The Fast Lane to Europe

Markku Reimaa:

PREPARATION FOR EU MEMBERSHIP CREATES NEW WAYS OF WORKING

CONTENTS

The origins and early days of EU information in Finland

Preparation for EU membership posed a new challenge for the whole of Finnish society. The consultative referendum encouraged open discussion of the issues to be decided. New channels of communication had to be created between the authorities and the general public. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs, which had previously been responsible only for providing information on foreign affairs, was now given the additional task of informing the general public about the EU.

The peaceful revolutionary changes in Eastern Europe and the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991 visibly and convincingly ended the post-war period in Europe. German unification in autumn 1990 had already indicated that the crumbling of ideological borders would allow the implementation of peaceful changes in line with the Final Act of the Helsinki Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) and the Paris Charter of November 1990.

The work of constructing the architecture of the New Europe now involved both the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, once again restored to their former independence, and newly independent former Soviet Republics such as Belarus and Ukraine. The Helsinki CSCE follow-up meeting and second summit in the summer of 1992 was thus attended by altogether 52 countries.

Brisk preparations for EU membership

In autumn 1990, the Swedish Government decided in principle to apply for full membership of the European Economic Community as soon as possible. This unexpected change of direction in Swedish policy had an immediate effect on Finland. Although all the EFTA countries were at that time engaged in negotiations over the creation of the European Economic Area within the parameters proposed by the Commission President Jacques Delors, internal preparations began immediately in Finland as well, with a view to possible membership. The treaties on the European Economic Area were ready for signature on May 2, 1992.

The internal preparations and the actions of the Government and Parliament progressed to the stage at which Finland's official application for membership of the European Economic Community was submitted in Brussels on March 18, 1992. The Commission gave its response on November 4 of the same year, and formal negotiations got under way on February 1, 1993. Austria, Norway and Sweden began negotiations at the same time.

The Maastricht Treaty came into force officially on November 1, 1993. The final stage of negotiations between Finland and the EU was then completed in record time, allowing the outcome to be initialled on March 1, 1994. The accession treaty was officially confirmed at the Corfu Summit on June 24, 1994 in the presence of President Martti Ahtisaari. On his authorization, it was signed on Finland's behalf by Prime Minister Esko Aho, Minister for Foreign Affairs Heikki Haavisto, Minister of Foreign Trade Pertti Salolainen and Permanent Secretary of State Veli Sundbäck of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.

A new dialogue between the public and the authorities

In the autumn of 1994, all the Nordic countries followed their long-standing democratic traditions in submitting the outcome of the negotiations to advisory referenda. The referenda were held in Finland on October 16, Sweden on November 13, and Norway on November 28, 1994.

The opening of formal membership negotiations posed a new challenge not only to the negotiators, but also to the general public and the media. The topics being negotiated were complex and obscure, there was an unusually large number of participants _ in addition to the Commission, each of the 12 Member States was represented _ and the pace of negotiation was extremely rapid. For the general public, the basic difficulty lay in translating the detailed, individual negotiation items into understandable language. There was an evident need for what was in some respects a new type of public service.

This need was underlined by the very narrow margins in favour of the Maastricht Treaty in the referenda held in the old Member States of France and Denmark. Ordinary citizens of the European Union were clearly finding it difficult to keep up with the rapid pace of change and to understand the practical implications of what was going on.

In Finland, too, there was quite considerable discussion on possible ways of intensifying the flow of information between the authorities and the general public. This resulted in acceptance of the need to establish an on-going channel for exchange of information between officials and the general public. This would enable the authorities to pass on information about the EU and Finland's activities as effectively and rapidly as possible, while also allowing members of the public to pose questions on

topical matters of relevance to themselves. For the Finns, membership also came to mean a debate on the elements of traditional independence and how vital this was; there was thus good reason to take the matter seriously.

The Finns were forced to adopt a practice which had always been foreign to Finnish society: open debate on an important matter of current affairs. As the first, and to date only, referendum in Finland had been conducted in 1931, there was no history to draw on for support in preparing for the poll.

The Government assumes the main responsibility for information on the EU

Finland's traditional Scandinavian democracy and multiparty system has created a tradition of government by coalitions between a number of parties. At any one time, the parties in the Government can hold widely divergent views on the relative importance of a range of policy issues, leaving the practical implementation of policy dependent on a very sensitive and precise political balance.

This was the case also in relation to EU membership. The Prime Minister represented the Centre Party, for which the reform of Finland's agriculture policy within the framework of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy was the most difficult question of all. In contrast, the other main party in the Government _ the National Coalition Party _ was much more positive in its basic attitude towards membership. It was partly due to these differences that the Government kept the main responsibility for the dissemination of information on the EU in its own hands.

The Government decided in the first place to take steps to ensure that independent non-governmental organizations would feel a need to intensify their own provision of information on the question of membership. A budgetary allocation was accordingly made to this end.

At the same time, the Government requested the Ministry for Foreign Affairs' Department for Press and Culture to launch an EU information service for the general public in Finland. The emphasis was to be on the distribution of factual information presenting the overall picture in such a way as to highlight both positive and critical perspectives. During the preparations for the referendum, the Government placed its faith in arguing the facts rather than simply lecturing the public. Information provision was based on the precise content of Finland's treaty of accession as signed at the Corfu Summit.

The Ministry for Foreign Affairs' new service

Europe Information began to operate on March 1, 1993. For the first time in Finland's peacetime history, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs had been given the task of informing the Finnish public on an aspect of current affairs, its traditional role having been to raise Finland's profile abroad.

EU membership has blurred the old distinction between foreign and internal affairs. Similarly, it became hard to distinguish between domestic and foreign requests for information.

The first office for the new service was opened in the centre of Helsinki in May 1993. Its function was to distribute free material in both Finnish and Swedish to ordinary members of the public in as clear and neutral a form as possible. At the same time, the emergency phone line linked to the service was to call on experts in answering questions asked over the phone, preferably within 24 hours.

The second phase _ when the membership conditions had been finalized and the treaty of accession was ready for signing _ saw the establishment of information offices (19 all together) in all the main regions. Job-creation funds were used to recruit three EU information officers for each office.

Television was also employed to inform the public about the implications of membership prior to the main day of voting in the referendum. For instance, the popular rural soap opera `Metsolat' explained the concrete effects of membership on the lives of ordinary people.

Referendum a milestone for Europe Information

On October 16, 1994, 70.8% of the Finnish electorate voted in the consultative referendum, 56.9% voting `yes' and 43.1% `no'.

Europe Information's public information service was generally felt to have been well-balanced and cost-effective. It had proved able to reach different interest groups and sectors of the public, and was also technically up-to-date.

Perhaps the most concrete result was that government showed it could flexibly reform its services and even create new ones. In cooperation with experts from the European Commission, a model was formulated which took into account both the Commission's own communication traditions and the contemporary environment of Finnish culture and the Finnish approach to public information.

The essential point was to provide members of the public with as broad a base of knowledge as possible for forming their own opinions. This also indirectly permitted some dismantling of the high fences which are often felt to exist between the authorities and the general public, allowing for more normal interaction and exchange of information.

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