FOI officers walking on Finn ice

Nordic countries have traditionally been seen as strongholds of transparency due to their long history of freedom of information laws. As readers of this blog may know, Swedish freedom of the press act (1766) is considered the oldest piece of FOI legislation in the world, with Finnish act on government publicity (1951) coming not far behind.

However, a recent article in the leading Finnish newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, suggests that the state of FOI in Finland would not be as good as it is commonly assumed. A study group from the department of political science at University of Turku made FOI requests by email to 230 random state authorities, asking salary and bonus details of responding organisation’s highest ranked official. All this information should be disclosed without delay and without any further inquiries about requester’s identity or purpose of requests.

Results are interesting, to say the least. According to the spokesman of the group, professor Matti Wiberg, only fifteen (15) authorities responded properly and without delays, with eight more responding after another request was made. All others (207) either ignored the request completely or gave inadequate responses. Several of the authorities also demanded personal details of requester or asked requester to visit office in person, which they would not have been allowed to do.

What is the moral of the story? Arguably, results of the test underline the importance of FOI watchdogs and education on FOI issues. Since Finnish authorities don’t collect comprehensive statistics on FOI requests (as I was told last year by the registry of Ministry of Justice), responsibility effectively falls to independent journalists and study groups to gather data by themselves. This surely doesn’t make it any easier for academics to conduct research.

Logically, the big question that follows is why? It is tempting to argue that the lack of statisitics derives from the deep tradition of FOI in Finnish society. Document publicity is taken as granted and therefore there wouldn’t be any accurate need for statistics. Recent test proves, however, that the impeccable state of FOI in Finland is far from given.

Without available data on authorities’ responses to FOI requests, officials can’t really be held properly accountable, which arguably undermines the initial purpose of having FOI in the first place. Evidently Finnish officials have been given great freedom and therefore great responsibility to act in accordance with FOI legislation.

However, the old question of who is policing the police is still relevant. It is highly questionable, whether the Parliamentary Ombudsman of Finland has sufficient resources to pay special attention to breaches of FOI act, if 90% of authorities fail to conform to it. Another potential watchdog, Data Protection Ombudsman, for one, concentrates only on data protection issues.

Institutional issues aside, one could also ask what is the point of having comprehensive FOI legislation if individual officials subject to it are either unwilling to work according to it, or – as it’s perhaps more likely – not aware of the obligations it sets for them? Without further education of officials on FOI and comprehensive statistics to feed academics with Finland may face a threat of noticing that their good reputation in governmental transparency is based on rather false grounds.

The Stasi Debate

The Finnish Vergangenheitsbewältigung is a bit like the day after an university undergraduate’s party. There’s an incoherent babbling taking place on who went to sauna with whom and what they might have done together.

Lately the main role in this debate has been given to possible connections in the 1980′s between Finnish politicians and the East German security organisation Stasi. The right-wingers are undoubtedly eager to trace the possible Stasi-connections of some mainstream Finnish socialists. While doing so, they pride themselves on being on the “right side of the history” as the capitalist system still seems to breath on its own lungs. (Although a respirator is already being warmed up).

Well, what is the role of the archives in this game? The Finnish media, Finnish security police (Supo) and the judiciary have been playing a sort of cat and mouse game for the last decade or so. There is a certain list of names kept tightly in the archive of Supo. This list was given to Supo in the early 1990′s by the West German intelligence service and it contains the names of Finnish citizens who were suspected by the West Germans of keeping contact with the East Germans .

Finnish legislation states that the material of Supo is to be kept secret for 60 years unless it is evident, that the public use of this information will not endanger the security of the state (the law on freedom of information, 621/1999 24§ 9.). Now, it has been decided that the revelation of a document concerning connections with a nowadays non-existent state does not cause any harm to the general security of the Finns. According to this, the document should be published.

On the other hand is the question of the legal protection of those individuals whose names appear on the list. Quite recently in a seminar concerning archives and the history of Finnish foreign ministry former minister of foreign affairs Dr. Erkki Tuomioja stressed the fact that no names with significant political importance are on the list. He had gotten the information from a senior civil servant who was aware of the content of the list. Tuomioja argued that individuals included on the list would have to face a devastating pressure from the media because of something they may never have been involved with. After all, the list itself doesn’t prove any wrong-doings on anyones behalf.

The score of “to publish or not to publish” is now one to one. Supo has an ace up on its sleeve, though. The already mentioned law on freedom of information states also, that “documents concerning the relationship between the state of Finland or the citizens of Finland and a public agency or citizens of a foreign state are to be kept secret if their publication would cause damage to the foreign relations of the state of Finland or to the capability to work within the international community” (621/1999 24§ 2.). There is a common law within international intelligence services, which states that all information given by intelligence service to another should be kept secret. If Supo were to reveal the content of the list it would break this common law and thus its capability to work internationally would diminish significantly. And THAT would endanger the security of the state (remember 24§ 9.).

The game is still on. A recent copy of Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat states that Supreme Administrative Court (KHO) will make a decision next summer whether the list should be published or not. Already in 2003 KHO decided in favor of Supo, that the revelation of the list might endanger the national security and thus the list should be kept secret. However, in 2008 same KHO made a new statement, according which Supo is obliged to publish the list. A new verdict is needed, as Supo decided to appeal against the verdict of 2008.

The head of Supo, mr. Ilkka Salmi has told the media that Supo will reveal the list if KHO’s upcoming verdict so states. The whole issue has swelled into such unreasonably large scale, so whatever the verdict is, some unneccessary stir will be arisen. There are more important issues in Finnish history which need clarification and are in a danger of being buried under the  fuzz about twenty people who may or may have not have met someone or someone else and may or may have not discussed about something or something else.

What is my opinion on the publication of the list, you may ask. Supo has a strong legislative power to decide on the public use of its documents and they have all the right to use that power. But I also believe in the words of secrecy studies’ grand old woman, Dr. Sissela Bok: “When a government develops secret police powers or control over censorship, the risks are even greater. Secrecy can then become an end in itself, creating subtle changes in those who exercise it, in how they see themselves, and in their willingness to manipulate and coerce in order to uphold the secrecy and thus shield themselves.” (Bok: Secrets – On the Ethics of Concealment and Revelation, p.178)