Jean Sibelius and His World

by Grimley, Daniel M.

  Russian involvement in Finland was not simply based on benign absence or strategic self-interest. In a number of distinct ways, Russia actively supported the development of Finnish national consciousness and tolerated a degree of administrative autonomy. Many of the archetypal symbols of Finnish national consciousness were in fact dependent on Russian patronage and, at this early stage at least, were not indicative of any resistance or rebellion within the Grand Duchy itself. The establishment of institutions such as the University of Helsinki (moved to the capital after a fire at the Åbo/Turku Academy in 1827) and the Finnish Literature Society (Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, founded 1831) was sponsored by the Russian authorities as a way of promoting a form of Finnish nationalism that would be both loyal and grateful to imperial rule.28 The publication of Lönnrot’s edition of the Kalevala by the Finnish Literature Society in 1835 was emblematic not just of the development of Finnish nationalism but, rather more subtly, of the shared intellectual interests of many Russian and Finnish scholars at the time. Branch points to the fact that “for much of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the largest and probably the most outstanding centre for academic research and learning in the North-East Baltic region was the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg.”29 In particular, the study of Finno-Ugric philology was a field that enjoyed considerable practical support in Russia:30 “For almost 150 years, the Academy of Sciences together with bodies working under its aegis, provided a scientific apparatus for the planning and execution of fieldwork. Over the same period, the Academy assembled a library and an archive of Finno-Ugrian materials that was unsurpassed in Europe.”31 Typical of this project was the work of figures such as Matthias Castrén and Anders Johan Sjögren. Before becoming the first professor of Finnish language and literature at the University of Helsinki in 1850, Castrén, supported by the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg, carried out extensive ethnographic and philological fieldwork in northern Russia and Siberia. Likewise, the work of the linguist Sjögren, who traveled through Russia between the 1820s and the 1850s and did much to make St. Petersburg the leading center of Finno-Ugric studies, suggests that in the early phase of Finland’s incorporation into the empire, Russo-Finnish relations were characterized by a degree of mutual interest.

  The reign of Nicholas I from 1825 to 1855 continued the course set by Alexander I, and the Finns demonstrated little of the independent spirit of Congress Poland that led to the uprising of 1830–31; indeed, the Finnish Guard actively participated in the Russian suppression of the Polish uprising, and as Jussi Jalonen suggests, Finnish autonomy was, at least in part, a reward for its early loyalty to its new ruler.32 Tuomo Polvinen argues that of all Russian provinces, Finland was the one that caused St. Petersburg the least anxiety:

  Through the bestowal and preservation of autonomy the regime successful secured the loyalty of the Finns. It was not in vain that Nicholas I had earlier advised: “Leave the Finns in peace. Theirs is the only province in my great realm which during my whole reign has not caused me even a minute of concern or dissatisfaction.” As Osmo Jussila aptly points out, the Finns had acquired a “good conservative reputation” at the Imperial court in St. Petersburg; for a long time it was not considered necessary to question Finnish trustworthiness. On the contrary, during the reform era of the 1860s and 1870s the autonomous administration of the dependable Grand Duchy was decisively strengthened.33

  If Nicholas I pursued Alexander’s policy of benign coexistence, then the accession of Alexander II inaugurated a period of more explicit support for Finnish autonomous administration and offered what David Kirby has called “an end to the period of ‘frozen constitutionalism.’”34 In part, Alexander II’s approach to Finland was characteristic of the liberal tenor of the start of his reign, which saw a number of major reforms in Russia itself, including the abolition of serfdom in 1861. In 1863, he convened the Finnish Diet for the first time since 1809, and it was to meet regularly thereafter. His speech to the Diet struck what had become the traditional balance between respect for Finnish constitutionalism and Russian autocracy:

