The 2000s were in many ways interesting times in Finnish far-right politics. The economic recession of the 1990s (partially the result of the collapsed Soviet Union and with it, much of Finnish foreign export) had brought bankruptcy and social unrest to lots of people. This manifested itself in more or less racist skinhead subcultures, who vandalized and assaulted immigrants in particular, but seldom were organized on a national level. Come the 2000s, this trend had largely died down, except for a few cites were the international Blood & Honour network kept organizing concerts until today. The boneheads of the 90s were also met by organized resistance, and Antifa Finland would be active in several cities during these years.
In Finland, fascist organizations had a hard time getting established and usually were focused on starting political parties that remained minuscule or dissolved after a while. The longest functioning fascist organization, Suomen Sisu have been continuously active since 1998, but during the first decade it existed more as an informal club for the like-minded. It would eventually grow and now has several members serving as MP:s, which tells you something about how mainstream fascist ideas has managed to become in Finland.
The NRM spreads to Finland
A major change would come in 2008, when the Nordic Resistance Movement entered the scene. The revolutionary national socialist group was founded in Sweden in 1997 by bank robber and militant nazi Klas Lund, and emerged as a violent, disciplined organization that focused on building a network of local groups. During the late 2000s, it had established itself in Norway and Denmark. By 2008, a group of young Finnish neo-Nazis approached the Finnish leadership and received their blessing to form a NRM branch in Finland. One of them, Henrik Holappa, had been exchanging letters with the imprisoned US nazi terrorists The Order, and through them gotten the contact to Magnus Söderman, who at the time was a leader in the Swedish Resistance Movement. The Finnish section would originally function under the name Finnish Resistance Movement (Suomen Vastarintaliike, SVL) when they started organizing in Helsinki, Turku, Oulu, Tampere and Jyväskylä.
After a couple of years of establishing themselves and recruiting, they began holding public demonstrations and their activists began striking against political opponents in a methodical way that was unseen in Finland before. Although there had been harassment against minorities and fights between political opponents in the inter-war period and after, the 1990s had been more defined by spontaneous, drunken shenanigans than defined political strategies. Although the NRM in Finland was small, they were determined to intimidate and be seen. NRM activists attacked the Helsinki Pride parade with tear gas in 2010, causing harm to tens of people. In 2011, their activists attacked a left-wing politician with pepper spray, and in 2012 they attacked a man at his home in Tampere. By this time, anti-fascists had begun taking precautions against the new threat and also gave the NRM a few humiliating experiences after their public appearances.
While the neo-Nazis made some headlines, most of the general public and authorities did not consider them dangerous, maybe because there were not many investigative journalists, scholars and anti-fascists that had published material about the new breed of Nazis. This changed with the release of “Äärioikeisto Suomessa” by Li Andersson, Dan Koivulaakso and Mikael Brunila. The book detailed the history of the far-right in Finland, and was a welcome contribution to the understudied field, detailing the connections between NRM and movements like the Italian Casa Pound. Some right-wingers and liberals were negative: the book was considered alarmist, and there was “no dangerous far-right to worry about” in Finland. At this time, the Finns party (populist far-right) had just gained their first parliamentary victories, but this was by many considered to be a populist protest and trend that would not last.
The peak of NRM
When a panel discussion was held in the Jyväskylä city library in January 2013, writers Andersson and Brunila were invited to present their book. The event was considered to be under threat from neo-Nazis and the (anarchist) organizers were expecting trouble, and not without reason. Three NRM members assaulted the event armed with bottles, and stabbed one of the door men when they were chased off. This event caused a lot of shock and outrage, and increased NRM activity during 2013 led to several confrontations such as an antifascist mobilization successfully chasing Nazi “street vigilantes” off Helsinki streets. At this point, the NRM were confident that they had enough influence and co-operators within the Finnish far-right to launch a larger “nationalist” march on Independence day in December 2014.
