ABSTRACT
Finland has recently been much admired due to economic success. Finland has been in the news because of high rankings in competitiveness, technology, education and economic growth. 1 The success has largely been embodied in the growth of the Nokia group and ict sector. Yet the economic boom and the success of the Finnish high tech industries are a relatively new phenomenon, starting from the mid-1990s. In fact, the years of good economic performance were preceded by an exceptionally deep recession in the beginning of the 1990s. At that time, the Finnish gdp shrank by 10 percent in 1991–93, and employment decreased by 20 percent. As a consequence, the unemployment rate rose from 3 to 17 percent between 1990 and 1994.
