This project focuses on intergenerational social mobility and educational inequality in Finland, and in the other Nordic countries (Norway, Sweden, and Denmark). In these countries, relative social mobility, or social fluidity has recently stalled, especially for those born after the 1970s despite generous welfare provisions and the expansion of equal educational systems. Most of the previous studies have assumed that mobility would follow a uniform pattern in these countries. However, this project stresses that Nordic countries differ substantively in the relationship between education and labor market; and that these differences emerge evidently when comparing intergenerational social mobility at occupational level. Traditional approaches in social mobility research, distinguishing only large scale or big-social classes from each other, e.g. upper class, working-class, seem to be poorly equipped in explaining this phenomenon. Therefore, this project employs a novel approach to the study of social mobility using detailed information at occupational level, distinguishing between micro-classes, e.g. plumbers, electricians, architects. The research has a strong policy dimension. Liberal democracies are facing political struggles in creating greater equality of opportunities as the radical educational expansion increased educational equality, but had a smaller impact on relative chances to intergenerational mobility. Often, micro-level processes in the social reproduction and related social exclusion dynamics are more difficult to be reached by policy interventions. The project employs log-linear models and counterfactual framework to analyze educational and social class inequalities through different approaches to social mobility. It uses census and register data for each Nordic country, which are accessed by project collaborators who will work with the applicant to analyze data and sharing syntax/code on a repository online.

2022