In Finland, the liberal-conservative National Coalition Party and the far-right Finns Party, whose members together add up to nearly 90 percent of the current government, have united around a shared political project: authoritarian neoliberalism. The right-wing government is taking from the poor to give to the rich while dismantling Finland’s rule-of-law state and civil society.
Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s coalition government took office on June 20, 2023. That same day, it unveiled its plan to slash public spending — primarily on health care and social security — by €4 billion by 2027, while granting a tax cut to individuals earning over €85,800 a year in wages and salary. The plan also included undermining the power of trade unions.
Less than a year later, this April 16, Orpo’s government announced an additional €1.6 billion in spending cuts and a 1.5 percentage point increase in the value-added tax rate, signaling its rejection of progressive tax-reform proposals. The situation worsened in July when President Alexander Stubb, a member of the National Coalition Party, signed a controversial bill granting the government the power to block asylum seekers from entering Finland through Russia. The bill violated constitutional and international laws, as well as migrants’ human rights, and marked the partial fulfillment of the Finns Party’s long-standing goal of closing the country’s borders to migrants.
On August 8, Finance Minister Riikka Purra revealed that the 2025 budget would include an additional €100 million in cuts to public spending. A month later, reports emerged that Orpo’s government, along with the Ministry of Finance, had urged the European Commission to alter the criteria for assessing Finland’s…
Auteur: Otto Kyyrönen
