BETWEEN NATO AND NON-ALIGNMENT: HOW TO UNDERSTAND THE "U-TURN" IN FINNISH FOREIGN POLICY.

• Author: Glassner, Sebastian

INTRODUCTION

"Parempo myohaan kuin ei milloinkaan"--Finnish proverb (translation: "Better late than never") Military non-alignment has been a foreign policy tradition in Finland for more than eight decades. The country has been militarily non-aligned since the end of the Second World War, a decision that was never abandoned during and after the Cold War. (1) In the face of a profound reality shock--the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022--this long-standing tradition is now being challenged by the Finnish NATO accession on April 4, 2023. However, the road to accession has not been smooth. Hungary and Turkey blocked Finnish and Swedish applications for NATO membership for several months. Despite these setbacks, Finland's then-Prime Minister Sanna Marin reaffirmed her country's will to join the alliance in January 2023, hoping for a quick and smooth ratification. (2) Moreover, in early March 2023, the Finnish Parliament voted overwhelmingly (in favor: 184; against: 7; abstention: 1) in favor of NATO accession in 2023. (3) The "U-turn" in Finnish foreign and security policy thus appears to have been not only sudden, but also robust enough to withstand all obstacles of the accession process. This puzzling development raises the following research questions: How did Finland's NATO membership come about? How did the war in Ukraine act as a catalyst for this policy change? And what predictions can be made about its sustainability?

To answer these questions, neorealists might offer a third-level explanation. While they can provide reasons for the emergence of conflicts, they cannot explain the specific foreign policy of a state. (4) Although some scholars undertake this very endeavor, they fail to build a consistent theoretical argument. (5) Thus, neorealism is unwilling or unable to explain the reasons for and the suddenness of Finnish foreign policy change. By including domestic processes and conditions, neoclassical (6) and postclassical (7) realist approaches to Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA) would argue that the U-turn in Finnish foreign policy was due to a change in security perceptions triggered by the Russian invasion. However, instead of elaborating on this premise, they tend to rely on liberal auxiliary variables. Schweller, for example, includes social/elite cohesion and state vulnerability as additional explanations. (8) The reason why neo- and postclassical, as well as liberal, FPA approaches avoid the study of security perceptions, including threats and dangers, lies in their non-essentialist nature. (9) Poststructuralist approaches, on the other hand, because of their anti-essentialist ontology, anti-foundationalist epistemology, and emphasis on constitutive relations, allow the study of intersubjectively-shared security perceptions, how they are affected by reality shocks, and how this representation shapes foreign policy. (10)

Subsequently, we draw on a wide range of poststructuralist discourse theories. Building on these works, we argue that the national discourse constitutes a legitimate scope of foreign policy. Discourse, however, is contingent; different discursive formations struggle for hegemony. In this process, although temporarily stable, common sense is constantly challenged. Reality shocks open a window of opportunity for the contestation of hegemonic positions and can therefore be viewed as catalysts for change. Accordingly, we conduct an analysis of the Finnish elite discourse on foreign and security policy before and after the Russian invasion to trace discursive changes. To this end, white papers, parliamentary debates, speeches, and press releases by Finnish politicians from 2016 onwards will be analyzed. Beforehand, the structure and main participants of the Finnish elite discourse are introduced. Finally, we look at changes in public opinion and discuss the elite-mass relations in Finland before summarizing the results.

POSTSTRUCTURALIST DISCOURSE THEORY AND FOREIGN POLICY

In view of the explanatory difficulties of neorealism after the end of the East-West conflict, constructivist and poststructuralist approaches developed in FPA in the 1990s, placing ideational factors such as norms, values, and national identities at the center of knowledge production. While positivist research designs conceive of ideas as largely constant explanatory factors (causes of action), the advantage of post-positivist research, including poststructuralist approaches, lies in conceptualizing them as contingent. (11) Poststructuralist scholars emphasize the performative aspect of language in the context of meaning generation, (12) as it is a "medium of both communication and mystification." (13) Accordingly, a "discourse delineates the terms of intelligibility whereby a particular 'reality' can be known and acted upon." (14) Consequently the analysis of Finnish foreign policy discourse provides insight into the constitution of security perceptions and the options for action derived from them. Moreover, discourse theories in FPA assume that foreign policy action must be discursively legitimized within liberal democracies. (15)

