Legal history of Finland
The legal history of Finland is closely intertwined with the legal history of Sweden , because Finland only achieved full state independence in 1917. As in Sweden, the old Germanic local custom, which was collected in private legal records in the Middle Ages, applied for a long time. The reception of Roman law found its way indirectly through the legal studies of young Finns, especially in Germany, but also in Italy and France. Since 1640, the Turku Academy also had its own Finnish university. The most important Finnish legal scholar of the time was Michael Wexionius .
In 1734 the Sveriges rikes lag - a code of law in nine books that contained all of Sweden's general law - came into force in Finland and remained in force even after the cession of the new Grand Duchy to Russia. In 1863 the Finnish Reichstag was convened again for the first time, which subsequently initiated some reforms of the law of 1734. The most important are a reform of marriage law and criminal law in 1889 and a reform of guardianship law in 1898. The relatively large autonomy of this period ended with the first wave of russification towards the end of the 19th century.
Finland finally gained independence in 1917. As a result, a gradual development from an agricultural state to an industrial state began . The legal climate remained generally conservative. A liberal reform of marriage law in 1929 is to be excluded from this: the formal equality of men and women as well as adjustments in matrimonial property law made Finland a pioneer throughout Europe. After the hesitant beginnings between the world wars, industrialization did not develop fully until 1945, but at an all the more amazing speed and brought with it the welfare state in legislation . Modern Finnish law is also strongly influenced by the influences of European law and the legal standardization of the Nordic countries.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Juha Pöyhönen (Ed.): An Introduction to Finnish Law . Kauppakaari. Finnish Lawyers's Publishing, Helsinki 2002, ISBN 978-951-640-622-3 , pp. 2-5 .