, the millennial feminist environmentalist who had just become prime minister, the world looked so different than it does today. Back then, reports were slowly beginning to circulate about a strange, deadly virus in China, but it all felt very far away. Finland, like many European countries, receives its fair share of Chinese tourists, and Finnair has had popular direct flights to China.
After a few weeks in which she was criticized for not taking more urgent action to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus, in mid-March she did something her country had never done in peacetime: invoked the Emergency Powers Act, allowing for an infusion of public funds for health care and social welfare. She also ordered the closing of the nation’s schools, museums, libraries, and public gathering places, as well as its border—but as of this writing, not its day-care centers.
Although few in Finland expected Marin to rise so fast, she had been a rising star in the center-left Social Democrat party. Widely admired for her equipoise and directness, she had cowritten the party’s environmental platform and had been a member of Parliament since 2015. In December, when her predecessor—Prime Minister Antti Rinne, a male, boomer-era former labor-union leader—was forced to resign in the wake of a postal-worker strike, her party chose her in a narrow vote to replace him.
I ask Marin about this rightward tendency. “I find that our job is to give people hope for the future,” she says. “One of the reasons why there are so many populist movements in Europe, right-wing movements, is that people are frustrated and lacking hope,” she says. “They have maybe lost their jobs. They are worried about the income of their family. They are worried about the future of their children.
It is on the issue of benefits for parents that Marin becomes the most animated. She shows me pictures on her phone of the famous baby box that all Finnish new mothers receive from the state—stylishly designed, filled with clothes and products; a stuffed animal, a snowsuit with gray and green polka dots. The practice dates to the 1930s and was a way to encourage mothers to get prenatal care. On her Instagram feed, Marin has mastered performative pregnancy and motherhood.
The couple met when they were 18, in Tampere. “She was a little bit more serious than her peers,” he tells me when we meet for coffee at an upscale mall in downtown Helsinki. And she was always interested in politics. “The important thing is to be supportive,” he says—about child care and everything else. “She may talk about some issues and I can act as a sounding board,” he says.
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MarinSanna LIZZY BORDON WAS SO GAY AND UGLY THE STATE OF MA KILLED HER WITH MORE THAN 40 WACS. ~ GENERAL BLAC CHINA
MarinSanna Knowledge and decision making skills derive a true leadership. MarinSanna is the most successful PM at a little age. She is an admirable role model of today's generation entrepreneurs. respect marinsanna
MarinSanna Seriously? how is that going to make the other horrendous problems Finland has? Playing the part of martre, is so yesterday. And your the P.M. for god shake or did you make a promise to the head guy at that exclusive club!? Surely your not THEM! oh wait your E.U. so sorry!
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