Abstract
After the dust created by the post-war division of Europe had begun to settle many Western observers were surprised to find that a small North European state, which had fought two bitter and unsuccessful wars against the Soviet Union since 1939, and which possessed a long land frontier with this giant neighbour, had retained not merely its independence but its Western political and economic system. Soviet behaviour towards Finland after 1944 did not appear to conform with widespread views about Soviet motivations and objectives drawn from Soviet conduct elsewhere in Europe. In short, Soviet-Finnish relations were regarded as a special case, as anomalous, with few relevant parallels for other states bordering on the USSR.
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Notes and References
See J. P. Vloyantes, Silk Glove Hegemony: Finnish-Soviet Relations 1944–1974. A Case Study of the Theory of the Soft Sphere of Influence (Kent, Ohio: 1975).
N. Ørvik, Sicherheit auf Finnisch (Stuttgart-Degerloch: 1972).
Interview of Professor M. Woslenski, former Secretary of the disarmament commission of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, in Der Spiegel, 7 October 1980. Woslenski left the USSR in 1977.
S. Harrison, ‘Dateline Afghanistan: Exit through Finland?’, Foreign Policy, 41 (Winter 1980–81) 183 and 186.
D. Vital, The Survival of Small States (Oxford: 1971), ch. 4.
G. Maude, ‘The Further Shores of Finlandization’, Cooperation and Conflict, XVII (1982) 6.
H. Hakovirta, Suomettuminen (Jyväskylä: 1975) pp. 162–3.
W. Laqueur, ‘Europe: The Specter of Finlandization’, Commentary, 64, no. 6 (1977) 40.
For example, T. Junnila, Suomen Itsenäisyydestä on Kysymys (Porvoo: 1971) pp. 109–11.
W. Lacqueur, A Continent Astray, 1970–1978 (New York: 1979) p. 223.
For this period see D. G. Kirby, Finland in the Twentieth Century (London: 1979) ch. 3.
See ibid., p. 117
For an analysis of the institutional factors contributing to the particularly strong position of the Finnish president, see P. Kastari, ‘The Position of the President in the Finnish Political System’, Scandinavian Political Studies, 4 (1969).
See J. Nousiainen, The Finnish Political System (Cambridge, Mass.: 1971) ch. 7.
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© 1985 Roy Allison
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Allison, R. (1985). Introduction. In: Finland’s Relations with the Soviet Union 1944–84. St Antony’s/Macmillan Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17768-4_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17768-4_1
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