Affiliated with the Christina Institute of Women Studies

1

Hilkka Pietilä, M.Sc.

Helsinki University,

Affiliated with the Christina Institute of Women Studies

e-mail:

THE PROGRESS OF WOMEN IN FINLAND –

THEIR COMMITMENTS AND ENTITLEMENTS

IN THE PAST AND PRESENT

Abstract

1. Two Finnish path breakers

- The Union of Finnish feminists

- The Martha organization

2. Marthas and Marys

3. “Domestication of the State”

4. The equality discussion in 1960s

5. More women in politics – does it make difference?

6. The welfare society – a hidden catch

7. Formal equality, a narrow notion 8. Formal equality struggle strengthens male values

9. Women’s empowerment for change

References and Sources

A modified version of the paper published in “GLOBAL FEMINISM,

Transnational Women’s Activism,

Organizing, and Human Rights”

Edited by Myra Marx Ferree and Aili Mari Tripp

New YorkUniversity Press, 2006

Hilkka Pietilä, M.Sc.

20.01.2007

THE PROGRESS OF WOMEN IN FINLAND –

THEIR COMMITMENTS AND ENTITLEMENTS

IN THE PAST AND PRESENT

Abstract

Historically there are three kinds of equality processes in Finland, two very different early feminisms, the state feminism and formal equality policies. This article will first take a look on the history of early feminisms, the Union-League of Finnish Feminists and the Martha organization, which were born late 19th century and have been active ever since.

Then we study the new form of equality movement,the Society of 9 and its impact on establishment of the formal state instruments for advancement of women, the National Equality Council. We will then follow the expansion of the so called state feminism, the adoption of the Equality Act and establishment of the post and office of the Equality Ombudsman in 1987.

The emerging welfare society in Finland during the 20th century also has had profound impact on the status of women and their significant role in the economic progress of the country. It integrated women very firmly in the prospering male society.

The strengthening of state instruments and their work for equality has had a narrowing effect on the equality concept and general discussions on gender issues. When the equality has become a juridical and political issue the impact of transformative feminism has been declining.

Finally the formal equality policy and machinery is challenged for strengthening the male values and their impact in culture and society rather than bringing about a more equal and balanced social and cultural development, where both feminine and masculine elements and values would balance each other, transform and enrich the whole society.

The first women’s organizations in Finland were founded in late nineteenth century. That time the country was an autonomous “Grand Duchy” under Russian Czar. It was the time when alsonational uprising processes were emerging in many countries of Europe, Russian revolution was approaching, labour movement and modern political parties gained support in Finland and other countries.Finland became an independent state in 1917.

The most important women’s organizations from that time in Finland were theUnion –the League of Finnish Feminists and the Martha organization, both still living and doing well. They were established in the last decade of the 19th century by a few handfuls of well educated young women activists mainly from the Swedish speaking intellectual families.

1. Two Finnish path breakers

- The Union of Finnishfeminists

The first feminist organization Women’s Union in Finland was established in 1892 by the group of educated intellectual women, who had already earlier had for some time an informal discussion club, where they developed their critical thinking and shared impressions and inspirations from other countries. It is amazing how many of the issues discussed among women ever since, were the subjects of their discussions already then.

The Feminist Union’s main emphasis was on political, economic and social rights for women. As early as 1895 the Union made proposals to the Senate about these reforms. That time there was two issues in Finland as subjects of public campaigning all over the country.They were the resistance against curtailment and suppression of citizen’s rights by the Russian authorities and the campaign for the constitutional reform, which would provide universal political rights for all, including women.

The driving force in the founding process of Feminist Union was Lucina Hagman, rector of the first Finnish language coeducational secondary school and later professor and parliamentarian.An interesting aspect was that in spite of being a women’s rights organization Union was open for both men and women in the beginning. There were several male members even in the first board of the Union. Lucina Hagman was elected as the first president of the organization.

-The Martha organisation

Around the end of the 19th century the oppressive measures of the Russian regime towards Finland were accelerating and the tensions in political climate increased constantly. In that situation Lucina Hagman, then already the president of the Feminist Union, initiated with some of her active women friends also another women’s organization with the aim to start working with women around the country. The aim of this organization was to start training and educating housewives in order to raise the quality of life in the Finnish families and thus in the whole poor society that time. Another aim was to mobilize also women to participate in the nation-wide campaign againstoppression.

