The Social Democratic Party of Finland (Finnish: Suomen sosialidemokraattinen puolue [ˈsuo̯men ˈsosiɑ(ː)liˌdemokrɑːtːinen ˈpuo̯lue], SDP; Swedish: Finlands socialdemokratiska parti, SD), nicknamed demarit in Finnish, is a social democratic political party in Finland. It is the third-largest party in the Parliament of Finland with a total of 42 seats.
Founded in 1899 as the Workers' Party of Finland (Finnish: Suomen työväenpuolue; Swedish: Finlands arbetarparti) the SDP is Finland's oldest active political party and has a close relationship with the Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions. It is also a member of the Party of European Socialists, Progressive Alliance and Socialist International.
Following the resignation of Antti Rinne in December 2019, Sanna Marin became the country's 46th prime minister. The SDP formed a new coalition government on the basis of its predecessor, the Rinne Cabinet, in effect continuing its cooperation with the Centre Party, Green League, Left Alliance and Swedish People's Party. Of the nineteen ministerial spots that were decided upon in conjunction, seven of them were designated to the SDP in the Marin Cabinet. In September 2023, Antti Lindtman was elected as leader of the party following Marin's resignation after the 2023 Finnish parliamentary election.
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History
The party was founded as the Workers' Party of Finland in 1899, with its first meeting being held from 17–20 July in Turku. At the beginning of the 1900s the party presented demands as well as solutions to the tenant farmer question, the managing of employment, improvement of workers' rights, freedom of speech and an 8-hour work day.
In its 1903 second party conference in Forssa, the party's name was renamed to the present form: Social Democratic Party of Finland, but the Grand Duchy of Finland's then governor-general Nikolay Bobrikov had outlawed the SDP from using "social democratic" in their name before, but this ban was not followed on by the party members when the name was changed. At the same time, the at the time radical Forssa Programme was agreed upon, which served as the official party platform until 1952. The goals of the programme were as follows: an 8-hour workday, a minimum wage, universal compulsory education and prohibition.
The Forssa Programme is based on the Erfurt Programme approved by the Social Democratic Party of Germany in 1891 and the Social Democratic Party of Austria's programme, respectively. Its immediate demands have been fulfilled, but the most significant and currently unfulfilled requirement is the right to vote directly on laws (direct democracy, as opposed to representative democracy [except for two times, and then just on advisory referendums: once about prohibition in 1931 and another on the 1994 Finnish European Union membership referendum.) The demands on total separation of church and state, abolition of religious education in all schools and the prohibition of alcohol have all since then been abandoned.
The SDP was closely associated with the Finnish Trade Union Federation (SAJ), established in 1907, with all of its members also being members of the party. The party remained a chiefly extra-parliamentary movement until universal suffrage was introduced in 1906, after which the SDP's share of the votes reached 47% in the 1916 Finnish parliamentary election, when the party secured a majority in the parliament, the only time in the history of Finland when one party has had such a majority. The party lost its majority in the 1917 Finnish parliamentary election after the Russian Provisional Government had rejected its Valtalaki 1917 proposal and disbanded the Finnish government, starting a rebellion with the broader Finnish labour movement that quickly escalated into the Finnish Civil War in 1918.
Ideology
The SDP is a centre-left social-democratic party.
In its 2020 declaration of principles the party's ideals and priorities are: sustainable development, all-encompassing equality, peace, solidarity, freedom, co-operation, a clean and pristine environment together with democratic socialism. The SDP also embraces humanism's values as well as the Nordic model's accomplishments.
In the 1900s, the party known as the Finnish Workers' Party was founded on the basis of social issues, class and socialism. SDP was the only political party in Finland for a long time. In 1907, the SDP was the strongest socialist party in Europe, as evidenced by the qualified majority in the Senate of Finland in 1917. At the beginning of the 20th century, the party received its main support from groups of the landless population and the rural population. In 1919, at the SDP's meeting, a split was made with the radical communists, as a result of which they broke away and founded the SSTP. As a result of the civil war and the October Revolution, the workers' movement became even more divided.
Up until the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the party opposed Finland joining NATO and instead preferred for it to remain in the Partnership for Peace.
The SDP is in favour of queer rights, the construction of nuclear power plants, the conservation of Swedish as one of Finland's two official languages, the separation of church and state, and to the increase of funding given by the state to public schools and universities. The party is advocating for Finland to become coal-free by 2030. The SDP had advocated for policies preventing foreigners from outside the EU from working in Finland, but has since then softened its positions on immigration and has come to support certain immigration reforms. In its 2023 parliamentary election programme its self-declared goal was the increase of work-based immigration coming to Finland as a way of responding to the country's labour shortage and low birth rate. In 2023, the SDP, along with the NCP, both criticised the Finns Party for their lack of willingness to the easing of work permit requirements for foreigners coming from outside the European Union.
The party opposed certain economic reforms both in the 2011 Finnish parliamentary election and in the subsequent negotiations about the government programme. The SDP maintains a close relationship with trade unions. The party has opposed social reforms that would reduce the role of earnings-related unemployment benefits. The government pays the benefits to recipients through financial middlemen that are almost exclusively trade unions.
Controversies
Some of the SDP's politicians have received criticism about their defense of Russia for years by the media and academics, for example, SDP politicians Eero Heinäluoma, Paavo Lipponen, Erkki Tuomioja, Antton Rönnholm and Tarja Halonen have received critique on their positions towards Russia.
In 2005, according to Halonen, Russia's goals were: "...democracy, human rights and good governance." Nine years later, in 2014 after Russia annexed Crimea, Halonen thought that Russia should not have been punished by sanctions or isolation.
SDP's former party secretary Antton Rönnholm has also taken his part. Through his consulting firm's services offered to Gazprom, he was sent an invoice for almost 200,000 euros for assisting in the South Stream gas pipeline project. More than half of Gazprom is owned by the Russian state, and it is partly used as a geopolitical tool in Europe and the rest of the world.
In February 2022, politician Erkki Tuomioja published a work with the title "Finland and NATO – Why Finland should have the opportunity to apply for NATO membership and why that opportunity should not be used now". In his work Tuomioja estimated that Russia was viewed rather unanalytically.
Also in February 2022, when Russia had already been pressuring Ukraine for a long time, the social-democratic MEP Eero Heinäluoma and Mauri Pekkarinen from the Centre Party both said in a Finnish current affairs television programme that preparing for a Russian threat was part of the problem. According to Heinäluoma, placing defensive armaments in Russia's neighbouring countries was instead a threat to Russia.
Paavo Lipponen has lobbied for and been a consultant for Russia's Nord Stream project since 2008. In that year Russia went to war with Georgia. In a report published by the European Parliament's special committee in 2022, the Social Democratic Party prime minister Lipponen and Centre Party prime minister Esko Aho were stated to be among the European politicians that Russia and China had hijacked to promote their special interests. Some current SDP politicians have therefore appeased Russia in the past.
Voter base
The average age of an SDP member is 61.5 years. Over one half of all SDP voters are active members of the workforce.