Finlandization
Finlandization is a political catchphrase that describes the power relations between two neighboring countries . It is used for the influence that a powerful neighboring state exerts on its smaller neighboring state and its politics.
The term arose during the Cold War as a criticism of the policy of the social liberal government of the Federal Republic of Germany towards the Soviet Union (" Ostpolitik ") ( Cabinet Brandt I , II , Cabinet Schmidt I , II and III , autumn 1969 to autumn 1982). The catchphrase refers to a country's efforts to maintain neutrality and to maintain good relations with a powerful neighboring state, as was practiced between Finland and the Soviet Union during the East-West conflict .
Finland, which had been an autonomous Grand Duchy in the Russian Empire since 1809 , declared itself independent after the October Revolution of 1917 (December 6, 1917). After the Soviet-Finnish winter war in 1939 and 1940 and the corresponding territorial losses ( Karelia ) for the Republic of Finland, Finland attacked the Soviet Union in 1941 together with German troops in the so-called Continuation War . The armistice followed in September 1944 ; on February 10, 1947 a peace treaty was signed in which Finland had to cede territories to the Soviet Union. On April 6, 1948, the Finnish-Soviet Treaty was signed .
Until joining the Council of Europe in 1990 (after the fall of the Iron Curtain ), Finland remained strictly neutral and was therefore often criticized for “hasty obedience” to the Soviet Union. In retrospect, the author Sofi Oksanen spoke in 2014 of a state of “reduced independence, gnawed democracy and stifled freedom of expression”.
In Germany, the term was mainly used by Franz Josef Strauss (1915–1988, including candidate for chancellor of the Union parties in 1980 ), who stood for close ties between Germany and the USA. In doing so, he criticized Egon Bahr and Willy Brandt's new Ostpolitik . This term was originally coined by the political scientists Walter Hallstein and Richard Löwenthal , who discussed the risk that US troops could be withdrawn from Germany. In the security and armament debates of the 1970s and 1980s, Finlandization became a political battleground that warned against the goal of making Germany a reunified but “neutralized” country. The term was also used in Finland itself, when a particularly friendly relationship was established with the Soviet Union during the era of Finnish President Kekkonen (Kekkonen was Prime Minister March 17, 1950 to November 17, 1953 and October 20, 1954 to February 17, 1956, and then President until October 26, 1981).
In Japan, where Prime Minister Nakasone, after taking office in 1980, struck emphatically anti-Soviet tones and repeatedly warned against the Finlandization of his country, the famous writer and commentator Katō Shūichi ( who also teaches at the Free University of Berlin for a while ) sat down in 1981 in an article entitled “Re-evaluation of Finlandization “( フ ィ ン ラ ン ド 化 再 考 , Finrando-ka saikō ) for a positive replacement of this term (as a promising form of peace policy). His colleague Eiichi Tanizawa countered that Finland had only retained more freedom than the Eastern European Soviet vassals because it repeatedly offered resolute military resistance to Soviet occupation attempts; Even such a modest national goal as Finlandization can only be achieved through resistance.
Web links
literature
Rinna Kullaa: Non-Alignment and Its Origins in Cold War Europe: Yugoslavia, Finland and the Soviet Challenge . IB Tauris, London 2011, ISBN 978-1-84885-624-0 .
Individual evidence
- ^ Eckhardt Fuhr: What Germany can learn from Finland. welt.de, October 7, 2014, accessed October 8, 2014
- ↑ 谷 沢 永 一: 反 日 的 日本人 の 思想 . PHP 文庫, 1999, ISBN 4-569-57327-4 , pp. 240 ff .