In a poststructuralist perspective, discourse is understood as a system of meaning in which ideas about social reality are constructed. (16) Therefore, national security perceptions are also subject to this discursive negotiation. Bockenforde describes this process as follows:'

[Discourses [...] indicate what is perceived and understood as a concrete threat in a community, which means can be used to maintain security or which the community is willing to use, and which threats it accepts as unavoidable. (17) However, discourses are contingent and meaning cannot be fully stabilized. (18) Instead, different discursive formations are constituted in and through discourse. Foucault defines discursive formations as regularities in types of utterances, concepts, or thematic choices. (19) Yet, discourses are not completely open. Discursive practices are limited by formation rules. The latter determine necessary discursive exclusions of certain terms or topics that are incompatible with a formation. Thus, "[discourse analysis looks for the rules governing what can be said and what not." (20) Discursive formations are represented by "privileged storytellers" (21) who act as relevant articulators in public and political discourse because of a particular discursive structure. This structure (constitution, institutions, political culture) determines access to political discourse. (22) Yet, these storytellers are not to be understood as actors, but as subjects produced by discourse. However, being part of a certain discursive formation storytellers are capable of strategic discursive actions. (23) Different formations struggle for interpretive hegemony by offering different argumentation chains and recommendations for action. (24) The goal is to establish a common sense that is supported by large parts of the population. (25) The arguments can be combined in a variety of ways and are thus the starting point for a wide range of recommendations for action. At the same time, however, one and the same recommendation for action can arise from different formations. We refer to the alignment of recommendations from diverse formations as a discursive alliance. (26) Methodologically, the number and importance of representatives to be assigned to a formation, as well as similar argumentation patterns in successive discourses, serve as indications of an existing hegemony. If, however, an argumentation pattern is attacked by numerous discourse participants, this testifies to the opposite.

Survey results can indicate the extent to which political elites cover public discourse. This analytical separation of discourse arenas (elite and public) allows for a nuanced study of different discursive dynamics. We speak of elite-mass congruence when elite discourse mirrors public discourse. In societies where elite discourse differs significantly from public discourse, we attest an elite-mass split. (27) It may even be the case that contestant formations in elite discourse are hegemonic in public discourse. In this case, no clear legitimation of foreign policy is possible, which leads to foreign policy paralysis. An example of this is Italy's Berlusconi II cabinet (2001-2005). A government coalition of outspoken Eurosceptic parties (palazzo) was opposed by a still strongly pro-European public (piazza). (28) This mismatch prevented the government from changing Italy's traditional EU-friendly policies. The government was paralyzed and forced to maintain continuity. (29)

Reality shocks or crises can have a catalytic effect when incorporated into discourse. Inherent in the theoretical approach is an anti-foundational ontology, which, however, does not completely reject the existence of a material reality (30) Following the Essex School, we assume that material reality exists but is only given meaning through discourse. (31) Consequently, it is only through their entry into discourse that reality shocks can exert their influence. (32) The invasion of Ukraine by Russian troops is a clear and serious violation of Article 2 IV of the UN Charter and, due to Finland's geographical proximity as a direct neighbor of the aggressor, a reality shock.

Discourses are--as mentioned above--contingent. Hence, even if a pattern of argumentation can be stabilized, it may change at any time. (33) Discursive change encompasses the emergence of new discursive formations as well as changes in discursive hegemonies and alliances. Behavioral change, in turn, refers to changes in foreign policy decisions and actions. (34) Reality shocks develop their catalytic effect especially when they cannot be integrated into hegemonic common sense, leading to dislocations. (35) Taking discourse and behavior into account, different types of change emerge, which Figure 1 presents.

Figure 1: Foreign Policy Change Discursive change Behavioral...