Rafael Paasio

Rafael Paasio (1963)

Rafael Paasio, 1918

Kuusta Rafael Paasio (born June 6, 1903 in Uskela , † March 17, 1980 in Turku ) was a Finnish politician and two-time Prime Minister .

Professional career

The trained printer later embarked on a journalistic career. In 1942 he became editor-in-chief of the social democratic daily Turun Päivälehti .

Political career

Member of Parliament and Speaker of Parliament

Paasio began his political career in 1948 when he was first elected a member of the Reichstag . There he represented the interests of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) . As early as 1949 he became chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. In 1966 he was the first spokesman for the Reichstag. He held this office of President of Parliament again from 1970 to 1972.

Party leader and prime minister

From 1963 to 1975 he was chairman of the SDP. As such, he sought better relations with the Soviet Union than his two predecessors Väinö Tanner and Karl-August Fagerholm .

During his time as chairman, the SDP achieved great electoral success in 1966 when it increased the number of seats in parliament from 38 to 55. After this electoral success, Paasio succeeded on May 21, 1966 in forming a coalition government with the Center Party , the Communist People's Democrats (SKDL) and the Social Democratic Federation, which emerged from the SDP. Due to criticism from within the party, Paasio had to resign as prime minister on May 22, 1968 in favor of Mauno Koivisto .

On February 23, 1972 he was again prime minister of a social democratic minority government. On July 19, 1972, however, he resigned because he did not want to bear sole responsibility for the signing of a trade agreement between Finland and the European Economic Community (EEC) . Successor as Prime Minister was the Secretary General of the SDP Kalevi Sorsa , who Paasio followed in 1975 as the SDP's successor.

family

His son Pertti Paasio (* 1939) is also a member of the Reichstag and was also chairman of the SDP from 1987 to 1991 and foreign minister in Harri Holkeri's cabinet from 1989 to 1991 . His granddaughter Heli Paasio (* 1972) was elected a member of the Reichstag in 2003 and also represents the interests of the SDP there.

Biographical sources and background information

• K. Rafael Paasio , Internationales Biographisches Archiv 24/1980 from June 2, 1980, in the Munzinger archive ( beginning of article freely accessible)
• Biography in Person Cyclopedie
• Forgetting the past. Article in TIME magazine from April 1, 1966
• Finland in the era of consenus 1966 to 1981. In: Library of US-Congress, 1988
• The Social Democratic Party. In: Library of US-Congress, 1988
• History of the Finnish Parliament