Theme 6: Interpreting Finland: generations of the social change

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Theme 6 Interpreting Finland generations of the
social change

• Ways of life studies interpreting the process of
  modernisation

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From country to town, from small farm to factory
(Ahponen Järvelä 1983)

• The basic idea to see the changing way of life
  as a challenge to workers in the context of the
  workers community
• The way of life was defined as the process of
  everyday life as based on its essential social
  conditions (experiences) as connected to the
  individual perspectives (expectations)
• The changing situation social mobility in a
  modernising country
• Urban migration people moved in big numbers from
  rural areas (in North Karelia) into a provincial
  capital (Joensuu)
• From agriculture to industry workers in two
  factory interviewed
• The interviewed workers represented metal
  industry and mechanical woodworking industry

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The strategy of analysis in the study of urban
migrants

• Strategy of analysis was basically descriptive
  and inductive, however structurally framed
• the becoming of a wage-worker as the basic theme
• The empirical research strategy was triangular
• participant observations
• a structured questionnaire (survey) addressed to
  about 150 respondents
• Thematic interviews with about 30 married couples
  or individuals as representatives of different
  age categories (generations)

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Thematic interpretation

• Biographies five generation-groups, the aspect
  of gender (males and females) taken into
  consideration
• Determinants age work-career, family career
• Family life from the traditional (patriarchal)
  family structure to modern family-model - more
  individual life-problems
• The housing career house-owning and
  house-building as a life-task increasing
  privatisation
• More opportunities for making choices however
  the continuation of relative stable every-day
  life
• Increasing consumption more possibilities for
  the material well-being and choices
• From the pursuit of self-sufficiency to
  consumerism (basic needs -gt satisfaction)
• Aims to improve the standard of living
• Adoption of the consuming habits
• Expensive living costs (housing)
• The increasing need for competition on material
  success

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Becoming a wage-worker as a life-process

• Stable employment, sustaining work-contract
• Work gives safe frames for the life unemployment
  is seen as a serious risk
• Fixed time-tables in the work
• Clear separation between the work-time and the
  free (domestic) time
• Near relationship with nature the use of nature
  during weekends and holidays
• High culture is not much enjoyed cultural
  events are is not an important part of life
• Hobbies are preferred in the domestic sphere
• Education as an opportunity for the better life
  expectations for the next generation (children)
• Political activism is practiced only by few
  workers (trade unionists)

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The use of autobiographies for the social
interpretationstudy results from an
autobiographical competition

• Structural development of the Finnish society
  seen as based on narratives collected in an
  autobiographical competition (see Roos 1987
  Life stories of social changes four generations
  in Finland, in Roos Sicinski Ways of Life in
  Finland and Poland 1987, 151-161)
• The competition was organised by the Finnish
  Broadcasting Corporation in 1979
• First prize 1 500 Fmk some additional prizes
• 137 autobiographies were received 70 of them
  were long enough and coherent for the purposes
  of the analysis
• Most participants represented the southern part
  of Finland (both from urban and rural areas)
• Quite many were recent urban migrants from the
  Eastern countryside
• the period of urbanisation and the industrial
  modernisation as experienced

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Roos Four generations in the Finnish society -
criteria for the analysis

• A good autobiography according to Roos
• Straightforward (avoin, suora, vilpitön)
• Well-written, logically constructed
• Reflection of autobiographical consciousness
• Understands ones life as a wholeness
• A bad autobiography according to Roos
• A loose, incoherent collection of stories
• construed by external considerations (as-if
  learnt from outside)
• Periodic experiences individual life-histories
  are seen typological as connected to the dramatic
  events in the social history of Finland
• Generation typology are based on analyses of
  autobiographies as self-written but historically
  interpreted narratives
• In the life-historical interpretation of what is
  relevant for the socio-cultural change of the
  society, the key-experiences of certain
  generations are taken into focus
• The individual key-experiences are considered
  only as related to the most significant
  socio-historical changes

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The dramatic periods experienced as
constitutive for the Finnish nation during the
20th centuryA national autobiography

• The period of earning the independence in 1917
  through the civil war (winter and spring 1918)
• The great depression in the beginning of 1930s
• The period of the WW II and the reconstruction of
  the society with fundamental socio-political
  changes (the large generation)
• Building of the Welfare state industrialisation,
  modernization, urbanisation
• the Great Migration
• The deep recession (depression) in the beginning
  of 1990s
• The turn from the welfare state toward the
  competitive society in the contexts of the
  fortress Europe and globalisation

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The Finnish generations as typified by Roos
Grounded on autobiographies

• The generation of wars and depression born
  between 1900-1920
• Key experiences
• the Civil war, the Great Depression, the Second
  World War (soldiers, upkeep of the home-frontier)
• Poverty, misery in the childhood, meaningful
  losses in the family,
• Inability in attending school, hard work
• Endeavour for the better life
• The generation of reconstruction and growth
  born in 1920-1935
• Key experiences are cut by the WW II
• Want and even misery in the childhood
• Reconstruction builders of the modern Finland in
  their young adulthood
• Hard work as the method for the good life
• Self-earned (and self-built) own houses and
  apartments with modern equipments

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Finnish generations(continued)

• The generation of the great transformation born
  during the 1940s
• Key experiences
• Rapid change of the society in the childhood
  improving economic and social security
• Migration from the countryside to the urban areas
  with or without their parents
• Lengthening of the education, better career
  possibilities
• Housing as a life-task (savings), modern
  consumption patterns
• The importance of the emotional and intimate
  relations
• Increasing interpretation of family problems
  need for therapeutic consultation
• Roos the generation of non-experiences (not
  experiences of big outer catastrophes)

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The Finnish generations(continued)

• The suburban generation born in 1950s - 1960s
• See also Kortteinen Lähiö (The Suburb 1982 or
  Ways of Life in a Finnish suburb, in Roos
  Sicinski 1987, 111-125)
• Key experiences
• Prospects of life different than earlier more
  individual choices
• Motivation an important factor for schooling
• Feelings of new insecurity
• Worry about different risks (in the spheres of
  environment, social welfare or intimate relations
  (breaking partnership)
• The trial for the success conscious construction
  of the life-strategy
• Façade-building, happiness-barrier,
  life-political programming

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The Finnish generations todayThe generational
fractions of young adults in the 2000s A
generation of the new work

• From factories to studio, from industrialism to
  the media society
• Project work in studios by means of computing and
  communication
• Media workers, interactive (proactive) workers
• Flexible working times
• Contents creation, the creative class
• New professional capacities
• Hardening competition, effectiveness demands

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The generation of consumption culture and
service-societyA precarious generation

• Increasing opportunities and possibilities of
  choices
• Exaggerated consumption demands
• Manipulated consumption, Consumption of virtual
  reality
• Precariousness as the signifier of
  life-opportunities
• Individual responsibilities against risk
  behaviour
• Floating fl?neurs without fixed and stable
  commitments
• The global generation
• A multicultural generation aiming to global
  citizenship
• New generation movements
• Globalisation critics
• Environmentalists
• New civil activists/creative citizens