In October 2016, the Baltic country of Estonia elected its first female president.
But one could argue that she doesn’t have much to govern.
Estonia is bigger than Switzerland, but its population is comparable to the US state of
Maine.
So what is life really like in Estonia?
Well, Estonia was once a socialist Soviet Republic.
However since regaining independence in 1991, the country has joined the EU, NATO, as well
as the OECD, and has firmly positioned itself as politically, culturally and economically
western.
Estonia’s free market economy is growing every year, and its government debt is among
the lowest in Europe.
That said, the country has a considerable income gap, with the top 20% of the population
earning more than five times as much as the bottom 20%.
Estonia’s economy and culture is heavily focused on technology.
In 2000, the country declared internet access to be a human right and has since established
hundreds of free wifi zones.
Estonia has also fully digitized its government services, and was the first country to allow
online voting in a general election.
Like many other Baltic and Nordic countries, Estonia is extremely homogenous, with nearly
70 percent of the population being ethnic Estonian.
Russians are the largest ethnic minority, representing roughly a quarter of the population.
But perhaps surprisingly, Estonian culture takes little influence from Russian culture,
and instead positions itself closer to its Nordic neighbors, like Finland.
Finnish and Estonian people enjoy similar cuisines, and both have a tradition of relaxing
in saunas in the winter.
Estonia has even pushed for ascension into the Nordic Council, arguing that it lost the
opportunity for membership during Soviet rule.
Like its neighbors Finland and Russia, Estonia struggles with widespread alcoholism.
The average Estonian drinks an estimated 3 gallons of alcohol annually, and experts say
somewhere between 1,500 and 2 thousand Estonians die from alcohol consumption each year.
Thats a lot of deaths for country with just over a million people.
In the scope of Europe, Estonia is unique in that religion is not very widespread.
Although Christianity is the country’s primary faith, only 28 percent of the population identify
as religious, and only 16 percent of Estonian adults say they believe in God.
As a result, Estonian values tend to be less traditional.
The country has the highest rate of unmarried adults in the EU in part because so many couples
live together without opting for marriage, which is not as culturally important as it
is in other countries.
Most Estonians live in urban areas.
In fact nearly a third of its population live in its capital city, Tallinn.
Tallinn is often called the ‘Silicon Valley of Europe’, as it has more startups per
person than any other European country.
Many of these small business have actually grown into global companies.
One example is Skype.
The city also rolled out free public transit in 2013, and is now making a $22 million dollar
annual profit from the project.
There’s no doubt Estonia is modern, progressive and highly developed.
The country is considered high-income, and consistently ranks highly in education, press
freedom, quality of life and overall human development.
Barring the harsh winters and relative isolation, life in Estonia doesn’t sound too bad.
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Even though Estonia likes to think of itself as Nordic, the country is technically Baltic.
But what does that mean exactly?
And how much power do Baltic states have?
Find out in
this video.
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