The day have for many years been the showground for anti-capitalist protests against the Presidents ball in Helsinki, where the left previously have had the initiative. Now, fascists from Suomen Sisu, the fascist magazine Sarastus, the Nordic Resistance Movement and other fringes of the populist and far-right announced that they would march through Helsinki with torches under the slogans of “patriotism”, which also attracted many conservative Finns who usually don´t chant fascist slogans. This so-called “612” march has now been going on for ten years, and would go from attracting around 100 people, to 1500 at its peak in 2017. The 612 marches have usually been paired with smaller, openly fascist NRM demonstrations the same day, which eventually became impossible and where taken over by the “Blue black movement” after the Covid-19 pandemic (more on that later). The increase of anti-fascist organizing and networking with other social movements would eventually bear fruit and have a demoralizing effect on the fascist growth, since a lot of their “good time” supporters stopped showing up at public events when the anti-fascists began outnumbering them by far.
The NRM was boosted by a general turn to the right in 2015, when many racist groups took to the street to spread hate against asylum seekers. The same year, the Finns party entered government with the other center/right-wing parties and employed austerity and racist measures. The Nordic Resistance Movement would also have its peak in all the Nordic countries around 2016 and 2017, with growing membership and big street actions. They did many public demonstrations between 2014 and 2019, often with the backup of Swedish members if the demonstrations were pre-announced. Having guests from Sweden and other countries raised their confidence, and with their help they dared to be on the offense, for example when they assaulted people in Jyväskylä in 2015 and were arrested for rioting.
In 2016, another turning point happened in Finland when major NRM activist and hooligan Jesse “Eppu” Torniainen assaulted passer-by Jimi Karttunen at a NRM street action in Helsinki. Karttunen was kicked to the ground and later died of his injuries, which was the final straw that led to Finnish authorities starting a process to outlaw the organization. The NRM initially boasted about the manslaughter, naming the perpetrator “activist of the year” but later tried to tone down the incident during the police investigations. The tactics of NRM started to change during the following years, with less recruiting and a lower profile. During 2017 they mobilized in Tampere during the initial court process, marching under the banners of “Freedom of speech” while being harassed by anti-fascists and locals. The organization would for a while portray themselves as martyrs hunted by liberal democracy, a change in tone from the previously proud Aryan revolutionary imagery that they used. 2017 would also prove to be the turning point for the Swedish branch, which tried to gather the largest national socialist demonstration in Swedish history in Gothenburg. Instead, they were met by tens of thousands of anti-fascists, beaten and arrested by the police. These blows would cause internal conflict, losing members and burning out their resources.
Banned in the Supreme Court
In Finland, the district courts decided that a ban of the NRM would be possible since the goals of the organization are incompatible with Finnish law. The Nazis would appeal this through the District court and Supreme Court until 2020, while establishing different fronts to continue through. In 2018 and 2019, the NRM still tried to remain strong with several public demonstrations. Some Swedish and Norwegian members would be mobilized to Finland during these years, but the last time the “Tyr” rune of the NRM was seen on Finnish soil was in 2019. The Nazis would for a short while try to use only their green color, sometimes combined with older symbols and swastikas.
They would also abandon their old websites, favoring the “Kohti vapautta/towards freedom” slogan but also abandoning that after a while. There were also attempts to start smaller groups for martial arts, propaganda and book publishing, ie outsourcing the NRM activites to groups under many names. The activity in most of these have been low – the Veren laki (“blood law”) fight club occasionally do martial arts trainings, Kielletyt kirjat (“banned books”) publish Nazi literature, and the Partisaani (“partisan”) website publish propaganda, but all in all the 2020 ban made the NRM brand lose its shimmer. After the court process, most of the founding members have disappeared from the spotlight. While many social movements tend to lose activists as they reach their 30s, in this case the Resistance Movement brand has also lost its shine. Despite the talk, few people are actually invested enough to build an underground movement or carry on defying the ban. In our analysis, state intervention and prohibition is not a desired way to combat fascism since it does not remove it from society and can just as likely be used against leftist movements. We can however conclude that it took one of the most potent nazi movements in Finland off the street and seriously complicated the lives of the remaining members.
