Thread by @ErikAngner

One of the most long-standing critiques of Swedish corona policy is that it is, represents, or results from, some kind of national chauvinism. The critique gets it backwards, but it's interesting anyway: it's basically the most Swedish objection ever. /1

The line "Sweden has picked the worst possible time to experiment with national chauvinism" appeared at the very beginning of the pandemic, alongside the new term of art "public-health nationalism," e.g. in this piece. (It's been repeated many times.) /2
washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/…

The basic argument is that (a) Swedish policy results from the premiss that Sweden or Swedes are better and/or more informed than others, and (b) that the premiss is false: it isn't any better, and they aren't any better informed, than anybody else. /3

On the merits, (a) is demonstrably false. If anything, the Swedish public-health agency had *lower* confidence in Swedes' ability to stop the spread of covid-19 than their international counterparts. By mid-March of 2020 it had given up entirely. /4

https://twitter.com/ErikAngner/status/1272834134453424128?s=20

Here are data on chauvinism across Europe, fwiw. /5

https://twitter.com/JacobGudiol/status/1389118654231556098?s=20

Anyway, what makes the critique the most Swedish thing ever is (b). It's a version of the famous Law of Jante: "Don't think you're special!" "Don't think you're better than anybody else!" "Don't stand out!" /6
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Ja…

So the critique is interesting – but not for the reasons its authors think. /fin