The recent political scandals in Finland, where ministers and politicians have been exposed for making racist statements, have sparked a wave of protests. These mobilizations deserve recognition, but it is important to note that racism cannot be reduced to the problem of individual prejudice, offensive language, or reputational damage to Finland abroad. Racism is systemic, embedded in state institutions, border regimes, and immigration laws that reproduce a two-tier society: one where full social membership is reserved for citizens, while migrants remain suspended in a state of precarity.
The programme of Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s government must be understood in this context. By redefining residence, asylum, and citizenship rules, the state entrenches racialized hierarchies and deepens migrants’ exclusion from rights, welfare, and political participation. What emerges is not only stricter immigration control but also a political project of enforcing temporariness—structuring migrants’ lives around insecurity, expendability, and conditional belonging.
Permanent Temporariness and Labour Precarity
One of the most striking measures is the extension of the residence requirement for permanent status to six years, accompanied by language and income thresholds. Those earning more than €40,000 annually are rewarded with an accelerated path, demonstrating how economic productivity is placed above social inclusion.
At the same time, work-based residence permits are rendered fragile: a migrant may face deportation after just three months of unemployment. This turns residence into a disciplinary device, tethering basic life security to uninterrupted employability in a labour market where recruitment processes often exceed three months. Employers gain disproportionate power, knowing their reports to authorities could trigger deportation.
Rather than promoting integration, these measures cultivate a workforce that is atomized, non-unionized, and easily exploited—a segmented labour market with migrants filling insecure positions. In effect, immigration law becomes a tool of labour market stratification, dividing workers by race, origin, and citizenship status.
Asylum under Siege
The government also aims to halve the annual refugee quota, even as the world faces unprecedented displacement since World War II. More fundamentally, it proposes to make asylum temporary: three years for refugee status and one year for subsidiary protection, the minimum allowed under EU law.
This echoes Denmark’s “paradigm shift,” where protection is explicitly conditional and revocable. In practice, such policies hollow out the 1951 Refugee Convention by shifting protection from a durable right to a precarious allowance. Syrians in Denmark, for example, now face the threat of return despite the ongoing war. Should Finland follow this path, it risks institutionalizing a form of protection that is permanently temporary, perpetuating insecurity rather than offering sanctuary.
Moreover, the government seeks to block rejected asylum seekers from transitioning to work-based residence permits. This ignores the lived reality of asylum seekers who, despite bureaucratic rejection, have found employment and contributed to Finnish society. The signal is unambiguous: even those who demonstrate “integration” through work are not welcome if they entered through the asylum channel. This conflates asylum seekers with undesirability itself, racializing them as perpetually “out of place.”
Intensified Hierarchies and Exclusions
The programme intensifies stratification among migrants themselves. Highly paid professionals are promised faster permits, while others face lengthier and more precarious routes. Family reunification is narrowed to nuclear families, with uncertainty hanging over dependent relatives. Undocumented migrants’ access to healthcare is restricted to emergencies, despite evidence that denial of preventive care neither reduces migration nor saves costs.
These measures align Finland more closely with the EU’s externalization agenda, deepening cooperation with Frontex and exploring return agreements with third countries. Migrants are thus situated within a broader European apparatus that treats mobility from the Global South as a threat to be contained.
Eroding Belonging, Weakening Society
Conversations within migrant communities reveal widespread skepticism about building a future in Finland. If residency and citizenship are deliberately delayed, if family unity is undermined, and if unemployment risks deportation, why invest in language learning or long-term settlement? Many are considering leaving Finland altogether, even when educated here or working in sectors facing acute labour shortages.
The irony is stark: while policymakers lament demographic decline and labour shortages, their policies erode the very foundations of long-term social participation. Instead of integration, they produce isolation, insecurity, and disposability.
Conclusion: Beyond Performative Anti-Racism
Finland’s migration policy under Orpo’s government cannot be understood merely as a matter of tighter border controls. It is a structural project that entrenches racialized divisions, transforming migrants into permanently temporary workers while denying them social and political membership.
If anti-racism in Finland is to be meaningful, it cannot stop at condemning racist speech. It must address how laws, policies, and institutions normalize inequality, undermine solidarities, and erode the possibility of making a life in Finland. The deeper question is whether Finland will choose to sustain its myth of universal equality—or confront the reality of a stratified society built upon exclusion and conditional belonging.
