Finnish People's Democratic League ( fi, Suomen Kansan Demokraattinen Liitto, SKDL; sv, Demokratiska Förbundet för Finlands Folk, DFFF) was a Finnish political organisation with the aim of uniting those left of the Finnish

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...

. It was founded in 1944 as the

anti-communist Anti-communism is political and ideological opposition to communism. Organized anti-communism developed after the 1917 October Revolution in the Russian Empire, and it reached global dimensions during the Cold War, when the United States and the ...

laws in Finland were repealed due to the demands of the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

, and lasted until 1990, when it merged into the newly formed Left Alliance. At its time, SKDL was one of the largest

leftist Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in so ...

parties in capitalist

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

, with its main member party, the

Communist Party of Finland The Communist Party of Finland ( fi, Suomen Kommunistinen Puolue, SKP; sv, Finlands Kommunistiska Parti) was a communist political party in Finland. The SKP was a section of Comintern and illegal in Finland until 1944. The SKP was banned ...

, being one of the largest communist parties west of the

Iron Curtain The Iron Curtain was the political boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. The term symbolizes the efforts by the Soviet Union (USSR) to block itself and its ...

. The SKDL enjoyed its greatest electoral success in the 1958 parliamentary election, when it gained a support of approximately 23 per cent and a representation of 50 MPs of 200 total, making it the largest party in the

Eduskunta The Parliament of Finland ( ; ) is the unicameral and supreme legislature of Finland, founded on 9 May 1906. In accordance with the Constitution of Finland, sovereignty belongs to the people, and that power is vested in the Parliament. Th ...

. SKDL joined several Finnish governments. The first SKDL minister was

Yrjö Leino Yrjö Kaarlo Leino (28 January 1897 – 28 June 1961) was a Finnish communist politician. Imprisoned twice for his communist activities, and spending much of the Second World War as an underground communist activist, he served as a minister in t ...

who took office in November 1944. After the 1945 parliamentary election SKDL was a major player in the Paasikivi III coalition with social democrats and parties of the centre, and in 1946 SKDL's

Mauno Pekkala Mauno Pekkala (27 January 1890 – 30 June 1952) was a Finnish statesman and politician who served as Prime Minister from 1946 to 1948. Pekkala was a member of the Social Democratic Party of Finland and member of several wartime cabinets as Mini ...

became the prime minister. The Pekkala government led the state until summer 1948, after which the SKDL didn't participate in any coalitions until 1966. The late 1960s governments, led by social democrats and including centre, were called

popular front A popular front is "any coalition of working-class and middle-class parties", including liberal and social democratic ones, "united for the defense of democratic forms" against "a presumed Fascist assault". More generally, it is "a coalition ...

by the SKDL. The party left the government in spring 1971 but returned in 1975.

Kalevi Sorsa Taisto Kalevi Sorsa (21 December 1930 – 16 January 2004) was a Finnish politician who served as Prime Minister of Finland three times: 1972–1975, 1977–1979 and 1982–1987. At the time of his death he still held the record for most da ...

's third coalition was the last one SKDL was in, until December 1982.

Organisation

A person could be aligned to the SKDL through its basic organisations or as member of the "community members" which were the

(SKP), the (1944–1990), (1944–1965), (1946–1952), the Socialist Unity Party (SYP) (1946–1955), the (1965–) and the

Democratic Youth League of Finland The Left Youth (''Vasemmistonuoret'' in Finnish, ''Vänsterunga'' in Swedish) is a political youth organization in Finland. It is considered the youth wing of the Left Alliance, but it is not officially affiliated with the party - members of th ...

(1967–1990). During most of its existence the SKDL had over 50 000 "own" members. In addition to the community members, tens of different nationwide organizations were controlled by the SKDL members, see for example the

People's Temperance League People's Temperance League (in Finnish: ''Kansan Raittiusliitto'', KRL), is a temperance organization formerly linked to the Finnish People's Democratic League (SKDL). In the 1970s KRL was taken over by the orthodox pro-USSR-wing of the Communist ...

. The supporters of the SKP constantly had a majority in the SKDL, thus it was regarded by many as a

communist front A communist front is a political organization identified as a front organization under the effective control of a communist party, the Communist International or other communist organizations. They attracted politicized individuals who were not ...

. The SKP members often attended two consecutive meetings to decide on the same issues. However, not even

socialism Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes th ...

was mentioned in the party programme until the late 1960s. The number of communist party members amongst the SKDL MPs constantly increased from 1945 on, even though many prominent left-wing socialists and former social democrats had joined the alliance in the 1940s. One of the few organized non-SKP forces in SKDL was the Socialist Unity Party (SYP) which was founded mainly by former social democrats in 1946. The small and marginalized SYP left the SKDL in 1955 but most of the socialists inside the SKDL chose not to follow the decision made by the party chair

Atos Wirtanen Atos Kasimir Wirtanen (27 January 1906 in Saltvik – 10 March 1979) was a Finnish left-wing intellectual, journalist, member of Finnish parliament (1936–1953) and cultural critic. He was born in Saltvik, Åland. Wirtanen entered parliament ...

and they remained members of the SKDL through its basic organisations. In the early 1970s a Joint Committee of the SKDL Socialists was formed but it never developed an organisation and remained a loose coalition.

Publications

' was SKDL's party organ from 1944 until 1956. SKDL also published many regional daily newspapers. In 1957 ''Vapaa Sana'' was merged with the SKP organ ' to launch '' Kansan Uutiset'', which was the organ of both parties until 1990. ''Kansan Uutiset'' still appears and since 2000 it has been the organ of Left Alliance.

Leaders

Electoral results

Parliamentary elections

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Local elections

Presidential elections

None of the party's own candidates were elected President, although Urho Kekkonen was elected both times when SKDL seconded him.