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Eldritch
03-30-2011, 02:38 PM
Here's the official, politically correct summary of the mood of the country, a couple of weeks before the parliamentary elections:

http://yle.fi/ecepic/archive/00377/Euroopan_Keskuspank_377974b.jpg

Recent publicity could leave the casual observer with the impression that Finland is now a hotbed of eurosceptic sentiment. Politicians are jostling to lay down ever more stringent conditions on increasing Finland’s contribution to the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), and the biggest refusenik party is surging in the polls to the point where it could be a part of the next government. So is the country a bastion of euroscepticism?

“The Finnish political landscape has changed more than we have changed,” says Astrid Thors, Finland’s Minister for European Affairs and a member of the liberal, pro-Europe Swedish People’s Party, when asked why her pro-European positions are now more lonely than in the past.

“The debate we have about Europe in Finland follows the British debate, which does not reflect what happens in the rest of Europe,” adds Thors, a fluent French speaker. “Just compare Le Monde and the British papers. The Finns are relying too much on the British press and English-speaking sources, and that also distorts the debate.”

Tapio Raunio, Professor in Political Science at Tampere University, says that the anti-bailout statements do not represent a major shift in thinking so much as the verbalising of currents of thinking that had previously remained hidden. When the entire system is dedicated to ironing out differences so that Finland speaks with one voice, the debate and criticism is not seen by the public.

”For all these years you’ve had this kind of quiet criticism within the parties, and now you see it coming to the surface,” says Raunio. ”There’s been hardly any public debate about the EU. But at the same time we’ve known that within parties there are quite severe differences or ideological differences about how Europe should be developed. Now you see those differences coming to the fore."

Withdrawing into our shell?

One party facing a particular struggle is the Centre Party. With a rural base similar to that of the True Finns, the party’s grassroots instincts are sometimes at odds with its policies.

“In the Centre Party we are not very eager to extend guarantees. We want to search for alternatives first, but if it seems really that there is no better chance then of course we have to consider it.”

The National Coalition Party faces a similar dilemma. Finance Minister Jyrki Katainen believes that while Finland should examine all other options, an increase in Finland’s loan guarantees to the European Financial Stability Facility might well be necessary. Nevertheless, he told Reuters recently that Finland faces a choice between “whether we want to withdraw into our shell" or "be an international open and active player also in future."

This kind of pro-Europeanism is getting more difficult to find these days. Pekka Haavisto, a Green League MP, special representative of the Finnish Foreign Minister in various African crises, former EU representative in Sudan and Darfur and an advocate for Roma rights, is nobody’s idea of a populist eurosceptic. But even he expresses a certain disappointment with the direction of EU policy in recent years.

”There is a feeling of a lack of leadership,” says Haavisto. ”There were high expectations after the Lisbon Treaty, and even among the Greens, people are wondering about Europe. There are very few European politicians advocating a European agenda, and that makes many people in Finland think that they might well be on their own.”

Finland’s Social Democrats have historically been strongly pro-European. Now though, some SDP politicians are demanding greater conditionality on bailout contributions and opposition to the competitiveness pact.

” We are critical of EU policy on those specific issues, and we clearly recognise at the present that it is right-wing parties that are dominating and utilising the EU for their policies, particularly on economic issues,” says Kimmo Kiljunen, a Social Democrat MP and former UN and OSCE official.

”That is the so-called competitiveness pact that the right-wing parties are trying to get through all European countries. These are very conservative positions. We are not eurosceptics, but we are sceptical of and oppose the right-wing policies pursued by the EU.”

“Nothing to do with solidarity”

This criticism of EU policy is echoed by the Left Alliance. Their political secretary, Jussi Saramo, believes that the EU should be reformed, and the bailout package is currently directed at the wrong targets.

”They are saying that we are helping the Irish, Greek and Portuguese people, but actually we are not,” claims Saramo. ”This system has nothing to do with solidarity; it is helping the banks. The people are still suffering from low wages, unemployment, cuts in public services and so on. We think that the European Central Bank should give loans to European countries at reasonable interest rates, and not to give loans to private banks so they can give money to the states.”

Christian Democrat Secretary Peter Östman takes a similar line, saying that the pain of sovereign debt crises must be balanced between lenders and governments. Up to now, the bailout has been too focused on the banks and not enough on the countries in trouble, he argues. But even he refuses to take on the eurosceptic mantle, preferring to mention the single currency’s positive impact on Finland’s exporters.

“The only eurosceptic party in parliament”

The populist True Finns’ leader, Timo Soini, firmly rejects any increase in Finland’s bailout contributions, believes Greece should default on its debt, and warns of the inevitable failure of the entire European project. If there is a eurosceptic in Finland, surely he must be it?

“We are the only eurosceptic party in the Finnish Parliament,” says Soini. “We are not against Europe, or European people; we are just against the kind of system the European Union represents.”

