The Svecoman ( sv, Svekoman, , ) movement was a

Suecophile A Suecophile is someone with a great interest in the Swedish culture and the Swedish language. The term is most often used when this interest is held by a non-Swede. An individual like this is also sometimes referred to as a ″Sweaboo″. In th ...

or pro-

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

nationalist movement that arose in the Grand Duchy of Finland at the end of the 19th century chiefly as a reaction to the demands for increased use of Finnish vigorously presented by the Fennoman movement. The Fennoman nationalist movement had demanded that

be replaced by Finnish in public administration, courts, and schools. At the time, Finnish and Swedish were spoken by about 85 and 15 percent respectively of the duchy's population.outlines of Finnish history''
/ref> The ideas of the "Svecomans" were an important part of the public debate of the 1870s and 1880s that was evoked by the reinstatement of the

Diet of Finland The Diet of Finland (Finnish ''Suomen maapäivät'', later ''valtiopäivät''; Swedish ''Finlands Lantdagar''), was the legislative assembly of the Grand Duchy of Finland from 1809 to 1906 and the recipient of the powers of the Swedish Riksda ...

, which now convened every third year.

History

Finland had been a part of

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

from the early Middle Ages until the Finnish War of 1808–1809, when it was ceded to Russia and made a Grand Duchy within the Russian Empire. Although Finnish was the language of the majority of the new Grand Duchy, a significant minority was Swedish-speaking. Swedish had been the language of administration and in educational institutions when Finland was part of the Swedish realm. The Svecomans promoted the idea that Finland harbours two peoples, or nations, speaking different languages, with different cultures, and originating from separate parts of the country. In accordance with contemporary science, these two peoples were consequently denoted as members of different " races". This idea was radically new. Until then, the Swedish-speaking rural population had been mostly ignored, but now this minority was considered important and directly associated with the

elite In political and sociological theory, the elite (french: élite, from la, eligere, to select or to sort out) are a small group of powerful people who hold a disproportionate amount of wealth, privilege, political power, or skill in a group. D ...

of Finland. The language strife between Fennomans and Svecomans in these decades also mirrored more general political divisions: * The Fennomans were favoured by the Russian authorities, while the Svecomans channeled the remaining fear of the Russians and the cultural attachment to their old enemy

. * After the Crimean War, when the Swedish-speaking towns on Finland's south coast and the merchant fleet had been severely damaged, neutralist views received strong support among educated Eastern-Swedish. * The Fennomans were chiefly dominated by the clergy, the Svecomans by

industrialist A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...

s and academics from other faculties besides the theological one. The spiritual leader of the Svecomans was the linguist

Axel Olof Freudenthal Axel Olof Freudenthal (12 December 1836 – 2 June 1911), was a Swedish-speaking Finnish philologist and politician. He was born in Siuntio, and studied at the University of Helsinki where the nationalistic movement struggle between the Fenn ...

, who also had claims of racial supremacy. The feeling of unity between the Swedish-speaking rural population and the (remains of the) Swedish-speaking elite is the lasting legacy of the Svecoman movement, and this became the core idea of the Swedish People's Party, which was founded after the introduction of

equal and common suffrage Universal suffrage (also called universal franchise, general suffrage, and common suffrage of the common man) gives the right to vote to all adult citizens, regardless of wealth, income, gender, social status, race, ethnicity, or political stanc ...

in 1906.

References

{{Refimprove, date=March 2007 Swedish-speaking population of Finland Finnish nationalism Swedish nationalism

History

See also

References