Universalism in flux – Welfare profit-makers’ views towards the institution of welfare universalism
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8139554 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Laura Tarkiainen (0000-0002-2003-2531, Tampere University, corresponding author), Hanna Kuusela (0000-0003-3845-8140, University of Jyväskylä) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Publication date | 2026-02-26 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Acta Sociologica (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0001-6993 • E-ISSN: 1502-3869 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/00016993261425833 |
| OpenAlex | W7131659821 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 48 |
In recent decades, the growing influence of profit-making in Finnish healthcare and social services has affected a core institution of the Nordic welfare state – welfare universalism. This study investigates elite views concerning this institution. Drawing on new institutional theory, we analysed qualitative interviews conducted with 22 Finnish owners and managers of private care companies who have earned significant income or wealth in the healthcare and social service sectors. The findings revealed that despite healthcare being framed as an acceptable profit-making domain, interviewees considered universal coverage for and access to basic education and healthcare as normative, established and culturally legitimate forms of universalism. Conversely, interviewees responded to universal social security benefits with strong resistance and recommendations for normative and regulative change. Our analysis shows that Finnish welfare profit-makers construct clear hierarchies between different services traditionally positioned at the core of the universal Nordic model, and their normative assessments of welfare universalism appear to reflect the logic of Finnish welfare policy reforms, which makes them appear rational and morally legitimate. In other words, the interviewees’ understanding of universalism as a normative institution aligns with what is currently possible or not in the regulatory setting of the Finnish welfare state
Elite · Health care · Institution · Normative · Social Welfare · Universalism · Welfare · Welfare state · Healthcare Systems and Practices · Healthcare Systems and Reforms · Social Policy and Reform Studies
Institutional Entrepreneurship and Change in Fields
Politics against Markets
Social Responsibility and Healthcare in Finland
Universalism and the Challenge of Diversity
Universalism in Welfare Policy
Enrolling the child in private early childhood education and care in the context of universal service provision
Educational marketization the Swedish way
Oscillating meanings of the Nordic model
A Nordic Nirvana? Gender, Citizenship, and Social Justice in the Nordic Welfare States
From universalism to selectivism
Universalism and social policy
The Nordic Welfare State in Finland
European long‐term care marketisation
The Choice Revolution
Institutional Entrepreneurs and Social Innovation in Danish Senior Care
The marketization of care
Institutional Sources of Business Power
The Scandinavian Model and Women's Interests
Taking ideas and discourse seriously
Lords of the Dance
The hyperopia of wealth
The moral economy of universal public healthcare. On healthcare activism in austerity Spain
The moral economies of market societies
The Nordic Model on the Global Market of Ideas
Vanguard fantasies
Advancing Universalism in Neoliberal Times? Basic Income, Workfare and the Politics of Conditionality
The winners of marketisation
Marketization and universalism
Varieties of Scandinavian universalism
The Limits of Social Solidarity
Cultural Resistance to Policy Change
Financialization of Eldercare in a Nordic Welfare State
Marketisation of Nordic Eldercare - Is the Model Still Universal
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |