Carl Marklund: Close neighbours, divergent partners? Finnish-Swedish cooperation rekindled in the light of crisis

Carl Marklund
Post-Doctoral Researcher
Institute of Contemporary History, Södertörn University
Sweden

Over the past years, bilateral collaboration between Finland and Sweden has deepened and intensified in several important policy areas. The two countries have a long history of close cooperation, which has traditionally been channelled through regional Nordic institutional settings, such as the Nordic Council, and, more recently, through joint fora of Baltic regional cooperation. Today, arenas such as NATO will serve as testing grounds for continued Finnish-Swedish cooperation, thus raising the question as to how Finnish-Swedish bilateral links are likely to develop in near future. This question, in turn, is partly motivated by the double tendency pointing simultaneously towards both convergence as well as divergence in the contemporary policy choices of the two countries. Contemporary as they may be, these convergences and divergences also reflect deep-seated historical factors and sentiments that now return to the forefront of regional awareness. They are likely to impact upon the two countries’ responses to joint political challenges and thus the direction of bilateral collaboration itself.

Recently, Finnish-Swedish cooperation has gained a new sense of urgency, above all following the Covid-19 pandemic and the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine. During the Covid crisis, the two countries – whose economic and social life is deeply integrated through intensive trade, travel and transnational migration and settlement over generations – suddenly found themselves pursuing highly divergent policies regarding pandemic management, affecting all of the above. [1] Finland chose controlling internal and external travels and enacting testing and quarantining early on, while Sweden pursued a policy of “wait-and-see”, including voluntary recommendations, avoiding a nation-wide “lockdown” and initiating an initially selective vaccination campaign. Just as in the other neighbouring Nordic countries, Sweden became associated in Finnish public opinion with a relaxed, possibly even careless, attitude to the pandemic which to some extent signalled a shift in the Finnish perception of Swedish political culture as marked by ambitious societal concern and precautionary planning. Now, Sweden appeared to follow a highly liberal course of action. [2] While Finland and Sweden have long cooperated on matters of public health, subsequent investigation has shown that consultations between the relevant authorities initiated between the two countries as per standard operational procedures relatively soon petered out as a result of highly divergent views not only on the nature of the pandemic but also on the possible countermeasures against it. As such, it is a recent example of Finnish-Swedish divergence, primarily caused by pre-existing differences in terms of administrative traditions, political culture and available resources and legal instruments between the two countries. In an interesting reversal of roles, Sweden has increasingly begun to look to Finland for policy examples, not the least in the field of public health, educational policies and civil defence, and there are currently several fora for intra-authority collaboration being established on these issues. [3]

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has caused a direct and immediate rethinking of both Finland’s and Sweden’s traditionally neutral foreign policy, resulting in simultaneous applications from both countries for NATO membership in spring 2022. While Finland’s accession has been relatively smooth, with the country gaining its membership in April 2023, Sweden’s path has been markedly more turbulent and torturous, despite attempts from both Finland and Sweden to link up the individual accession processes. [4] Key points of contention concern Turkish and Hungarian objections to Swedish criticism of the status of democracy in the two long-time NATO members, Turkish demands for extradition of Kurdish activists in Swedish asylum as well as requests for US guarantees of making American military technology available to Türkiye. During 2022-2023, Anti-Islamic protests as well as activities instigated by organized crime has further aggravated the Swedish-Turkish relationship. While the integration of both Finland and Sweden within the control and command structures of the Western defence alliance has been complicated by this disjuncture in the accession process, bilateral defence cooperation between Finland and Sweden is already well underway, as is intra-Nordic defence cooperation. For example, Finland and Sweden have already concluded a defence agreement and have since conducted numerous joint exercises. This in turn has been facilitated by the overarching intra-Nordic defence cooperation, Nordefco, originally designed towards streamlining acquisitions and training, but now increasingly geared towards operational and tactical coordination. A key example is the agreement concerning closer coordination between the Air Forces of the Nordic countries, which in effect spells the creation of a highly capable joint “Nordic Air Force” of some 250 fighter aircraft, if not in name. [5] Moreover, Finland and Sweden already collaborate closely with NATO, including on operations and through frameworks such as the UK-led Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) as well as in the context of Operation Interflex, the training of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on site in the UK in response to the Russian aggression. [6]

With their relatively similar economic structures, heavily dependent upon their export industries for their wellbeing, and their commitment to overall similar political values and geographical proximity, it is evident that Finland and Sweden can benefit substantially from further collaboration. But it is equally evident that this collaboration tends to intensify during times of crisis, and crises are historically prone to generate tension and divergence. It will therefore be of particular interest to observe how the two neighbours will handle the challenges ahead.