Far-right advances post-NRM
While the saga of the Nordic Resistance Movement in Finland seems to be over, the growth of the far-right is not. Much of the far-right growth in the 2010s was enabled by populist far-right party The Finns (Perussuomalaiset), who now is the third largest party and in the most right-wing government Finland has ever had, enforcing austerity measures, union busting and the closing of the Russian border to protect against “the asylum seeker threat”. Jussi Halla-aho, who was party chairman 2017-2021 was a long-time member of the fascist Suomen Sisu association, encouraged ethno-nationalist rhetoric in the party and on his blogs as early as 2003, influencing thousands of people. His racist and fascist writings were even cited by Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik in his manifesto, highlighting the transnational reach of the far-right.
Speaking of terrorism and the NRM, we also have mention their influence on Finnish terrorist acts. In 2021 and 2023, several terrorist cells were uncovered by Finnish police. In Kankaanpää city, five young nazis were arrested when their stockpile of guns and ammunition was uncovered. In Lahti, four more were revealed to have 3D-printed guns and harassed immigrants, planning to further their struggle through “accelerationism”. The groups were initially suspected to have been “lone wolf” cells, but investigations showed that they had co-operated both with NRM members, the international Hammerskins network and the white power music scenes. Former and recent NRM members have also been involved in violent incidents: for example, the Oulu activist Sebastian Lämsä was under investigation for hiding explosives when he in 2024 assaulted immigrant children with a knife before he was apprehended. NRM members have also been instrumental in schooling the next generation of nazis in martial arts, arranging secret Veren laki MMA trainings and encouraging the start-up of “Active Clubs” in Finland.
The rest of the NRM members that still appear in public have engaged themselves in parliamentary politics, something the movement completely opposed ten years earlier but has since embraced. Leading figures such as Antti Niemi, Petri Nordman and Janne Moilanen appeared as candidates for the Blue Black Movement (Sinimusta liike), a political party started by Tuukka Kuru and others in the fascist milieu in 2021, following the disintegration of the NRM. The party espouses ethno-nationalism, racism and militarism and large parts of their program is at odds with Finnish and international law. After receiving 0.07% of the votes in the 2023 parliamentary election, they were stripped of their status as a legal party in Finland. They are however actively networking nationally and abroad to build their movement.
The Nordic Resistance Movement have in the 2020s outlived many of its competitors in the Nordic far-right, but now it seems that they are at their weakest since two decades. They only have a couple of members left in Norway and Denmark, their “mother chapter” in Sweden have lost one hundred activists and supporters, and the organization is outlawed in Finland. So what is their legacy?
While some of their activists are still being investigated by the police for trying to carry on NRM activities under different names, it is unlikely that they would be able to build a similar organization without huge investments and recruitment of young, dedicated activists. However, the trends in the radical far-right has also changed during this decade. While some of their members have stepped down from their involvement, others have been important as “veterans” in the new fascist movements that have taken their place. Some of the younger activists prefer clandestine activities and spreading “scary” videos and stickers while cultivating a sporty image, and these have gotten help to establish the world-wide “Active Club” network in Finland. Others joined the “Blue-blacks” party project, which grew out of radicalized former members of the Finns party and the Suomen Sisu milieu which organized secret fascist conferences and events for a couple of years. This marks a clear difference to the “old” fascists, who never would have published their full name and picture (though many of them were eventually outed by anti-fascists).
While the NRM no longer is a direct street threat to leftists, minorities and immigrants in Finland, the methods, ideas and some of their members still are. The NRM were far from reaching their goal of building a national socialist Nordic state, they did cause a lot of headlines and have caused deaths and damage around the Nordics. But their violence also had another effect: the spread of anti-fascist ideals and organizing on a whole new level. During the 2000s and 2010s, Finland did not have many dedicated anti-fascist organizations, journalists and activists (while many embraced the ideals and did great work when needed). The emergence of the NRM and other far-right trends demanded action, and many comrades from different walks of life reached out and found each other when it was needed the most. We still need anti-fascism, and this chapter is now a part of the history of fascism and anti-fascism in Finland. The next is still to be written.