Seen as an avuncular, down-to-earth figure, rarely seen in public without a Millwall FC scarf and a grin, Soini has seen his party’s poll figures explode in recent months, reaching a level equivalent to the traditional ‘Big Three’ parties. He describes his job as convincing enough Finns to vote for his party to ensure that the next government will not take part in the bailout, and rubbishes the idea that Finland would have to leave the EU if the country did not contribute.

“We are a triple-A rated economy. How could they kick us out and keep Greece or Portugal instead of us?” asks Soini. “It doesn’t work that way.”

One comparison the True Finns often run into is with its predecessor, the Rural Party (SMP). The party vehemently criticised Finland’s decision-making in foreign policy, which during the party’s high water mark in the 1980s was mainly directed towards the Soviet Union.

Appearing as an outsider criticizing the old parties was an effective vote-gathering strategy, but when the party entered government, it was hamstrung by ministerial responsibility and an inability to attack its coalition partners. Prof. Raunio believes the True Finns could be heading for a similar fate, notwithstanding their currently high levels of support.

”In Finland, this is particularly tricky in many ways, because the True Finns would be joining a coalition government. And one of the rules of being in a coalition is that you do not criticise the policies of your coalition partners. So I predict that if the True Finns will be in a government life will be extremely difficult for them. And presumably that will also show at the subsequent elections.”

YLE News (http://www.yle.fi/uutiset/news/2011/03/is_euroscepticism_on_the_rise_in_finland_2476054.h tml).

Motörhead Remember Me
03-30-2011, 04:51 PM
NOTTS COUNTY!!!!!

Raskolnikov
03-30-2011, 07:18 PM
I would imagine Finno-Ugrics have a natural linguistic barrier against the Graeco-Latinoid scientismic ideological-speak & worldview of alien propagandists. Is not Hungary the same way? (Better off?)

The contraexample is Spain, which in spite of having a militarist 'fascist' barrier on it up until very recently, quite quickly got globalised (for now).

Motörhead Remember Me
03-30-2011, 07:28 PM
I would imagine Finno-Ugrics have a natural linguistic barrier against the Graeco-Latinoid scientismic ideological-speak & worldview of alien propagandists. Is not Hungary the same way? (Better off?)


Not only the Graeco-Latinoid scientismic ideological-speak & worldview but we have a barrier when it comes to understanding you as well.

Raskolnikov
03-31-2011, 12:36 AM
I refer to the Latin and Greek neologisms from science, which are also used in what's called 'social engineering', which transfer easily into the popculture/common sense, media, and academia of nations linguistically related to the Anglophonic capital order (Aryan/Indoeuropean languages).

And, no, I suppose I and my manner of explanation are not well liked.

Motörhead Remember Me
03-31-2011, 07:26 AM
I refer to the Latin and Greek neologisms from science, which are also used in what's called 'social engineering', which transfer easily into the popculture/common sense, media, and academia of nations linguistically related to the Anglophonic capital order (Aryan/Indoeuropean languages).


Yes?

Eldritch
03-31-2011, 12:48 PM
I refer to the Latin and Greek neologisms from science, which are also used in what's called 'social engineering', which transfer easily into the popculture/common sense, media, and academia of nations linguistically related to the Anglophonic capital order (Aryan/Indoeuropean languages).

And, no, I suppose I and my manner of explanation are not well liked.

There's nothing with you, or with the way you explain things -- especially since you obviously are willing to elaborate, if someone has any questions to ask.

Btw you are on to something. The PC newspeak that multikulturists use sounds especially hilarious in Finnish. It's impossible for anyone with two brain cells to rub together not to see through it.

Don Brick
03-31-2011, 01:00 PM
I refer to the Latin and Greek neologisms from science, which are also used in what's called 'social engineering', which transfer easily into the popculture/common sense, media, and academia of nations linguistically related to the Anglophonic capital order (Aryan/Indoeuropean languages).

And, no, I suppose I and my manner of explanation are not well liked.

haha, funny. :p But an interesting theory nonetheless. ;) lol

Imperivm
03-31-2011, 01:03 PM
NOTTS COUNTY!!!!!

Notts County?? (http://www.nottscountyfc.co.uk/page/Home)

The Ripper
03-31-2011, 01:39 PM
I would imagine Finno-Ugrics have a natural linguistic barrier against the Graeco-Latinoid scientismic ideological-speak & worldview of alien propagandists. Is not Hungary the same way? (Better off?)

The contraexample is Spain, which in spite of having a militarist 'fascist' barrier on it up until very recently, quite quickly got globalised (for now).

I'd say its a legacy of the relative political isolation during the Cold War -era. Political concepts long applied in the West are newer and more foreign here. By the same token, the eagerness of the Finnish political and media elite to be the "model student" of EU-integration and all related social paradigms can be seen as a legacy of finlandization, only reversed to become West-orientated. Finlandization was of course a result of geo-political necessity, and most understood it as such. Perhaps this is why there is a tradition of skepticism beneath the surface.

Motörhead Remember Me
03-31-2011, 05:48 PM
Notts County?? (http://www.nottscountyfc.co.uk/page/Home)

Fuck, yeah.