This new organization was a genial way of political mobilization in a feminine manner. With the words of Lucina Hagman: “The treasures of knowledge and skills should be carried directly to the Finnish homes, to the actual carer and tender of the family, the Finnish woman, to bring her forward to become a strong protection of Finnish culture and conscious defence for the rights of her country”. These idealistic and even grandiloquent thoughts of the founder of Martha movement were the seeds of the ethos of Martha-work, which has given strength and motivation to its members until today.

The working strategy of Marthas was very practical and simple, and it was genial, indeed, thinking the situations of women, whom they wanted to address. The plan was to send educated women - often teachers and home economists - as a kind of “missionaries” to travel around the country, visit homes and women, teach and train them, organize meetings, seminars and courses with them on practical and citizenship skills. In the beginning “the missionaries” were volunteers, who used their vacations and whatever time they could release for this work.

The courses and extension work covered, for example, the importance of cleanliness and hygiene, nutritious food, fresh air and good care for the health of children and whole families. Skills for child care, better cooking and housekeeping, handicrafts, raising chicken, cattle and pigs, establishing kitchen gardens and growing vegetables and fruits, utilizing berries, mushrooms and wildlife from the forests and fish from the thousands of lakes etc. were subjects of innumerable meetings and gatherings.

This “Martha method” was effective means to reach women around the vast country and for improving health and well-being of people through the households. It did not require big public investments in a poor country, but it required a lot of commitment, solidarity and hard work from the women. Along with the increasing skills and knowledge the rural women gained status in their families and communities and their self-confidence and respect was rising. It also helped them to acquire personal earnings, to which they often had had very little access that time. (Pietilä, 2001)

2. Marthas and Marys

At the time of rising national consciousness and dawning political independence one of the aims of Marthas as well as Feminist Union wasto preparewomen for political participation. These women’s organizations brought up the particular importance of political rights to women. In spite of the times of oppression the constitutional reform was adopted in Finland 1906 and it granted general and equal franchise to all.

Finland was the first country in the world to grant full political rights to women,while they got the eligibility for the office at the same time as the right to vote. The first modern parliamentary elections took place in Finland 1907. As the result of advance training given to women by Marthas and Feminist Union 19 women were elected into the parliament of 200 members already then. Seven of these women belonged to the founders and activists around Marthas and Feminist Union.

I would see these two long-lived women’s organizations like two sisters. They were born very close to each other in time, they even had a common mother, Lucina Hagman, who was the initiator of both. However, their working methods and the scope of their activities were very different.

The ideal of Marthas was from the beginning to build bridges across the class and political lines in Finland. In the early years the aim was especially to raise the quality of life in the poorest and most remote parts of the country and thus to decrease the inequalities between various counties and between the families.

The Feminist Union had somewhat elitist membership and it remained a small organization as far as the number of members is concerned and the activities have mainly been centred in Helsinki.However, at times it has had a lot of influence inpublic debates on women’s issues in the country.It has given stimulation and encouragement to the openly feminist fractions of women’s movement in Finland.

To use the biblical metaphor, one can say that these two organizations have been like Martha and Mary, the one a practical activist in everyday life of families and people all over the country, the other an inspiration and stimulus for generations of women seeking radical ideas and space for feminist debate and sharing experiences and thoughts.

With the terminology of today the Marthas haveempoweredwomenby strengthening their capabilities and self-confidence in the years of poverty and today by copingwith problems of waste and destruction of environment in affluent Finland.The Marys of the Uniondevelop feminist thinking for today’s needs, strengthen and encourage efforts towards profound changes in the patriarchal culture.

3. Domestication of the State

In her work “Gender and National Identity in Finland” an American researcherEllen Marakowitz (1996) compare very interestingly the impact of these two organizations in formation of Finnish identity and writing the national narrative in those formative years of nationhood before national independence, which was achieved in 1917. Both of them belongedto the broad front of political and other popular organizations for national independence and universal suffrage, and both of them emphasized the particular importance of political rights to women.

