Criminology, crime and criminal justice in Finland

424372EUCXXX10.1177/1477370811424372Lappi-SeppäläEuropean Journal of Criminology
Country survey
European Journal of Criminology
9(2) 206–222
Criminology, crime and
© The Author(s) 2012
Reprints and permission: sagepub.
criminal justice in Finland
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DOI: 10.1177/1477370811424372
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Tapio Lappi-Seppälä
National Research Institute of Legal Policy, Finland
Finland is a small Nordic country with a population of 5.3 million. The Finnish juridical
system is manifestly rooted in the legal culture of Western Europe, with strong influences
from neighbouring Nordic countries. Today, Finland enjoys an internationally high level
of social security and equality, high social trust and political legitimacy, and low levels
of penal repression.1 But this has not always been the case. During the 20th century,
Finland experienced three wars (the 1918 civil war and the two wars against the Soviet
Union between 1939 and 1944). These crises left their marks both on Finnish society and
on criminal justice policy in the country.
Following a brief review of the development of criminological research in Finland,
this article focuses on the normative, legislative and practical aspects of the evolution
of penality in the country from the 1960s onwards, an era generally characterized by a
decisive shift towards decarceration. The subtleties of this evolution are then uncov-
ered by drawing a distinction between the period from the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s,
on the one hand, and the period from the mid-1990s to date, on the other hand. The
former period, it is shown, was consistently one of liberal reforms, whereas the latter
began with a ‘punitive turn’ that was eventually counterbalanced by way of well-
planned legislative measures of a progressive orientation. Attention is subsequently
paid to trends in crime in Finland as compared with its Nordic counterparts, demon-
strating that levels and patterns of crime in the country do not give cause for concern.
The last core section of the article provides an overview of the Finnish system of crimi-
nal justice today, from justice officials and institutions to the system of sanctions and
sentencing practice. The conclusion offers some brief remarks as to what the future of
Finnish penality might hold.
Corresponding author:
Dr Tapio Lappi-Seppälä, Director, National Research Institute of Legal Policy, POB 444, FI-00531 Helsinki,
Finland
Email: tapio.lappi-seppala@om.fi

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Lappi-Seppälä
207
Criminological research in Finland
As an academic discipline, criminology has a relatively weak position in Finland. Most
criminological research to date has been conducted in agencies and institutes outside the
university system.
A key actor in this respect has been the Institute of Criminology in Helsinki, which
was established in 1963 by the Ministry of Justice. In 1974, the institute was renamed
the National Research Institute of Legal Policy (NRILP) so as to signify the expansion
of its research agenda to other areas of socio-legal research. A major focus of the insti-
tute since its founding has been the development of standardized indicators of crime,
especially through self-report and victimization surveys; indeed, the institute’s annual
report ‘Crime and Criminality in Finland’ has long been the standard up-to-date source
of information for criminal justice organizations in the country. In 2001, reflecting the
long-term emphasis placed in Finnish criminology on homicide (Kivivuori and Lehti,
2011), the institute established a national homicide monitoring system in cooperation
with the Police College. Another substantial part of the institute’s work has been
focused on evaluations of law reforms, particularly as concerns sentencing, drug
policies and mediation.
Turning to higher education, criminology is taught and criminological research is
carried out in the context of other disciplines such as law, sociology, psychology, his-
tory and medicine. In Jyväskylä University, for instance, the department of psy-
chology has since the mid-1960s been leading a longitudinal survey linking early
childhood experiences to later criminal behaviour. The departments of sociology and
social policy at Tampere University, meanwhile, have been hosts to research on crim-
inal careers and control cultures in ‘borstals’, and psychiatric and medical criminol-
ogy research has been conducted at the universities of Helsinki, Turku and Kuopio.
All in all, academic criminology in Finland may be characterized as rich in content
but thin in volume.
Although universities have remained uninterested in developing institutional struc-
tures for criminological research and teaching, other actors have moved in the opposite
direction. In 1981, a new United Nations institute – the European Institute for Crime
Prevention and Control, better known as HEUNI – was established in Helsinki, its
primary objective being to serve as the European link in the network of institutes
operating within the framework of the United Nations Crime Prevention and Criminal
Justice Programme. Also, in the mid-1990s, a research institute was established by the
Ministry of the Interior in connection with the Police College. Its focus is studies of the
police and policing, but also economic and organized crime.
Special reference needs to be made to the fact that Finland participates in Nordic-
wide scientific endeavours, including in the field of criminology. Examples range from
the Nordic Criminal Law Committee, which operated during the period 1960–84 with
the aim of harmonizing criminal law in the region, to the Scandinavian Research
Council for Criminology, which was established in 1962 by the Nordic ministries of
justice with the aim of furthering criminological research within member countries and
advising Scandinavian governments on issues related to crime and criminal justice.
Also, against the background of rising crime rates and growing public concern in all

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208
European Journal of Criminology 9(2)
400
Political & social crises
1918-1945
350
'Normalization'
(the age of
reconstruction)
300
1945–1960s
250
Social reforms
and decarceration
200
mid-1960s–mid-1990s
150
Mixed trends
mid-1990s→
100
50
0
20
30
35
45
70
75
1900
1905
1910
19151915
192019
1925
193019
193519
19401940
194519
1950
1955
1960
19651965
197019
197519
19801980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
Fine
Fine defaulters
defaulters
War/political
War/political
Serving a sentence
Figure 1. Prisoner rates in Finland, 1900–2010 (annual averages).
Source: Criminal Sanctions Agency, URL (accessed 27 September 2011): http://www.rikosseuraamus.fi/16019.
htm); Aho and Karsikas (1980).
Nordic countries from the 1960s onwards, so-called Nordic Crime Prevention Councils
were formed in each country, first in Denmark, Sweden and Norway and then, in 1989,
in Finland. The Councils share the goal of promoting crime prevention at a local level,
stressing social and situational prevention over criminal justice approaches, and under-
lining the importance of community participation (see, further, Aromaa and Takala,
2005; Knutsson, 2005; Takala, 2005).
Major phases in Finnish penal policy
As is evident in Figure 1, Finland has a long history of high use of imprisonment. We
may speak of three main phases in Finnish penal policy. The first, covering the period
from the civil war of 1918 until the end of the war with the Soviet Union in 1945, was
characterized by recurring social, political and economic crises – and great variation in
the use of imprisonment. The second phase, known as the ‘age of reconstruction’, started
in the early 1950s. Finland was still recovering from the war, paying war compensation
and building the industrial infrastructures that formed the foundations of the welfare
state that was to come. The criminal justice system lacked adequate resources and penal
repression was higher in Finland than in its Nordic neighbours. This was all about to
change during the third phase, from the 1960s onwards.

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A heated social debate took place in the Nordic countries in the 1960s regarding the
justifications for and outcomes of involuntary treatment in penal and other institutions.
In Finland, criticism of the so-called ‘treatment ideology’ was combined with criticism
of the overly harsh Criminal Code and the excessive use of custodial sentences. The
resulting model became known as ‘humane neo-classicism’, and it stressed both legal
safeguards against coercive care and the more general goal of promoting less-repressive
measures. Thus, proportionality and predictability became the central principles in the
field of sentencing; individualized sentencing and sentencing for reasons of general pre-
vention or perceived dangerousness were retired (see, further, Anttila, 1971; Lahti, 2000;
Lappi-Seppälä, 2001; Törnudd, 1996).
More specifically, the aims and justifications of punishment shifted towards general
prevention, although this concept was now understood in a different manner. It was
assumed that general prevention...