  Many of the provisions of the fundamental laws of the Grand Duchy are no longer applicable to the state of affairs existing since its union with the Empire; others lack clarity and precision. Desirous of remedying these imperfections it is My intension to have a draft law carefully prepared which will contain explanations and supplements to these provisions, and which will be submitted to the scrutiny of the Estates at the next Diet, which I contemplate convening in three years’ time. Whilst maintaining the principle of constitutional monarchy inherent to the customs of the Finnish people, and of which principle all their laws and institutions bear the impress, I wish to include in this projected measure a more extended right than that which the Estates now possess in regard to the regulation of taxation and the right of initiating motions, which they formerly possessed; reserving for Myself however the initiative in all matters concerning the alterations of the fundamental laws.35

  The tension here would play a major part in the conflicts that erupted around the turn of the century. On the one hand, Finns seized on Alexander’s reference to the distinctly unautocratic “principle of constitutional monarchy inherent to the customs of the Finnish people,” as well as on his intimation that any changes to Finnish legality would be subject to scrutiny by the Diet. On the other, the emperor arrogated to himself the explicitly autocratic right to alter the country’s fundamental laws. For the time being, however, Russian interference was minimal, not least because after its defeat in the Crimean War Russia had little energy or authority to squander on the fruitless subjugation of an otherwise loyal province.

  Finland in fact thrived as a nation within the Russian Empire far more than it would have done as a provincial backwater of Sweden, developing many of the symbols and institutions associated with nationhood that it had lacked under Swedish rule. A national bank had been established as early as 1812, and a separate currency—the mark—was issued from 1860. The language edict of August 1863 established Finnish as an equal language alongside Swedish. Not only were the Finnish people represented by a Diet and administered by a senate, but, from 1878, they were defended by an army commanded by its own officers.36 Indeed, from the Russian point of view, there was considerable disparity between social and economic life on either side of the border. Partly this was a natural consequence of the different sizes of the two countries. Talented and ambitious Finns could readily take advantage of the career possibilities available to them through their much larger and comparatively underdeveloped neighbor, whether by serving in the Imperial army and the civil service (and not just in the State Secretariat for Finnish Affairs in St. Petersburg) or trading extensively and profitably with Russian partners. Conversely, institutional, social, and linguistic factors meant that Russians were often unable to achieve anything similar in Finland, which was governed primarily by local elites. Moreover, much of Finland’s economic development was the direct result of not having to provide for many of the costs borne by the Russian Empire (Finns were not conscripted into the Russian army but could volunteer to serve). Thus when Nikolay Bobrikov arrived in Finland as Governor-General in 1898, his findings were typical of a strain in Russian nationalist thinking that was affronted by Finnish autonomy:

  He recognised that the country had achieved considerable prosperity, but claimed that it was based on the privileges so generously provided by the Russian monarchy throughout the decades. He cited above all the incomparably light share of the military burden borne by the Finns. This had freed labour for other tasks and saved funds, which were channelled, for example, into education, railways construction, and other projects. The Finnish treasury took no part at all in financing the Foreign Ministry of the Ministry for the Navy; nor did it provide a penny towards maintaining fortifications.37

  This, then, was the context of Russo-Finnish political relations as it stood around the turn of the century. Finland’s place in the loosely administered, multiethnic R
ussian Empire had provided the ideal conditions for its growth as a nation, and Finnish nationalists had made astute use of the opportunities available to them. Although tensions between Russia and Finland around the turn of the century ran high, it is important to recall that for a large part of the nineteenth century, the relationship had been cordial and productive.

  By the 1890s, however, Russia had changed dramatically as well. Although still an empire in name, it had come to think of itself less as a diverse set of territories bound together by shared loyalty to the tsar, and more of a nation-state in the modern sense. It had begun to develop a far more efficient central administration, and formerly autonomous provinces came increasingly under the control of the government in St. Petersburg. In the case of the western borderlands, the discourse of Pan-Slavism meant that nations such as Poland or Ukraine were subject to Russification on ethnic grounds. In the Caucasus and Central Asia, Orientalist theories justified expansion because Russia saw itself as a European power bringing civilization to barbarian lands in the east. Finland, however, constituted a unique case: Russification could barely be defended on ethnic grounds, since Finland was not a Slavic nation; and its flourishing economy and progressive social makeup meant that it was not in need of Russian intervention to promote its further development and enlightenment. Yet geopolitical factors did play a significant role in shaping Russia’s attitude to the Grand Duchy. Where Finland had once provided a barrier against Sweden, it had now come to resemble the weak link in Russia’s defense against a newly united and increasingly confident Germany, to whom many Finns looked with considerable sympathy.

