The Skolt Saami village meeting system in the middle of changes

Authors

• Sonja Tanhua Giellagas instituutti

DOI: https://doi.org/10.37449/ennenjanyt.89201

Keywords:

skolt saami, village meeting, administration, traditional decision making, siida, history

Abstract

A special feature of the Skolt Saami community is the village meeting system. As the only Saami group in the Europe, the Skolt Saami have succeeded in maintaining their traditional form of decision-making, the village meeting system, as part of living culture and political activity.

Elsewhere in Europe and the Nordic countries, similar systems lost their place at an early stage of state development while kings and the Church took control of the "wilderness" of Europe and its inhabitants.

In the long history of village meeting from the late 19th century to the 1970s, three major revolutions can be seen that have influenced forms of traditional decision-making.

The village meeting has been influenced by both Russian local government and Finnish administration in Petsamo era. Significant changes were also brought the development of the 1960s and ‘70s, when the village meeting became an official, state-sponsored Skolt Saami governing body alongside general Saami Delegation.

It is rarely raised that the village meeting system is not a constant system but has been in ongoing interaction with the surrounding cultures and power systems. Studying these changes and interactions provides an interesting perspective on the forces and systems of power that Skolt Saami community have built their own political and social activities.