In political history compensates part of 8.4

Opetuksen kohderyhmänä pidämme Helsingin yliopistossa opiskelevia vaihto-oppilaita, joille on tarjolla vain harvakseltaan laajoja, englanninkielisiä luentosarjoja. Heidän ohella herätämme todennäköistä kiinnostusta Eurooppa-verkoston, Renvall-instituutin, Aleksanteri-instituutin, valtio-opin sekä historia-aineiden opiskelijoiden keskuudessa.

24.1.-11.4. Mon 14-16, U37 ls 1.

Due to the 30. anniversary of the Helsinki Conference on Security and Co-operation of Europe in 2005 the researchers of the Political History Department provide in-depth analyses on the detente process. The subject will be studied from different aspects by different scholars enlightening the major issues of the East-West relations in the late 1960's early 1970's, but reflecting at the same time Finland's role as the cornerstone of the lectures.

Vuonna 2005 on kulunut 30 vuotta Euroopan turvallisuus- ja yhteistyöneuvottelujen Helsingin päätöskonferenssista. Suomen Akatemian rahoittaman, Helsingin yliopiston Poliittisen historian laitoksella toimivan ja prof. Seppo Hentilän johtaman ’Liennytys ja Suomi’ –projektin tutkijat tarjoavat täten englanninkielisen luentosarjan viimeisistä tutkimustuloksistaan. Liennytystä tähän asti ei ole käsitelty tässä laajuudessa Helsingin yliopiston opetuksessa. Luentosarjan tarkoituksena on valottaa liennytysprosessin laajempaa merkitystä, idän ja lännen välisten suhteiden kehittymistä eri näkökulmien kautta. Yksi tärkeimpänä kulmakivenä on Suomen roolin tarkastelu. Aihe on ajankohtainen ja luentosarjalla tutkijat samalla osallistuvat parhaillaan nousevaan yhteiskunnalliseen keskusteluun liennytyksestä, Finlandisaatiosta sekä idän ja lännen suhteiden monimuotoisuudesta. Aiheen tekee ajankohtaiseksi myös se, että arkistojen yleinen salassapito aika, 30 vuotta, on juuri umpeutumassa. Näin tarjoutuu vihdoin tilaisuus historiantutkimuksen ja siten opetuksen laajentamiselle liennytyksen historiaan.

Oheistuotteena tutkijat aikovat julkaista myöhemmin oppimateriaaliksikin mahdollisesti soveltuvan englanninkielisen kokoomateoksen esitelmien pohjalta, poliittisen historian yliopistolehtori Juhana Aunesluoman, D.Phil., toimittamana. Käytännön toteutuksen koordinoinnista vastaa projektin tutkija Katalin Miklóssy, VTT.

Détente and Finland – Course Programme:

31.1.Kimmo Rentola: The Soviet Union, Finland and Détente

7.2. Jussi Hanhimäki: The United States and the Onset of European Detente.

14.2. Petri Hakkarainen: From Ostpolitik towards a European Peace Order? The Federal Republic of Germany and European Détente in the early 1970s.

21.2. Mikko Majander: The Socialist International as a Forum for Détente.

28.2. Juhana Aunesluoma: East-West Trade and Détente.

7.3. Aappo Kähönen: Construction of Finland's Role During Detente: An Intermediator Between East and West.

14.3. Seppo Hentilä: Finland and the German Question in the Framework of Détente.

21.3. Katalin Miklóssy: Finland as a Role-Model for Satellites. Hungary and Romania during the Détente.

4.4. Minna Starck: The Finnish Exploitation of Détente from the US Perspective in the Early 1970's

Last session: 11.4. 2005 – delivery of the diaries to the co-ordinator (Mon 14-16, U37 ls)

Results: 22.4. 2005 (on the notice board of the Department of Political History)

Session abstracts

31.1. Kimmo Rentola: The Soviet Union, Finland and Détente Rentola argues that we are used to see the European Détente process as progress taken step by step from the initiative in 1969 to the final triumph the Helsinki conference in 1975. However, it was a much more contradictory process, and even in the Soviet Union many had serious doubts about the idea and the détente in general. As for Finland, the security conference initiative was also a vehicle to protect the country against Soviet pressure, which was felt very hard after the occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1968.

7.2. Jussi Hanhimäki: The United States and the Onset of European Détente Hanhimäki’s lecture will address the role of the United States in the onset of European détente. It will provide some general background on U.S. policy towards Europe in the 1960s and review the differences and similarities between superpower and European détente. A central question addressed during the lecture is whether the United States actively ‘pushed’ for détente in Europe or was being ‘pulled in’ to respond to various independent European initiatives (e.g. West German Ostpolitik). The lecture will further assess the major outcomes of European détente and their significance on American foreign policy.

