[act-ma] The JP Forum Presents: How the US Can Be Like Denmark (and Norway, Sweden and Finland)

[Sarah Byrnes]

*Viking Economics: Life Lessons from the Nordic Countries - with George
Lakey*

Thursday, September 8, 7pm
First Church UU, 6 Eliot Street, Jamaica Plain
<http://act.ips-dc.org/site/R?i=KoFrfnV7cncZIPkeRwfQZg>RSVP on Facebook
<http://act.ips-dc.org/site/R?i=KoFrfnV7cncZIPkeRwfQZg>

The countries of Scandinavia - Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland - are
often thought of as a promised land of equality and happiness. But we also
often hear that the Nordic system is impossible to replicate elsewhere. The
US is too big, or too individualistic, or too . . . something.

In *Viking Economics*, veteran organizer George Lakey dispels these myths.
He explores the inner workings of the Nordic economies that boast the
world’s happiest, most productive workers, and explains how,* if we can
enact some of the changes the Scandinavians fought for surprisingly
recently, we, too, can embrace equality in our economic policy. *

Join us at the JP Forum on Thursday, September 8 at 7pm to meet George and
learn important lessons for the US context.

*About George Lakey*

George Lakey recently retired from Swarthmore College where he was Eugene
M. Lang Visiting Professor for Issues in Social Change and managed the
Global Nonviolent Action Database research project (
nvdatabase.swarthmore.edu
<http://act.ips-dc.org/site/R?i=N-dL3KfLB24UcQu5qo2d_A>). Each of his nine
published books has been about change and how to get it. He received the
Martin Luther King, Jr., Peace Award, the Paul Robeson Social Justice
Award, the Ashley Montague Conflict Resolution Award, was named the Peace
Educator of the Year in 2010, and received the Giraffe Award for Sticking
his Neck out for the Common Good.

Lakey is a Quaker, a gay man with four great-grandchildren, and plays
Broadway tunes for sing-alongs. His first arrest was for a civil rights
sit-in, he has served as an unarmed bodyguard for human rights defenders in
Sri Lanka, and recently walked 200 miles to protest mountaintop removal
coal mining in Appalachia. He has founded a number of social change
organizations including Training for Change and, most recently, Earth
Quaker Action Team (EQAT.org). Lakey is a columnist for
WagingNonviolence.org where he often shares lessons learned from leading
over 1500 social change workshops on five continents.

Check out this review of *Viking Economics* by Chuck Collins
<http://act.ips-dc.org/site/R?i=g-OmHY2HVlbZb4rXBkd6Bw>.

-- 
Sarah Byrnes
Institute for Policy Studies, New England Office