The Information Society and the Welfare State

Silicon Valley has been considered as the model that societies must imitate to succeed in the information age. However, recently another alternative has attracted strong international interest: the Finnish model. This is equally dynamic in technological and economic terms, but combines the information society with the welfare state. The Information Society and the Welfare State is the first accessible academic study of what the Finnish model really is. The authors analyse the factors that have enabled Nokia to become one of the world's leading telecommunications companies, for example, and Linux to become the biggest challenger to Microsoft in the operating systems market. They discuss the development of Nokia and the Finnish innovation model, with important lessons for businesses and national technology policies.