  If Russian policy in Finland was in part a pragmatic response to such factors, it was also driven by ideology. By the 1890s, the tendency of many Finns to assert that their country was a constitutional monarchy in union with Russia offended Russian nationalist faith in the primacy of autocracy (not least because Finns referred to Alexander I as the instigator of their particular constitutional arrangement). Accordingly, the years referred to as the first and second periods of oppression (1899–1905 and 1908–17 respectively) can be seen, at least in part, as an attempt to resolve the ambiguities inherent in the statements made about the nature of Russian rule in Finland by Alexander I and reiterated by Alexander II. Patriotic Finnish senators argued that no changes could be made to national institutions without the express agreement of the Diet; yet the Russians preferred to treat both the Diet and the Senate as consultative bodies, whose purpose was to ratify and enact imperial legislation in what was no more than a province within the empire. Although the Finnish postal system had been placed under Russian control as early as 1890, the main attempts at curbing Finnish constitutionalism date from the period of Bobrikov’s tenure as Governor-General (1898– 1904). In February 1899, Nicholas II issued his so-called February Manifesto, which aimed to limit Finland’s legislative power to specifically local issues, reserving imperial matters to the tsar and his government in St. Petersburg (although the nature of the difference between local and imperial issues was not clarified). In 1900, the Language Manifesto defined Russian as the official language of administration within the Grand Duchy. The Conscription Act of 1901 sought to bring military service in Finland into line with policy throughout the empire and force Finns to serve in the Russian army. Censorship was increased, and from 1903, Bobrikov was granted quasi-dictatorial powers to pursue the policies of Russification.

  Russian attempts to limit Finnish constitutional freedom and stifle the expression of national consciousness were always going to provoke a sharp response on the part of Finns, whatever their political views, class background, or sense of national identity. Petitions were made directly to Nicholas II reminding him that, as tsar, he had sworn to uphold the oaths made by his predecessors. The most dramatic of these petitions was the Great Address of March 1900, containing more than half a million signatures collected without the knowledge of the Russian authorities. Nicholas’s refusal to accept the delegation bearing the address only added to the impression that he had betrayed his constitutional vow. After Bobrikov’s assassination by Eugen Schauman in 1904, Russification became the official policy in the Grand Duchy.38 Yet it is important not to view Russian rule in Finland as a monolithic affair. While conservative newspapers wrote approvingly of Bobrikov’s policies, politicians and members of the court expressed considerable reservations. Sergei Witte, Russian finance minister between 1892 and 1903, feared that Bobrikov’s policies would provoke the resentment of otherwise loyal subjects. There was even support for Finland from within the imperial family. The widow of Alexander III, the Dowager Empress Maria Fyodorovna, wrote to her son, Nicholas II, to denounce Russian policy in Finland:

  It is a perfect mystery to me how you, my dear good Nicky, whose sense of justice has always been so strong, can allow a liar like Bobrikov to lead and deceive you! . . . Everything there, where matters always ran smoothly and the people were always happy and content, is now shattered and changed and the seeds of discord and hate have been sowed—and all this in the name of so-called patriotism! What an excellent example of the meaning of that word!

  Everything that has been, and is being, done in Finland is based on lies and betrayal, and is leading straight to revolution. . . .

  The few Senators whom Bobrikov has allowed you to meet were his henchmen, who lied to you in saying that everything was fine and that only a small minority in Finland were protesting. Those who tell you that the crushing of that country is your history’s noblest page are blackguards. Here and throughout Europe, indeed everywhere, enraged voices can be heard.

