The problem (or promise?) of American liberalism

What Nordic life tells us, in other words, is how steep and ambitious the path of American liberalism is. Conservative social ideals are notorious for their mercenary spirit and wishful self-justifications—the Thatcherite talks of neighbors helping one another and themselves as homeless people fill the sidewalks. Yet a certain hardness of heart rests in the practice of modern American liberalism, too. We have registered our willingness to make the Faustian deal that the Swedes have not. The possibility of having a truly Iranian-American life, or enjoying deep-Appalachian bluegrass, is important to our national variety. And, to let these cultures thrive on their own, we’ve agreed to let some of our people, by our withheld intervention, be thrown under the bus.

Because this is America, we hope for better. But we aren’t hung up on our tendencies to fall short. A Boothian observer of the U.S. would notice its capacity to overpromise and underdeliver. (By contrast, when the Finns are confronted with their educational achievements their impulse is apparently to doubt the data.) Like many Enlightenment-born nations, we declared our principles at the start—liberty, equality, the pursuit of happiness—and trusted that any friction among these ideas would be sorted out, eventually, in the churn of civic life. The trust continues. Progress is slow. While Nordic people have made the best of what they have, Americans persist in gambling on something better, and yet settling for something worse.

Nathan Heller, Northern lights: Do the Scandinavians really have it all figured out?