14.2. Petri Hakkarainen: From Ostpolitik towards a European Peace Order? The Federal Republic Of Germany and European Détente in the early 1970s. The aim of this lecture is to provide the audience with a general picture of the West German contribution to European détente in the early 1970s. While introducing the main contours of the Federal Republic’s Eastern policy, Hakkarainen will argue that Ostpolitik was only a part of the story. At the same time as West German officials were negotiating the bilateral treaties with individual Warsaw Pact countries, Bonn was actively promoting East-West cooperation in the multilateral Western structures, both in NATO and in the EC. Hakkarainen will highlight this with the special case of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE). In the preparations of that conference, where Finland played a key role, the FRG was caught between two competing approaches. On the one hand, it was tempted to hold back its participation in the CSCE as an instrument to advance its bilateral negotiations. But then again, the security conference fitted in neatly with West German ideas of a "European peace" as a long-term goal, which would possibly also leave open the way for a solution to the German question.

21.2. Mikko Majander: The Socialist International as a Forum for Détente. In the 1950s and 1960s the Socialist International was clearly a Cold War organization. The Soviet Union regarded its member parties as enemies that backed NATO policies in their native countries. Detente of the 1970s and especially the Ostpolitik of the German Social Democrats provided a window of opportunity for a change. With Willy Barndt as its Chairman the SI was revised into a useful forum for a new East-West dialogue. The Finnish Social Democrats placed high hopes on this process. They had been pioneers in opening party relations with Communist parties, also behind the Iron Curtain, and détente provided a chance to make a virtue out of this necessity. The deteriorating international mood toward the end of the 1970s proved the limits of optimism. The SI initiatives, for example, in disarmament failed, when the superpowers drifted into a ’new’ cold war.

28.2. Juhana Aunesluoma: East-West Economic Relations, Détente and the CSCE process. The lecture provides a general background of the development of East-West trade and economic relations in the cold war, the role of economic considerations in and outcomes of détente in the 1960s and 1970s. Economic and trade issues were also an important issue in the he CSCE process, where they were covered in the called second basket. The lecture seeks to explain their significance in the CSCE with particular emphasis on the extended notion of security arising from growing awareness of global economic interdependence. Finland’s special position as an early example of a national economy with extensive economic ties to the East and West is also dealt with in the lecture.

7.3. Aappo Kähönen: Construction of Finland’s Role as a Mediator Between the East and the West The central theme of the lecture is, how Finland, despite the conflicting views of the East and West on the credibility of the country’s foreign policy, could become a mediator and effective initiator of the CSCE conference, held in 1975. Answers to the problem are searched through comparing the changes of the Finnish international position between years 1958-1961 and 1969-1975 in the changing cold war context. If neutrality is seen as a prerequisite for mediator role, Finland was not a self evident choice, as it was connected by limited defense pact, the FCMA treaty, to the Soviet Union. As the treaty refrained explicitly to the German threat, the changes in the Soviet - West German relations presented Finland both potential threats and possibilities in relation to the USSR. As the new West German East policy enabled detente in Europe, this made the CSCE initiative, generally seen to favor Soviet objectives, more acceptable for the West. Simultaneously the initiative gave Finland a possibility to increase its room to manoeuvre.

21.3. Katalin Miklóssy: Finland as a Role Model for Satellites. Hungary and Romania during the Détente. Détente is generally approached from the angle of the super-powers, mainly as a relaxation process in the East-West dichotomy. By focusing on the minor actors of the international stage, we can reveal deeper, more complex and also more colourful mechanisms of détente. Miklóssy explores especially those hidden strategies the smaller socialist states furthered, in order, to achieve individual aims that run counter with the Soviet expectations. This topic also widens the concept of détente theoretically as an inevitable instrument and important phase in the gradual disintegration of the Eastern bloc. The lecture will shed new light also on the discussion of Finlandization by highlighting the value of the Finnish neutrality policy as a model for the Eastern bloc. The extraordinary Finnish ability to maintain equilibrium, concerning the Soviet line and national interest, provided an ideal example for the smaller bloc countries in how to proceed, from the position of satellites, towards the first steps in transforming their stance to the West, by means of a type of neutrality favoured by the Kremlin.

4.4. Minna Starck: The Finnish Exploitation of Détente from the US Perspective in the early 1970s This lecture will explain how Finnish foreign policy was regarded in the early 1970s by the United States, exploring the complexities of Finland’s attempts to maintain a truly neutral stance, and how this was projected to the West‘s most significant power. This paper addresses a number of questions. First, there is the major issue of how far US policy towards Finland was consistent with itself and to what extent US understanding of ‘neutrality’ differed from that of the Finns. Crucial to Kekkonen’s strategy were the security/SALT conferences, which met in Helsinki. Thus it is necessary to consider their importance for Finnish neutrality policy or moves towards the West and what benefits Finland would gain from these conferences. Further, it is important to ask whether Kekkonen’s policies may be seen as a form of ‘active neutrality’ in an attempt to make Finnish neutrality more visible and therefore better able to ensure the national interest. Finally, it is necessary to analyze what the successes and failures of Finland’s active neutrality policy were in the period 1970-1973, as seen in the West, and how the Finlandisation debate influenced it.