ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the relationship between sporting bodies, subjectivity, and the nation by tracing how geopolitics and nation-building have steered horse sports and identity in Finland. The examination highlights interdependency between identity and boundaries by relating horse sports to Finnish national, urban-rural, and socio-economic class affiliations in changing international contexts. The case study thus sheds light on a society’s ideological framework within which certain sports evolve and shows how time-and place-sensitive attention to human identity politics about animal sports can expand insight in sports research. Finland illustrates the interplay between geopolitics, identity, and horse sports well due to the prominent role of the horse in the country’s socioeconomic and military history, regional development, and the strong identity-political turns in Finnish geopolitics. The relationship between the state, horses, and the sports system is historically intimate, and even before independence from the Russian Empire in 1917, sports served Finnish nation builders as a source of pride (Raento 2006: 620-2; Tervo 2003). Not surprisingly, then, public figures have been a common sight at racetracks and are involved in the equine economy and the politics surrounding trotter racing and wagering. Hobby groups in parliament include an equine society with high-profile trotter racing and charity activities. The chair of board of the national trotting and breeding association Suomen Hippos is a center-conservative member of parliament. An influential figure in Finland’s national independence process and, later, president and marshal, Gustav Mannerheim (1867-1951), was a cavalryman, horse trader, and keen recreational rider. Finns, in many ways then, have been, and are, led by horsemen. Adding to the intimacy between the state, horses, and sports is the historical importance of the Finnhorse as an export resource and an agricultural and a military asset, the quality of which was tested by racing. The Finnhorse is an all-purpose coldblood horse breed, for which a national studbook was created in 1907 during the heat of nation-building and resistance against imperial Russia. The studbook marked the nation’s
boundaries by defining the Finnhorse as a purebred horse which originates only from Finland. The strategic importance of the breed for national defense and food production became outdated after World War II, but the Finnhorse still carries powerful identity-political meaning and symbolic value (e.g., Schuurman and Nyman 2014). Statistics reveal the role of horses today in this country of 5.5 million people. About 170,000 Finns are regular leisure riders, and the number of enthusiasts grows – especially in the urban south where most horses and people live. Riding clubs have 50,000 members and the number of riding stables and schools exceeds 1,000. Some 7,600 riding horses are licensed to compete and over 500 national or regional competitions are organized each year in the Olympic sports dressage, show jumping, and eventing (Raento 2015; SRL 2015). Trotter racing, with 200,000 active followers and accounting for 670,000 visits to the tracks in 2015, is the second most popular spectator sport in the country. Of the 74,200 horses in Finland in 2015, 34 percent were Standardbred trotters, 26 percent were Finnhorses (most of which are bred for trotting), another 26 percent were warmblood riding horses, and 14 percent were ponies, some of which serve as trotters. Turnover from wagering (230 million in 2015), prize money (17 million), and the number of posts (5,000) and licensed trotters (6,900) make Finland a medium-size trotter-racing country in Europe, where France, Sweden, and Italy lead the way (Suomen Hippos 2016; UET 2016). These numbers hide complex affiliations, sport-specific lifestyles and values, and identity-political and socio-cultural tension with long historical roots. All this is embodied in the type and breed of sports horses, which, in addition to the sport itself, are molded by economic and geopolitical circumstances, human ideologies, and fashion and image. The Finnish case shows clearly how wars and their aftermath steer the fate of particular breeds and sports. Individual horse sports and their structures also relate to strong affiliations which sustain particular sports cultures and underscore the interdependent and contested nature of identities and boundaries. This discussion contributes to the political study of sports, nation, and identity from the perspective of political geography (see Bale 2003; Koch 2013; Tervo 2003). By focusing on animal sports, this chapter reaches beyond the emphasis on the politics of national human team sports and mega-events (e.g., Dichter and Johns 2014), bridging sports studies with the study of animal geographies and the human-animal relationship (Hobson 2007; Urbanik 2012). It expands the focus on the gallop racing industry in the study of animal sports structures and introduces geopolitics to the discussion (Cassidy 2002, 2007; McManus et al. 2013; Raento and Härmälä 2014). Building on the Finnish-language popular horse sports literature, which describes the history of a particular sport, organization, or venue (Erola 2010; Jalkanen and Saarinen 1986; Mahlamäki 2003;
Vasara 1987), this examination also draws on a long-term personal interest and varied involvement in trotter racing, gambling and wagering, equine education, and their research (Karekallas et al. 2014; Raento 2015; Raento and Härmälä 2014; for an anthropological ethnography in the gallopracing industry, see Cassidy 2002, 2007).
