Affective Institutional Work and Ordoliberal Governance: Gender Equality in Parliamentary Debates on the Competitiveness Pact in Finland

Abstract

The 2008 economic crisis and its aftermath have created opportunities for institutional actors to formulate and implement neoliberal reforms and policies. In this article, we analyse a recent ordoliberal policy measure of the Finnish government-namely, the Competitiveness Pact-and related legislative measures. Ordoliberalism, a variant of neoliberalism, entails a strong state which aims to protect the economy from interfering influences. The government's main objective was to increase the competitiveness of the Finnish economy by lowering labour costs. However, the competitiveness measures caused a conflict between the government and labour market parties. As the measures mainly targeted the feminized public sector, they had clear gendered impacts that became central to the struggle between the government and trade unions. We utilize critical discourse analysis as a methodology to study affective institutional work and ordoliberal governance in parliamentary discussions on these measures. Our results show that gender equality was marginalized and considered a threatening issue for the ordoliberal regime. The Pact was also the government's attempt to make institutional changes to the norms and relations of the corporatist system, as the government assumed the leading role by setting demands for the labour market parties to fulfil.

Gender budgeting in the crossroad of gender policy and public financial management: The Finnish case

“…The government's gendered austerity measures involved cuts to childcare, elderly care and social benefits. Austerity policies were later complemented with efforts to increase competitiveness with measures that hit the femaledominated public sector the hardest (Kylä-Laaso & Koskinen Sandberg, 2020). In Finland, the gendered austerity and competitiveness policies enhanced feminist activism around economic issues and forced the idea of the gendered impacts of economic policies into political and public debates.…”

Fear and insecurity in the politics of austerity

“…Both opposition to and support for austerity recognise that the policy can lead to political conflict, which may be detrimental to successfully addressing the situation. Government parties, for example, acknowledge that political confrontations obscure the nature of austerity as a joint effort (for example, Minister of Finance Alexander Stubb, National Coalition, record 13/2015; see also Kylä-Laaso & Koskinen Sandberg, 2020). This is also emphasised in the Government Programme, which states that confrontations and resistance to change are central threats to the government's policy objectives.…”

Gender equality and the feminized public sector in the affective struggles over the Finnish Competitiveness Pact

“…Injustice in the negotiations process was then reflected in the injustice of the competitiveness legislation, the substance of which was harshly critiqued by the employees. A particularly important role was given to the figures of "unfairly targeted" and "low-paid public sector women" (Elomäki et al, 2016;Kylä-Laaso, M., & Koskinen Sandberg, 2020). This figure is an effective and potent way of resisting legislation.…”

“…Currently, as a result of decentralization and the Confederation of Finnish Industries withdrawing from centralized collective bargaining (Jonker‐Hoffrén, 2019), trade union confederations are also experiencing turbulence, and they are afraid of losing their power position in Finnish society. The role of social partners is also changing within routine corporatism, as the state has taken a stronger role in policy formulation (e.g., Kylä‐Laaso & Koskinen Sandberg, 2020; Saari et al., in press), which is weakening the relative power position of the labor market organizations. This creates an incentive to hold on to corporatist traditions at almost any cost, including giving in to gender equality objectives when this serves the purpose of maintaining the corporatist system.…”

“…Although trade unions, opposition parties, and many academics opposed the gendered impacts of the Competitiveness Pact (see e.g., Kylä‐Laaso & Koskinen Sandberg, 2020; Vuorelma, 2017), the issue of gender equality was ultimately overshadowed and sacrificed for the sake of consensus. The feminized public sector paid the highest price for increased competitiveness in the private sector.…”