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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   33007 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 19, 2023

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Finland has a new right-wing government. It's been called the most right-wing one in Finland's postwar history, since it is headed by centre-right National Coalition, contains the right-wing populist/nationalist Finns Party and doesn't contain the Centre Party, which has been previously been in government with these two but is, as the name says, more centrist.

Essentially, the new government is combining an anti-union, austerity-oriented economic agenda of the center-right with a list of anti-immigration measures favored by the nationalists. However, while the foreign papers have mostly been concerned with the claims that the most important thing about this govt is far-right inclusion, the economic agenda comes first; the anti-immigration measures, while they probably will lead to immigration cuts, are still not as hard as , for instance, what a roughly similar coalition in Sweden has set last year.

Among other changes, a work-based residence permit would expire if an individual fails to find a new job after more than three months of unemployment. Those with a student-based residence permits would not be allowed to rely on Finnish income support, while the tuition fees of Finnish educational institutions are to be reviewed.

The annual refugee quota is to be cut by more than half to 500 people, down from the present 1,050. Asylum would be granted for a maximum of three years , after which the need for international protection should be reassessed.

In future, obtaining a permanent residence permit will require six years of residence, a language proficiency test, a two-year work history without long-term unemployment or income support, and a requirement of an impeccable record.

Citizenship rules are also to be tightened, with the minimum residence requirement extended to eight years, along with an income requirement and mandatory civics and language tests.

Insofar as economic measures go,

The four parties have agreed on many other changes to the labour market, according to STT. It says that in the future an employee's first sick day would be unpaid, unless otherwise stipulated in their collective agreement.

Iltalehti reported that – assuming the government's plans are approved by Parliament – in future it will be possible to dismiss an employee more easily, simply citing any "reasonable cause". It will also make it easier for employers to offer one-year fixed-term employment contracts without having to cite any special reason for them.

The future government also wants to expand local bargaining – as opposed to centralised national collective agreements – to cover all companies. It will also seek to curtail the right to launch sympathy strikes and politically based labour actions.

There's also two minor parties, the Christian Democrats who basically set no demands for participation and are just happy to be a part of this government and Swedish People's Party, a liberal party that watches over the interests of the Swedish-speaking minority and had considerable troubles fitting in with the Finns Party's nationalism and probably managed to prevent some of their more hardline immigration proposals from taking force.

The main issue with immigration in most of Europe isn’t the laws on the books, it’s the utter inability to deport most people who are in the country illegally or semi-illegally (failed asylum seekers etc). The deportation apparatus doesn’t exist, deportations are subject to years of legal challenges, whole regions of the world are “too dangerous” to deport to or don’t have the appropriate level of relations with European countries (or just don’t want the listless young men back) and so on.

While the law needs changes, and incoming illegal immigration needs tackling, large scale deportation of those illegally in Europe is the biggest hurdle. In the US politicians openly declare they have zero intention of deporting all 15 million illegal immigrants, in Europe they say they want to but then just…don’t.

don’t have the appropriate level of relations with European countries, or just don’t want the listless young men back.

Correct, but you can't really force regimes like Assad or the Taliban to take them back as their countries are disasters anyway. They don't need more young people causing trouble. And while they might accept bribes, history has shown that such regimes often engage in double-dealing and backchannel smuggling to enrich themselves even after such deals are made.

In short, there is no easy solution to this problem even if the considerable liberal domestic opposition was overcome.

They don't need more young people causing trouble.

Neither do the countries these people are invading.

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