In English, Työelämä & asiantuntijuus 28.5.2025

Comprehensive Security Finnish style: uniforms, suits and sweaters

Teksti | Linda Hart

Finland is highly regarded and well known abroad for its approach to comprehensive security. The ResLab Research Group at Laurea UAS applies different areas and dimensions of Finnish comprehensive security into its research and development activities. When a team from a Polish foreign policy research institute visited Finland to make a documentary, what kinds of things did they want to discuss?

Photo by Merja Wesander 2022 / Helsinkikuvia.fi CC BY 4.0

The Finnish approach to comprehensive security has been of interest to security analysts and professionals in several European countries in recent years. In the ResLab Research Group in Laurea we form networks and consortia with professionals in institutions of higher education, local and regional authorities, expert associations and non-governmental organisations to formulate research and development projects. In these networks and teams, we apply features of the Finnish comprehensive security model and seek to formulate fresh approaches to, for example, pan-European challenges in fostering societal resilience, citizen participation in preparedness, and disaster management.

In March 2025, I had the pleasure to be interviewed by a team of colleagues from the Polish foreign policy research institute OSW (Centre for Eastern Studies / Ośrodek Studiów Wschodnich) during their visit to Finland. The OSW team were in Finland to shoot a documentary “Ready for War. What We Can Learn from Finland” on the Finnish approach to comprehensive security and national defence, published both on their Polish-language and English-language Youtube channels. The analytical focus of OSW, a public institution in Poland founded in 1990, ranges from energy policy and economic affairs to European security policy. OSW’s geographical focus extends from Central and Eastern Europe all the way to China and from Turkey and Israel up to the Baltic and Nordic states. In what follows, I offer a brief account of Finland’s comprehensive approach to security with an emphasis on citizen agency and societal resilience, based on conversations between me and the OSW team.

Uniforms, suits and sweaters

To put it in lay people’s terms, Finland’s comprehensive approach to national security is first and foremost a model of cooperation between government sectors for preparing to a wide array of risks to societal security. Conceptually, this approach has been preceded by, for example, ”total defence” and “comprehensive defence” (see e.g. Wither 2020, Szymanski 2020). Towards the early 21st century, due to international and  academic influences, the Finnish state approach to security administration incorporated elements of both “hard” and “soft” areas of security in with the aim of keeping the vital functions of society running in all circumstances. The model has evolved in the decades after the Second World War and now stands for a “whole-of-government” approach involving and engaging “whole-of-society” (see Virta & Branders 2023) meaning national and local authorities, public institutions, businesses, civil society, households, individuals, and even spontaneous organisation.

A doctoral dissertation from the Finnish National Defence University in war studies by Vesa Valtonen (2010) on cooperation between security actors offers an apt ethnographic anecdote to illustrate the variety of people that preparedness activities bring together. According to Valtonen’s interviewees whom he met in a regional exercise, there are obvious and less obvious types of actors. First, there are “uniforms”, usually authorities and civil servants of different kinds who take the lead in both exercises and actual crisis situations and bear the burden of institutional responsibility. Second, there are “suits”, perhaps representatives of local and regional government and private businesses. Third, there are “sweaters”, representatives of civil society, non-governmental organisations and perhaps also spontaneous volunteers. This could be extended from often male-dominated professions in security and government to female-dominated areas of employment: white coats for medical doctors, scrubs for nurses and other health care workers, and perhaps “aprons” for many functions in service industry.

Strengths and weaknesses

The main strength of the Finnish model of comprehensive security is that it enhances cooperation between government sectors and strives to engage people from different parts, levels, and spheres of society. It also has an ethos that everyone can do their share. This is reflected, for example, in training offered to Finnish citizens in voluntary national defence training, which offers educational activities to both reservists (adults who have completed Finnish military service) and non-reservists. Obviously, not everyone is equally positioned when it comes to duties and possibilities concerning contributing to society in different areas of comprehensive security. This varies according to age, sex, education, professional qualifications, health, disabilities and so on.

A downside to the comprehensive security model is that to some extent, it is a conceptual product of security administration, and it tends to reside in the heads of a governing elite and security oriented civil society actors with an interest and often also a profession in a security-related field. It also is a somewhat technocratic and sanitised model, that could take different kinds of human vulnerabilities better into account, such as being in the linguistic and social margins of Finnish society. As a concept it is often sometimes not familiar to local actors, for example, in municipality-level administration or education. The model needs to be further concretised and localised towards citizen-focused agency, something that research and development professionals in universities of applied sciences like the Reslab team seek to do.

Public opinion

One might ask does this matter to an average citizen. Are Finns, as a population and a polity, willing to get involved in matters relating to national defence? Are Finns as prepared as they are portrayed to be in foreign media stories, especially in ones produced since Russia’s full-blown attack in Ukraine in 2022? In Finland, political support for defending the country if under attack is high in comparison to other European countries (e.g. Inglehart, Puranen & Welzel 2015). According to data collected for annual opinion polls of the Advisory Board for Defence Information in Finland on foreign and security policy, “willingness to fight”, i.e. willingness to defend the country by arms if necessary has been high in recent years, with men and older generations holding more positive views than women and younger generations (Hart, Häggblom & Pulkka 2023),

The classic question asked in the public opinion surveys is: “If Finland were attacked, should Finns, in your opinion, defend the country militarily in all situations, even if the outcome seemed uncertain?” Positive responses to this question have been common with minor fluctuation over the years. In 2024, the national average of yes-responses to this question was 78%. Men and older generations tend to offer more support with over 80% of them answering favourably. Among women and younger generations, the rate is still high, over 70%. There is another question on personal willingness to defend the country asked in the opinion polls (less often than the first one): “If Finland is attacked, would you personally be ready to take part in national defence tasks according to your competences and skills?”. Usually, this has been viewed even more favourably than the first question, with a national average of 80% of yes-responses in 2024. (Annual Board for Defence Information 2024.)

Looking ahead

The Finnish comprehensive security model is sometimes lauded as a model worthy of becoming an export item, especially in the wake of Safer Together (2024) a report submitted to the European Commission by Finland’s former President Sauli Niinistö. As any other moder of security governance, it can be applied and adapted to different contexts. However, this calls for working diligently to apply it with a humble attitude to the characteristics of the society in question. By studying, applying and adapting models of bringing authorities, private sector and citizens together, universities of applied sciences and other research and development actors can work together to foster agency of citizens in crisis preparedness.

References

URN http://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi-fe2025052855816
henkilökuva.
Linda Hart
linda.hart(at)laurea.fi
.Soc.Sc., RDI Specialist, ResLab Research Team, Laurea UAS

comprehensive security preparedness willingness to fight
Jaa sivu