In early years of these organizations there wasquite a unique solidarity among women, which did cut across the class lines. The middle-class intellectual women believed that in order to create a Finnish nation it was necessary to raise the status, education, and living standards of rural women, who were the big majority of women that time.

Marthas’ work was clearly for the largerfamily of the nation whereas the Feminist Union’s efforts were for women only. The gender approach inUnion’s framework was one of sisterhood and Marthas’ approach was that of an interdependent male-female positions. “As the history of the two groups unfolds, it becomes apparent that it is Martha’s female imagery which takes hold in the Finnish nationalist narrative”, says Ellen Marakowitz.

Marakowitz also speaks about “the domestication of the state” by Marthas. The role of the state as caretaker was in the Martha imagery female, which ultimately became closely aligned with the Finnish state.Marakowitz suggests, that the image of the state as a caring and sharing female institution was written into Finnish national narrative already then.The shift in women’s activities from household to voluntary organizations to government is very clear.

4. The equality-discussionin 1960s

After decades of low profile in equality discussions and activities a new kind of equality organization, The Society of 9, was established in 1966. It was an organization of both women and men members and had primarily academics and intellectuals as members. Its membership remained small and its life circle short, but it had very important impact on gender and equality discussions in Finland 1960s.

Society of 9 considered that only paid work, individual income could give women the prerequisites for equality. Their aim was to get rid of the divided roles of women or the harsh choice between family and employment. This made the role of women also a political issue, since the claim for equal access to paid work for married women did require new social arrangements like day-care services, family planning and rationalization of the household chores. These claims got wider support that time also therefore, that expanding economy and labour market needed more labour, i.e. women were wanted into the labour force.

The policy of the Society of 9 was that gender distribution of labour both in the households and the labour market should be changed towards similar tasks for men and women, men should share the household work equally with women and the professional division of labour to women’s and men’s work should be eliminated. According to Riitta Jallinoja (1983, 161-162) this implied that women’s role should actually be changed towards similarity with the male role, although it was also understood that even the male role should become less competitive.

The politicization of the equality issue led to the understanding that also the solutions will be political. With appropriate legislation the gender equality will be achieved. Therefore the main task of the Society of 9 was to introduce the equality into the programmes of political parties and that will lead to new legislation. The whole issue was an issue of public policies and the private life and relations of men and women was not relevant any more.

According to Jallinoja the inclusion of the equality-issues and equality policies fully into the public sphere implied that “the private life and issues were pushed more and more aside” and the perception that “private life and public life were strictly separate spheres of life” became a general understanding (ibid. 190). This very categorical interpretation by Jallinoja has been challenged later for being a misunderstanding.

The first official equality institution, Finnish Equality Council, was established in these moods and thoughts in 1972.

5. More women in politics –does it make difference?

The women’s organizations founded late 19th century had an equality policy, which was based on the belief that the equality between women and men will be achieved if only it would be possible to eliminate all forms of discrimination, which prevents women to achieve the same education, political power and leading positions in the society as men have. This equality thinking prevailed for many decades.

First in 1970s a new kind women’s movement started to emerge. It spoke about women’s liberation in stead of equality. The aim of this movement was not to get women into the power positions within the male hierarchical structure but rather to dismantle that kind of power structures. The suppression of women was seen just as one mode of operation of the capitalist industrial society. Therefore it did not make sense of struggling for equality in this kind of male structure, but women had to strive for the change in structures and in the role of men and women.

This was the beginning of feminism here, which was aiming at change from below through conscientization, raising awareness of women in stead of using the traditional political institutions. These women claimed that “private is political” and linked the suppression and violence against women in private life with the prevailing patriarchal social and economic system.

A group of Nordic women researchers, politicians and activists prepared historically the first study on the quantity and quality of political participation of women in Nordic countries, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden and Island, by 1983 (Haavio-Mannila et all. 1985). The study “Unfinished Democracy” describes the ideological differences between various fractions of Women’s movement during the years in setting their goals for women politics.

The 1983 study was pondering the inadequacy of equality policies. The equal treatment of the unequals does not promote equality. The equal access to work does not help it there are no jobs, or to education if there are no schools. Therefore the new women’s movement was not very interested in equality after all. But what about having more women in politics, “not just as an end in itself, but in order to bring about change”? (ibid. 167)