There's not much of a difference between the Nordic Model and Venezuela other than Norway having the benefit of an industrialization drive while located in Europe and better State management.
As someone born in Venezuela who has some, uh... history, I guess, with the whole Chavez deal, I can tell you that last bit is like saying the main difference between slugs and people is some steps until you get to the leggy bits. I know you don't like those systems much with regard to Socialist discourse, but like, duuuuuuuuuude... ultimately, you can't ignore distinctions in outcomes, particularly when those distinctions in outcomes aren't due to a lack of resources. I can't stress this enough, "the benefit of an industrialization drive" is something we had in Venezuela too. We don't just have oil, but metals of all kinds too, and mineral resources like gemstones as well. I 'member we even found rare earth metals right around the time those became important thanks to smartphones-- and our labor aristocracy both had a reason to stick around and a reason to question the dynamics of capital. Our pro-capitalist dictators weren't precisely well-regarded and the system, prior to Chavez, had been stuck in a major two-party deadlock that disempowered the majority for the benefit of corporate exploitation abroad. That same corporate exploitation, though, meant that at one point we had access to specialist knowledge across a variety of engineering disciplines, and the rare situation where that specialist knowledge was being shared, to a greater or lesser extent, with the actual Venezuelan people, because there was just too much to do.
So when people say Chavez mismanaged it, they aren't even on the right track. Chavez fucked it. Chavez
ruined it. And then Maduro came and took what little Chavez had, and ruined
that. And I happen to know there's a bunch of Venezuelans on this forum who fuckin', like... hate socialism because of how bad it went, and how bad it keeps going. I can't stress enough how much conviction they have about what socialism is and what its outcomes are guaranteed to be; I can speak on authority with this because I was like 'em once. It's precisely because of this experience that I think it's worthwhile that people have their misconceptions about socialism challenged. It's also why I don't mind being challenged myself on what my conceptions of socialism are. I know I've got a ways to go-- even if sometimes I feel like the details are missing from more abstract forms of socialism that seek to do away with capital relationships in their entirety.
Incidentally, my issues with Venezuela are why, if anybody here thinks I don't see the problem with state capitalism, nah, trust me, I do. The vulnerabilities and flaws vis a vis regulatory capture from neoliberal societies remain in their entirety-- who gets to exploit those vulnerabilities changes, but they remain. Which is incidentally why the Nordic model remains of interest to socialists who believe such a system might represent a roadmap for a transitional phase into true socialism. I'm not sure I'm one of them, but the relative lack of corruption remains compelling. Ultimately, I'm of the opinion that the old tired shit about shifts in consciousness is as much a necessary ingredient of a successful revolution as disempowering the bougies. Without people giving a fuck about participating in the system, there's little to no chance of any revolution surviving a transitional phase where these vulnerabilities are in place. I'd argue that while the Nordic system remains fundamentally capitalist, I guess people's participation within that oppressive system keeps the worst from coming to pass, and that has to be a major thing to note for people seeking to foment some kind of revolution which is going to have tremendous upheavals.
