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A filmmaker and a crooked lawyer shattered Denmark's self-image

(www.theguardian.com)
196 points RapperWhoMadeIt | 3 comments | 27 Mar 25 13:01 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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frantathefranta ◴[27 Mar 25 13:36 UTC] No.43493499[source]▶
I'm fully aware that Sweden and Denmark are different countries (I lived in Denmark for 3 years), but this reminded me of the reel of Swedes playing every time I visit IKEA, where they talk about how corruption is absolutely unthinkable in Swedish society.

And there's also this tidbit from the article:

> Other Scandinavian nations also reeled upon watching The Black Swan. After the series premiered in Sweden, a criminologist at Lund University warned: “There’s a lot of evidence that it’s probably even worse here.”

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1. cess11 ◴[27 Mar 25 14:37 UTC] No.43494122[source]▶
Since the late eighties Sweden has privatised, as the euphemism goes, heavily. In particular schools and medical and elder care have become cesspools of corruption and mob activity. It's gotten worse in construction as well.

Today some active politicians simultaneously perform as senior advisers and the like for so called public affairs, i.e. lobbying, firms. That is, in the open. The leader of one of the largest parties in parliament and kind of part of the current government had a mob leader as guest at his wedding a while back.

There's an agreement among the largest parties to blame the fallout on immigrant minorities. They still disagree about whether to also put blame on sexual and gender minorities, as well as indigenous minorities. I expect them to start agreeing more during the next election.

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2. scottyah ◴[27 Mar 25 16:36 UTC] No.43495338[source]▶
Interesting. It really seems like wherever the power goes, the corruption follows. The good news with privatization is that it doesn't attract the corrupt looters to government and you can trust them as a culture to be a watchdog for corruption.

When the government as a body is in control of everything, all the corrupt looters go there, but you can't have the private industry keep them in check unless you count on the pipeline of years in industry gaining financial freedom -> public service as a regulator.

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3. cess11 ◴[28 Mar 25 07:07 UTC] No.43502404[source]▶
Privatisation is a reactionary strategy that aims to reduce or remove democratic influence over important social institutions like education and healthcare.

The entire point of social constructs like shareholder corporations is to make it hard or impossible to hold physical persons accountable for their actions and risk taking. In some areas of society this might be attractive and reasonable, in many others that involve e.g. vulnerable persons or justice it is not.

I have a chance to influence who sits in the regional political councils, but I can't influence the board in the corporation that runs the local healthcare centers. Capitalist competition optimises for mediocrity, for excellence you need democratic institutions and accountable politicians.