Finnish Journal of Social Research

Just a sport or a moral obligation? Football between pressures of politics, financial power and progress from Mussolini to Qatar

Vesa Vares — Thu, 14 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0200

The mantra of the sportsmen, sportswomen and politicians is that “sport and politics should not mix”. In practice, it is impossible to separate sport from political, national and economic connections, or from anything that has to do with society. Disagreements over how to define what is ”political” demonstrate this.

Today, we consider it appropriate, right, and in congruence with human values that football teams take the knee in support of the Black Lives Matter -campaign, or that the captains of the national teams are entitled to wear rainbow armbands, and we don’t consider this “political”, but a human rights issue. At the same time, authoritarian regimes have made the greatest sporting events – the Olympic Games and World Cup in football – objects of their interest, in the footsteps of Mussolini, Hitler and the leaders of the Soviet Union. The gigantically rich sheikhs and oligarchs have purchased traditional, world-famous football clubs, and the human rights situation of the migrant workers and migrants in Qatar was a highly controversial issue before the latest World Cup. Russia and Belarus were expelled from most international sport events after the Russian attack against Ukraine.

This paper deals with the history of political controversies in sports and is a part of the debate on politics in sport and economic influence on sport. It argues that the authoritarian and economic grip on sport has increased to worrying levels, but there are signs of positive development as well.

Change and continuation

Aki Koivula, Irene Prix; Anna Grahn — Thu, 14 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0200

Editorial note

Citizens’ attitudes on climate policy instruments

Jukka Sivonen — Thu, 14 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0200

Jukka Sivonen’s PhD thesis “Public attitudes on climate policy instruments: a comparative perspective in Europe” was examined at the University of Turku on 6 October 2023.

Structural evil or individual deficiency? The construction of poverty in the Finnish Parliament

Emily Vuorenlinna, Mikael Nygård, Janne Autto — Thu, 14 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0200

This article examines the political standpoints and arguments related to poverty by asking how Finnish politicians understand poverty as a social problem, how they construct the poor as a group, and what policy recommendations they propose to fight poverty. Qualitative content analysis was used to examine minutiae from the interpellation debate on the increasing inequality in Finland in November 2017. Despite an increase in austerity policies and a right-wing government, the poverty discourse remained in alignment with a predominantly structural nature, showcasing the strength of ideological and contextual continuity in terms of poverty policy development.

Diversity in lay perceptions of social class among Finnish youth

Katja Lötjönen, Jari Martikainen — Thu, 14 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0200

This study explores young Finnish people’s lay perceptions of social class with a focus on the class terms used to form hierarchies based on their everyday understanding. Our approach is based on cultural class research, which focuses on diversity and subtle nuances of class. The participants were 519 young people ages 15 to 25. The data were collected using the word association method and analyzed by quantitative and qualitative content analyses. While 254 participants perceived Finland as having social classes, their perceptions differed from each other. Half of them formed class hierarchies with more explicit logic, and the other half used more implicit ways of forming hierarchies with diverse class terms based on themes of economy, employment, power, majority/minority, and education. Our findings show ample diversity in both the vertical and horizontal perceptions of social class among young lay people.