The web-savviest political movements in Finland today • Have managed to lift their issues from obscurity to the big parties’ and/or national media’s agenda
The web-savviest political movementsin Finland today
• Have managed to lift their issues from obscurity to the big parties’ and/or national media’s agenda
Who are they?
• The anti-immigrationwing of The Finns orThe True Finns
• The Helsinki Spring
Here they come:
• The Finns’ wing…
• Estimated 4 percentturnout, if campaignedas an independentparty (Channel 4 news poll 23.9.2011)
• Levareges its power as an anti-immigrationmovement within the populist True Finnsparty
• The Helsinki Spring…
• A movementencompassing probablyup to thousands of university students
• Aims to boost the economy with a entrepreneurial ”startuprevolution”
Web-savvy, but different toolsThe Wing…- Closed events- Discussion forums, media website commentarychains and blogs- Anonymity
The Spring…- Open events- Twitter, YouTube, blogs
The Internet runs on love?
Criticism and hatred
• ”En vähäisimmässäkään määrin halua riskeerata tilannetta, jossa joutuisin maksamaan jollekin Afrikan sarven ihmissaastalle vahingonkorvauksia "kivusta ja särystä”.
• (Jussi Halla-Aho, MP TrueFinns on ”the humanscum of the Horn of Africa”.)
”Awesomeness”
A political party?
The Wing…
A ”party within a party”
Conscious of its’ ideology and methods
Already experienced in working w/ the politicalsystem and the media
The Spring…
Does not see itself as a political movement?
Unconscious of its’ distinctideology
Ready to align with anybodyfrom Sdp to Coalition party
Scope of action
Local Glocal
Origins of ideology
European counter-jihadism Libertarianism
Ideology
Nationalism
Anti-immigrant
Anti-EU
Protectionism?
Wealth distribution based on ethnicity
Globalism
Entrepreneurial capitalism
Free marketeer
Entrepreneurial immigration
Wealth distrubution based on merit
Political achievements
7-10 MP’s within True Finnsparliamentary group
Legislative initiatives & modest risingsupport in Sdp and Coalition Party
Conclusions and Q’s
• No political ideas grow without digital cultivation
• ”Old parties” live of adopting ideas from the Webosphere
• ”Old parties”ideological development has driedout along with their incapability to adopt to the new communication environment
• The Internet does not, for now, provide a platform for negotiation and deliberationbetween extremes
• Does the Parliament remain as the only suchfunctioning institution?
• Does the Internet as it now is actually worktowards a shattered society where decisionmaking is increasingly difficult?
• If so, should we make every effort to buildtools and develop practices for decisionmaking on the internet?