I looked after international correspondence, I organized visits for delegations and I wrote speeches. From time to time the party chairman would call and ask me to explain something. I had to take care to respect the party’s foreign policy line, which was pretty easy: it was the same as President Kekkonen’s and Finland’s. My work did at least provide a salary and a peaceful place to pursue my studies.
When the office closed for the evening I went to the library to study mathematics. I had decided I would also graduate from the University of Technology, though I did not finally do so until 1981.
I still hadn’t the faintest idea what I would do. I had the bright idea that I should stand for parliament for my home region of Ostrobothnia. I wasn’t at all enthusiastic. I’d had a bellyful of politics, and I doubted I’d get enough votes to be elected. I’ve never been a popular favorite, and I would have hated the electioneering and hand-shaking. The foreign ministry might have been an interesting alternative, but the life of a civil servant seemed a little slow for my restless nature. I had to come up with something, though – I was the twenty-six-year-old father of a family, with a great deal of education and a certain amount of experience and knowledge of the world, but no idea what profession I wanted to follow. It’s no wonder that my parents were bemused by my activities. They told me it wasn’t for this that they’d sent their son off to study.
BY MARCH 1977 I HAD MADE MY DECISION. I had talked things through over with Liisa and we decided we would leave Finland.
The intellectual atmosphere in Finland made the decision easier. Kekkonen was still the country’s sovereign leader, who sniffed the way the winds were blowing and tailored his skillful rhetoric accordingly. He had recently, in front of television cameras, forced on the country an “emergency government” in which the Communists had a central role. They did not, however, want to accept that responsibility, so the government quickly disintegrated into a minority coalition. The economy was in chaos. For several years inflation galloped at around 15 percent. As a man with a mortgage I benefited from the melting away of my debt, but high inflation was a sign of an unsustainable economic policy. In April 1977 Finland was forced to devalue its currency again. At that time the future of the communist system seemed reasonably promising. Cultural life, the universities, and the intellectual atmosphere were largely in the grip of the Left. There were demonstrations in support of the Soviet Union, Cuba, and the German Democratic Republic, and against capitalist plots, rapprochement with the West, and NATO. In spring 1977 alone over 750,000 wage-earners took part in strikes – about one worker in three.
In the seventies Finnish critics of the Soviet Union did not progress in their careers. At the same time Finnish firms did profitable business with the Soviet Union. Goods that could not be sold on western markets were good enough for the Soviet Union. Finnish products gained a formidable reputation for quality there. Finnish construction companies grew fat on exports over the eastern border, and the sales of Finnish textile and shoe factories were guaranteed. The company chiefs who depended on Soviet trade teamed up with politicians to form a dominant group that didn’t bother Soviet politicians with difficult questions – otherwise trade might have suffered.
I respected Kekkonen’s achievements and I supported his policy. Nevertheless I felt uneasy about the atmosphere in Finland at the end of the 1970s. I was bothered by the intellectual dishonesty, the rigid resistance to change, and the politicians’ ineffectuality. Like many other Finns I feared for my country’s future. I saw that Finland had to find a way of moving closer to western Europe: there was no alternative for the Finnish economy if it were ever to thrive. I believed that western democracy and capitalism were practically and morally superior to socialist economics and communist politics. But I wanted to know more about economics; I wanted to learn, so that my thinking would be more firmly grounded and more convincing.
And Helsinki was a dull, gray town. Dining out was grim, with no ethnic food apart from Chinese, or perhaps I should say “Chinese.” It was as hard to find a decent bottle of wine in Alko, which had a monopoly on the sale of alcohol, as to find an authentic sauna in Tuscany. The range of clothing in the department stores was very limited, and the fabrics and designs were old-fashioned. The best hotels would have rated perhaps three stars. There wasn’t a shred of optimism. And everything was regulated; it seemed as if the state or the local council made all your decisions for you.
In the autumn of 1976 I began to consider new options. At the start of 1977 I saw in a newspaper that the British Council was offering stipends for study in the United Kingdom. It was practically a rerun of the events that had taken me to Atlantic College exactly ten years earlier. Liisa and I sat at the kitchen table in our little flat and talked things through. Staying in Finland might not be the smart thing to do. We planned how Liisa might continue her own studies in London. I decided, after a few seconds’ careful consideration, that my new place of study should be The London School of Economics. It was a well-known and highly regarded university that trained economists, social scientists, and philosophers – and rock stars (Mick Jagger is also a graduate). I thought it might suit me well, too. I applied for a grant for postgraduate study at the LSE, and to undertake a doctorate. I was invited to interview and I got the grant. By April I had the funding for my new escape.
My decision caused astonishment, and even amusement. At that time many people abandoned their studies halfway through and became journalists, politicians, or activists. I had already graduated and yet I had decided to continue my studies, and many people found this absurd. Also it was unusual then to study abroad. Those who did went mostly to neighboring Sweden or to the United States. And many leftists wanted to reinforce their faith in the achievements of scientific communism by studying in Moscow, the German Democratic Republic, or even Warsaw.
I told my colleagues in the Centre Party office that I’d be leaving. I sat in a nearby café, where I was joined by two of my colleagues. We ordered pea soup for lunch. “Now, as we discussed earlier, this is a temporary job for me,” I began. “At the end of the summer I’ll be going to London to study. I’ve got a grant to complete a doctorate.” My colleagues’ soup remained untouched. One of them might have dropped a spoon. “So you’re really going for a long time? And giving up politics for good?” “Yes, I am. I’m really not sure what I’ll do in the long run, but for the moment I’m focusing on an academic career,” I replied.
By August 1977 we were back in London. The choice of London was partly a matter of chance and partly a matter of careful deliberation. As a former pupil at Atlantic College I loved British culture, the way of thinking and living. I had gotten to know how British schools worked, and I knew I would adapt well to a British university. The other option would have been the United States, because English was the only language I really knew apart from Finnish. But that would have been much more expensive. It also seemed to me that the LSE was better suited to my perfectionist streak. I wanted to go to a university where expectations were high. And, last but not least, London suited our family life down to the ground. I liked the thought that our son Jaakko, now a year old, would soon become a little Londoner.
In London I would again follow global politics and economics from a splendid vantage point. We socialized with diplomats and dons. Our little boy spent his days at the LSE kindergarten, while Liisa studied Health and Social Policy and Administration. A few years later she would become the first Finnish woman to take a degree at the LSE graduate school. I supported Liisa’s studies and believed they would open new doors for her on our return to Finland. Or perhaps we would not return, but would stay and build international academic careers.
London was not at its best in 1977, but it was much livelier and more vibrant and dynamic than Helsinki. The economy was in a mess, and the Labor government found it hard to control the demands of the trade unions. While I spent my time studying the theoretical differences between Keynes and Friedman, Britain was on a crash course in reality. Margaret Thatcher would be elected prime minister in May 1979, against a background of skepticism and hostility. Soon she would become the pre-eminent