Finland 2019: In Jyrki Katainen’s Finland, government provides preconditions for success

National Coalition Party leader envisions Finland ten years from now

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By Jouni Mölsä
     
      National Coalition Party leader, Minister of Finance Jyrki Katainen (Nat. Coalition Party) feels that it is hard to imagine that there would be any group of people in Finland in 2019 which would be worse off than now.
      “At that time we will have largely a full employment situation, stemming from the decline in age-groups”, he says.
      This means that Finland will have far fewer people of working age than there are now. This will bring great change.
     
Katainen believes that ten years from now Finland will be a country focusing more on high productivity, where people work hard. For Jyrki Katainen, the state is a “facilitator”.
      “A facilitator means that all will be offered equal possibilities for healthy life and powerful education, which will lead to the success of the whole society. I am a believer in civilisation”, he explains.
     
By this he means that once people have good starting points, and a welfare society to support them, the next thing to do is to have faith in growth in spiritual capital.
      “For this reason, the value world of the National Coalition Party is very close to people. We believe that people create their own happiness and that of the whole community, through their own actions, whenever it is possible”, Katainen explains.
      He does not want to speculate on whether or not he might be completing a second term as PM in 2019.
     
The National Coalition Party cannot help if policies that reduce income taxes and emphasise the responsibility of the individual will easily be seen as a model for a hard society. Katainen notes that reducing taxation is not a value in itself; it is a means to an end.
      “Spiritual capital comes from the highest level of know-how, and from people’s possibilities to fulfil themselves. One part of this involves incentives, which means that work is always rewarded. If people take risks or develop themselves, it must always be worthwhile.”
     
Jyrki Katainen believes that when people get to fulfil their dreams with a good conscience, good things will happen.
      “This is critical with respect to happiness, but the entire community also benefits from people’s success.”
      According to Katainen, Finland has for decades been moving in the direction of a society in which responsibility for caring for people has been seen as the job of the state or local authority.
      “Now an awakening is taking place. People no longer imagine that child obesity or the problem of loneliness of old people living alone can be solved exclusively by strengthening state services, or with income transfers.”
     
This might sound like another way of saying that in the future, the state and local authorities will not be able to afford to deal with welfare services, and that therefore, individuals will have to take responsibility on their own behalf.
      “I don’t mean that. We need to understand that it will not be possible to create well-being through the actions of the public administration. It requires more of families, neighbours, and next of kin. Responsibility for caring cannot be outsourced.”
      He feels that the possibility to study and get health care without paying helps secure equality, and that alone makes it important that it be kept that way.
     
Katainen does not feel that talk of extreme capitalism and socialism is very appropriate for Finland.
      “If the answer is a third way, then the Finnish social model already is a third way. There is no need to try to be a third way of the third way.”
      Katainen predicts that in 2019 Finland will be known as a developer and user of renewable energy and energy-saving technology. He feels that another area of success could emerge from the very ageing of the population that others fear.
      “Everywhere in the world there will be demand for service information concerning mobile welfare services, and Finland will have to confront these questions before other countries do. We need to know how to develop these products.”
     
The recklessness of the financial market has pushed the world into a recession. Katainen says that the National Coalition Party does not endorse neo-liberalism.
      “We can’t get an argument out of this. There is no sense in having a financial market where products are sold that cannot bear the light of day, whose producer is not actually known to anybody, and whose risks are not controlled by anyone.” Katainen says that the National Coalition Party has campaigned before on behalf of a responsible market economy.
      He points out that “the future is always different”.
      “If we keep that as a motto, then we will dare make changes that might seem a bit strange at first. Once they are done, everyone will wonder how we ever managed before.”
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 16.2.2009


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Vanhanen’s vision: Finland in 2019 - borders mean less and parties show true colours (15.2.2009)

JOUNI MÖLSÄ / Helsingin Sanomat
jouni.molsa@hs.fi