Euroeliitissä vai politiikan sivuraiteilla? : europarlamentaarikoiden asema suomalaisessa valtarakenteessa

Authors

• Ilkka Ruostetsaari

Abstract

As Finland is divided into 15 electoral districts in the general elections but only into one in the European parliamentary elections, it was anticipated that political amateurs, especially those with prior media publicity, would gain ground in politics. The purpose of this study is to find out whether the position of the Finnish political class has weakened as a result of European integration. Firstly, we analyse the social background of Finnish MEPs including age, gender, occupation and education, as well as their training in elected positions and party organisations prior to their recruitment to the European Parliament. We compare the data on MEPs to the data on Finnish MPs, based on a previous, wider European comparative study dealing with the parliamentary elites. Secondly, we analyse the political career patterns of Finnish MEPs. Especially, we are interested in the circulation of political careers between national and European levels. The study is based mainly on the material gained by personal interviews of MEPs and by a postal survey covering all Finnish MEP elected in 1994–1999. It is also possible to compare the recruitment of Finnish MEPs to their colleagues in the older EU member states on the basis of some previous studies. Even if the share of political professionals among Finnish MEPs is high, it appears that political amateurs have, indeed, come back to Finnish politics alongside with political professionals. The share of former MPs and other members of the political elite among MEPs has decreased since 1994. It is evident that Finland is moving towards British and German patterns where national and European career paths clearly diverge. All in all, a new upper layer of the political elite, i.e. euro-elite, has not emerged in Finland as a result of European integration.