Add a Nordic touch to China's welfare society

The vision of building a "moderately well-off society" (xiaokang shehui) by 2020, formulated in the early 2000s, is an important goal of China's 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20). What can China look to learn from experiences of "advanced" welfare states, the "Nordic welfare model" in particular?

The Nordic welfare model highlights the apparent relative success story of the four Nordic countries of Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden during the recent global financial crisis.

China's decades of economic success is recasting it back to become the world's leading economy, a position it held during 18 of the last 20 centuries. But social challenges persist, and new ones appear, prompting the introduction of a great number of social reforms.