Finnish protests in times of COVID – between political diversity and disorder policy

Abstract

The primary aim of this article is to examine the extent to which the COVID-19 pandemic influenced the scale, thematic structure, and character of street protests in Finland. The analysis covers the period from 16 March 2020, when the Finnish government declared a state of emergency due to COVID-19, to 23 February 2022. The study is based primarily on data from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), supplemented, where necessary, by police reports and local media sources. The collected data were aggregated, statistically analysed, and contextualized in order to identify the main characteristics of protest activity and police responses. During the period under study, 485 street demonstrations were recorded in Finland, 281 of which took place in Helsinki. Thus, the capital accounted for 57.9% of all protests, indicating a considerable concentration of protest activity around the principal national decision-making centre. Contrary to expectations associated with the exceptional circumstances of the pandemic, opposition to COVID-19 containment measures did not dominate the protest agenda. Demonstrations directed exclusively or partly against pandemic-related restrictions accounted for less than 15% of all recorded events. A significant proportion of protests concerned climate change, biopolitical issues, and the protection of human and civil rights, including developments outside Finland. Consequently, protest activity was predominantly associated with public interest groups, while issues characteristic of sectional interest groups appeared relatively rarely. Of the 485 demonstrations, 415 (85.6%) were peaceful, although police intervention occurred in 70 cases. The analysis also demonstrates the coexistence of negotiated management and more coercive forms of policing. The findings suggest that the geographical distribution of demonstrations, particularly their concentration in the national capital, may serve as an additional indicator of how citizens perceive the centralization of public authority and political decision-making.