I read the socialists thread and I was suprised to see how many people cite Scandinavia as an example of successfull socialist economies considering that Scandinavia is nowhere near socialism.
I'll talk about Sweden as it is where I live. Admidetly we do have a welfare state but so does all of western Europe and ours isn't as bad as say France's.
Even if we do have a large public sector we also have a very vital private sector. Compared to Sweden's population we have a very large share of the largest companies in the world (IKEA, Ericsson, Volvo etc). Except for our very high income tax (top income tax of 60%) and our relatively inflexible labour market we have a very free economy.
If you're going to define Scandinavia as socialist you would have to redefine the concept of socialism.
I might also add that those parts of the economy that are rather socialized do not work very well. We have very long waiting times for health care (unless you go to a private hospital). We have a problem with unemployment as it is very expenisve to hire and fire. In spite of being on of the healthiest people in the world we have a very high rate of sick leave (might have something to do with the fact that you get 80% pay).