a “supermodel.” Last month, the New Yorker celebrated Denmark’s hugely successful noir fiction and the egalitarian society behind it as something of a “post-modern” paradise. While these characterizations may be accurate, America and other advanced democracies can be forgiven for dismissing the case of these small, wealthy economies in a remote corner of Europe as an extravagant exception. Not so: the real secret of the Nordic performance is applicable to all, for it is a paradigm of enlightened self-interest at its finest.
Nordics are masters in keeping their friends close and their enemies closer: from their flexible labor-market policies to comprehensive environmental legislation, social and economic stakeholders grasp that long-term interests are best served not by opposing adversaries but by joining forces, adapting to and, if necessary, compromising with them. People here seem to intuitively realize that in a complex and deeply interconnected global environment, you are better off pursuing incremental cooperation rather than shooting for grand bargains.
The poet Paul Valery once wrote that: “we hope vaguely, we dread precisely;” if Nordic people are, by some measure, among the happiest on earth, it may be because they have found a way to hope very precisely. Just as for their trademark minimalistic architecture and design, the Nordics start out from a narrow focus on specific issues of strategic relevance, in order to attain ripple effects that are beneficial to the community as a whole.
Fabrizio Tassinari is head of Foreign Policy Studies at the Danish Institute for International Studies and non-resident senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. His next book is ‘Polaris: How to Advance when the West Fades.’
