Politics of public interest: Finnish forest capital’s strategy in the Kaipola paper mill shutdown

Figures & data

Table 1. Wood, paper and printed products share of total export products (Statistics Finland 2016).

1920	1930	1940	1950	1960	1970	1980	1990	2000	2010	2015
94%	84%	77%	87%	75%	56%	43%	39%	27%	21%	22%

Table 2. The paper production crisis in Finland during the 2000s.

Key facts on the paper production crisis

Reasons and consequences

Paper and paperboard #1 exports of the Finnish economy (7.4 billion euros in 2017; FFIF 2019a) Peak production and export volumes of paper close to 14 million tonnes in early 2000s (FFIF 2018a, 2020a) After 2008, both the production and export volumes of paper have dropped from 14 million tonnes to 9–10 million tonnes annually while the importance of chemical pulp and sawn softwood has grown relative to paper (FFIF 2020a) Print paper production has steadily fallen during the 2010s to just below 5 million tonnes in 2019 (FFIF 2020b) with exports following the same trend (FFIF 2017b) The number of personnel employed in paper and pulp production fallen by 10 000 employees from 2007 to 2018 due to layoffs, closures and automation (FFIF 2019b) The export of chemical pulp has taken some of the share of falling print paper with a production increase from 2 million tonnes to 3 million tonnes in 2010s (FFIF 2017b)

Rapid development of internet and telecommunications; the demand for paper reaching its peak globally (FFIF 2017a) and domestically (FFIF 2018b) Economic forecasts see demand for paper plummeting well into the future with internet adoption globally (Johnston 2016) Coupled with the 2008 financial crisis, the accumulating paper production capacity was starting to become a burden (Kuisma, Siltala, and Keskisarja 2014) Paper mill conversions: For example, Stora Enso converting a paper mill in Oulu to cardboard packaging in late 2020 (Stora Enso 2019) Paper mill closures: For example, Stora Enso announcing in April 2021 plans to close its paper mills in Kemi, Finland and Kvarnsveden, Sweden citing a 3.5 million tonnes of excess of paper production capacity and plummeting demand in the European markets (Lassila and Luukka 2021) New fixed capital investments in biorefineries

Table 3. The tripartite division of public interest politics through the lens of the empirical analysis

	Terrain of political struggles	Mode of doing politics	Method of enquiry
Governmental coalition	Contours of public interest politics legitimize the strategic direction of state policies ‘Neutral State’ as the representative of public interest and arbiter among struggling classes (Poulantzas 1978)	In parliamentary politics: Signalling allegiances to voter-bases and forming alliances with extra-parliamentary actors Coalition politics at the conjuncture of various social forces	Points towards analyzing public interest as a mechanism of political bloc formation Brings to fore how public interest functions as short-hand signaling of political allegiances
Forest capital	Corporate polity aids in equating the interests of key capital fractions as the public interest Seeking to create a terrain of arm’s length policies and regulation while tapping into beneficial state investment	Actively seeking to further its class interests through de- and repoliticization Invoking the role of the financial reproduction of society	Points towards analyzing the economization of public interest Brings to fore how capital fractions seek to position their economic interests in relation to the state and civil society
Labour unions	Defending the labour interests and the practice of labour negotiation	In defensive mode and relying on the institutionalizations established during Keynesian consensus of the post-war social contract	Points towards analyzing the calcification of the social power of labour interests Brings to fore how labour interests have been evacuated from public interest politics

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