The Resilience of a 'Family Business Party': The Institutionalization, De-Institutionalization and Re-Institutionalization of Finnish Populism

This paper focuses on the 'objective durability' dimension of institutionalization and, more exactly, the persistence and resilience of Finnish populism which has found expression in the Smallholders' Party founded in 1959 - re-designated the Finnish Rural Party in 1966 - and the True Finns, which succeeded the moribund Rural Party in 1995. Both the Finnish Rural Party and True Finns have experienced periods of low 'external institutionalization' when they have elected only a solitary MP (1966-70; 1995-2003) - and been viewed as largely a marginal phenomenon - and yet both have entered governing coalitions on the crest of waves of electoral protest (1983-91, 2015-). Distinctively, this paper conceptualises Finnish populism as a 'family business party' trading in anti-establishment politics, with its primary capital asset the leadership charisma which it has kept 'in the family'. The founder-entrepreneur Veikko Vennamo (1959-79) handed over the MD's role to his son Pekka (1979-91) and it passed on to Veikko's 'adopted son' Timo Soini from1997 onwards. The 'business' has experienced periods of strong growth (1970, 1983, 2011 elections), it has briefly gone 'out of business' (the Rural Party was wound up in 1995) and was re-launched as a new 'brand' a few months later. Above all, the 'firm' has plied its trade both in the stultifying 'Finlandised' Finland of the 1970s as well as the post-Nokia, Europeanised Finland of today. Accordingly, this paper presents a critical appraisal of the trajectory - the institutionalization, de-institutionalization and re-institutionalization - of Finnish populism as a case-study in 'objective durability'. It is necessarily 'broad sweep' covering inter alia the circumstances of its origination, changes of name, organisational discontinuities and competitor-actor strategies. The approach is designed to complement and supplement studies of populist parties in Denmark and Norway.