  What causes me to suffer above all is that I love Finland just as I love all of Russia, and what causes me despair is that you, who are so dear to me, have been induced to do all these iniquities, which you would never have done on your own initiative.39

  The Dowager Empress’s views were certainly shaped by the fact that she was born Dagmar, Princess of Denmark, yet they are also testament to the diversity of views within elite circles in St. Petersburg. As Polvinen notes, “Bobrikov did not represent all of Russia.”40 And to see the history of Russo-Finnish affairs solely, or even predominantly, through the prism of his tenure as Governor-General is to neglect other significant aspects of the relationship between the two countries.

  The complexity of Russian nationalism is mirrored as well by the intricacies of Finnish national identity around the turn of the century. Theories of nineteenth-century small-state nationalism tend to subsume Finland into a broad account of how homogenous ethnic and linguistic groups struggled to achieve self-determination within overarching multiethnic territories dominated by a particular ruling class (such as the Ottoman, Austro-Hungarian, Russian, and even British empires).41 Yet Finland does not entirely fit this model, as Risto Alapuro argues: “It is not quite correct to picture Finland as a colonial territory on an Eastern European periphery struggling through nationalism to free itself from the dilemma of uneven development.”42 Alapuro then goes on to list the ways in which Finland constituted an exception to a widely accepted view of nationalism: Finland enjoyed its own autonomous administration within the empire; it was more economically advanced than the ruling power; and it was not governed by a foreign elite.43 But the single factor that complicated nationalist responses to Russian rule in Finland was the complex composition of Finnish society. According to the received narrative of Finnish self-determination, a group of Finnish nationalists, freed from Swedish rule and unwilling to undergo Russification, developed a national language and culture that articulated its aspiration to statehood. Yet Finnish society in the nineteenth century was not always as homogenous or harmonious as this vision suggests. Divided into four estates (the nobility, the clergy, the burghers, and the peasants) and two major language groups (Finnish and Swedish), Finnish society was often subject to internal divisions—divisions that were further complicated by people who often had multiple allegiances to more than one social or linguistic faction. Thus, as Thaden notes, “whe
n the long-dreaded full-scale attack of the Russifiers struck Finland the nation was in no condition to adopt a policy of united resistance. Although their dismay over the turn of the events was almost universal, the Finns’ internal conflicts were so bitter that no agreement on a national policy could be achieved.”44

  Finnish responses to Russian policy in the Grand Duchy were, then, contingent on significant differences within Finnish society itself. The Finnish nationalist (or so-called Fennoman) movement was, initially at least, the greatest beneficiary of Russian rule; its cause was supported by the Russians in an attempt to weaken Swedish influence, and both politically and culturally its members were often sympathetic to Russian values, at least before the years of oppression. By contrast, members of the Swedish party (or Svecoman movement) “were on the whole more determined opponents of Russification than were Finnish speakers,”45 and some even argued that “the ‘ultra-Fennomans’ were consciously or unconsciously serving the purposes of Russia.”46 Moreover, the Fennoman movement was internally divided along generational lines: “The established leaders of the Fennoman party were intellectually conservative, Lutheran-clerical, and anti-Semitic; they had little sympathy for liberal ideas.”47 Yet by 1880 or so, “some members of the party (particularly the younger ones), influenced in part by ideas from the West, considered it time to pay attention to problems of the modern world of wider relevance than Finnish-Swedish linguistic antagonism.”48 The causes that were of greatest interest to the Nuorsuomalainen Puolue (Young Finnish Party) were not those of language, culture, and nationality that had proved too divisive within Finnish society in the middle of the nineteenth century, but those of “liberalism, democracy, and constitutionalism.”49 Believing that these values were most ardently and effectively espoused by the Svecomans, the Young Finns put aside issues of language in order to defend the principles of Finland’s constitutional freedoms, whereas the “Old Finns” (led by Yrjö Sakari Yrjö-Koskinen, who had Fennicized his Swedish name of Georg Zakarias Forsman) preferred a policy of compliance with what they saw as more moderate elements in the Russian administration.50 Thus the question of whether Finland should pursue a policy of resistance to or accommodation with Russia revealed sharp fault lines within Finnish society itself.