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Finland Civil Service
Article 84 of the Constitution Act stipulates that only
Finnish citizens may be appointed to the civil service,
although
exceptions may be made for some technical and teaching
positions.
Article 85 states that educational requirements for the
civil
service will be set by law or statute, and that only on
special
grounds may the Council of State make an exception to the
set
requirements. Exceptions of this type seldom occur. No
exceptions
may be made for appointment to a judicial post. According
to
Article 86, successful applicants for civil service posts
will be
promoted on the basis of "skill, ability and proved civic
virtue." State employees also often must have an
appropriate
mastery of the country's two official languages.
There is no general recruitment in Finland for civil
service
posts, nor does the country have a preferred school for
training
civil servants. The recruitment is done on an individual
basis
for a vacant or a newly created post.
Civil servants enjoy a fairly secure tenure in their
posts,
but they may be dismissed for poor performance or for
disreputable behavior on or off the job. About 90 percent
of
civil servants were unionized in the late 1980s. Since the
passage of the Act on Civil Service Collective Agreements
in
1970, civil servants have had the right to strike. If a
strike of
a category of civil servants threatens society's welfare,
the
dispute may be reviewed, but not settled in a binding way,
by a
special board. If required, the Eduskunta may settle the
disagreement through legislation.
By the early 1980s, there were about 125,000 civil
servants
employed in the national government, which made it the
country's
largest employer. More than twice this number worked for
local
government and for related institutions. Government
employment
grew rapidly during the 1960s and the 1970s, and was
accompanied
by a marked increase in the politicization of the civil
service,
especially at higher levels. Even at lower levels, posts
were
often filled on the basis of party affiliation. Sometimes
appointments were arranged by "package deals," through
which the
parties secured for their members a suitable portion of
available
posts. Care was taken, however, that appointees met the
stated
requirements for state posts, and political parties even
arranged
for training so that their candidates would be qualified
applicants for given posts.
Politicization of public jobs resulted partly from the
desire
that the civil service, traditionally conservative,
reflect the
new political dominance of the center-left governments
formed
after 1966. President Kekkonen also used the spoils system
to
cement the broad coalition governments he introduced in
the
second half of the 1960s
(see Finland in the Era of Consensus, 1966-81
, ch. 1). A study from the early 1980s found that
by 1980
the number of senior civil service posts occupied by
nominees of
the Center Party (Keskustapuolue--Kesk) and the Finnish
Social
Democratic Party (Suomen Sosialidemokraattinen
Puolue--SDP) had
doubled for the former and tripled for the latter in just
fifteen
years, mostly at the expense of officials linked to the
National
Coalition Party (Kansallinen Kokoomuspuolue--KOK).
Widespread criticism of the politicization of the civil
service and complaints that the practice was harmful to
efficiency and to democratic values led to recommendations
for
stricter control of hiring and even for the prohibition of
all
political appointments. By the late 1980s, no such ban had
been
instituted, but in general a decline in partisan
nomination for
civil service posts seemed to have occurred since the
election of
President Koivisto in 1982. Appointments in provincial
governments, however, continued to be booty for
politicians.
Despite these partisan practices, the civil service had a
reputation for competence, and it enjoyed the support of
most
Finns.
Data as of December 1988
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