Vilnius puts on a show, January 2024.
Photographer: Alfredas Pliadis/Xinhua/Getty Images
Lithuania Blazes a Trail Ukraine Can Follow
The Baltic nation is building a vibrant capitalist democracy in the shadow of Putin’s war machine.
“This is a golden age for Lithuania. This was a concrete jungle twenty years ago, now it’s clean and nice. We have so many possibilities. You can travel. You can study. You can start a business.” Journalists are often mocked for relying on the dubious wisdom of taxi drivers. But this encomium from the man who picked me up at Vilnius airport was delivered with real feeling. And I heard variations of the same theme repeated dozens of times during a visit to the country, from CEOs, academics, and even normally cynical journalists. This all felt like a shot of adrenalin to a visitor from a Britain that is consumed by loathing the government and despairing of the future.
Forty years ago, Lithuania was an impoverished province of the Soviet Empire. Today its GDP (adjusted for purchasing power parity) is 90% of the European average — on a par with Southern European countries. The 2024 World Happiness Report found that Lithuania’s under thirties are the happiest in the world — and, though such surveys should be treated with skepticism, even a spark of happiness is remarkable if you consider the country’s history and geography.