Scandinavia and the World
Scandinavia and the World

Comments #9712336:


100 in European years 23 12, 1:53am

@sahkari10000

Oh, I think others have noticed your comment too - I'm simply the first one to comment on it, that's all. :-)

Well the war with Sweden in 1809 wasn't actually Russia's idea, but France's. Russia had been forced into an alliance with Napoleon France at that time, after having lost a war to them.
Napoleon was crushing all opposition in Europe and Sweden was one of the few nations still opposing it, together with Great Britain.
But Napoleon couldn't really deal with Sweden as the British controlled the sea and the Baltic lay between Napoleon's forces on the continent and Sweden.
So he demanded that his forced ally Russia attack Sweden and force them so surrender and break their alliance with Great Britain.

The Russians did as they where told and kept Finland as a buffer state against Sweden, which traditionally had been the aggressor in the region.
But as you say, the Finns where given special status within the Russian empire to avoid conflicts.

Russia at that time still had serfdom, which meant much of it's peasantry was little more then slaves, who could be bought and sold with the land they lived on.
Finns, as Swedish subjects, where used to much better conditions then that and Tsar Alexander I rightly realized that trying to force the same terrible condition on the Finns would lead to constant rebellions in Finland. That's why Finland got the special status.

Well Tsar Nicholas II's reign was obviously the most repressive, while some earlier tsar's (notably Alexander II) was more liberal. But none of them actively encouraged Finnish independence of course.

Regarding trade - when a nations is forced by political ties to trade with another, and that other nation then collapses and the trade abruptly ends - that will of course always hurt the economy, because the economy has at least in part been built around this trade.
You saw the same thing on Cuba for instance, but even more so, as they where almost excessively trading with the Soviet Union and other Warsaw-pact countries before the Soviet Unions collapse.

But that doesn't necessary mean that the trade the nation had before the collapse was especially profitable - just that it was the trade it had.

Finland could probably have done just as well - if not better - economically, if it had been allowed to decide it's own trade policy completely free of Soviet influence during 1945-90.
And if it hadn't been so reliant on trade with the Soviet Union, it obviously hadn't been as adversely affected when it collapsed.

I'm no expert in this, but I don't actually think that the arrangement forced on Finland by the Soviet Union was the best possible for Finland - but more that it was a good arrangement for the Soviets. That's seems far more likely.

And that Finland was poor in 1809 and then came out as an European average in 1917 - are you really sure about that?
I'm not sure at all.

I know Finland was poor in 1809 and I know you're a rather rich nation now - but I do think most of the development actually happened during the years you where independent?

Sweden is the same, basically. We where poor in 1809 and we're rather rich now - but it's not really until after WWI we start developing quickly. Or at least it's not until then most regular citizens get's to enjoy any real part of our economic growth.
I suspect the same is true of Finland, and I don't contribute that to you're independence as such, but increasing industrialization and political liberalisation.
But in the case of Finland, neither of those things would have happened if you had been forced to remain in the Soviet Union.
So independence was still crucial for your economic development, I'd say.
And I don't think Finland developed better under Russian rule 1809-1917 then it would have if it had remained part of Sweden. But no one can say that for sure of course, as what might have been is just a speculation.

Ok, sad to hear that the Finnish schools spend so little time teaching their pupils about your history. It's a very important subject, I feel.

And I feel like that in part because I'm very interested in it, personally.
I've not studies Finnish history specifically, but I have a number of years of university level studies in history behind me (enough to be allowed to teach history at a high school level), and I've read a lot privately as well.

So that's my background, talking about this. But I'm by no means an expert on Finnish history of course. :-)