Idar Kreutzer, head of the Nordic region's biggest life assurer, was in New York recently when a senior executive of a large US bank invited him in for a quick chat. It soon extended into a two-hour discussion of the Nordic business model and corporate diversity. “It surprises me, the interest and the curiosity in the Nordic model,” says Mr Kreutzer, chief executive of Norway's Storebrand.

The model of capitalism practised in Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland is seen by some as one of the few winners of the current economic and financial crisis. From its response to a previous banking crisis to its promotion of women in the boardroom, the Nordic model is piquing interest around the world in the same way as the Japanese style of capitalism did in the 1980s or the Germans' in the 1960s.

Just as those systems faced challenges after their time in the limelight, so does the Nordic model. There are doubts, too, about how easy it would be to export it to other parts of the world. But the recent appointment of Ericsson's Carl-Henric Svanberg as chairman of BP, joining two other Nordic heads of big UK companies, demonstrates the growing respect for Nordic capitalism and its leaders.