ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses how the Finland-Swedish minority's identity construction related to anti-fascism during the interwar period. Many Swedish speakers were initially involved in the far-right Lapua movement, 1929–1932, which claimed to unite the language groups in its fight against communism. Other Swedish speakers, however, were concerned about the fate of the Swedish-speaking minority after the defeat of communism. Would it be next in line, just like national minorities in fascist Italy or German Nazism? Anti-communism remained a strong part of the political identity of many Swedish speakers, but as a response to ultra-nationalist mobilization among the Finnish far right, anti-fascism became a powerful albeit contested ingredient in the ethnic mobilization of the Swedish-speaking minority identity during the 1930s. The chapter presents three different layers of anti-fascist responses, including the liberal-conservative Swedish People's Party, the Swedish-speaking Social Democrats, and the anti-fascist minority literature produced by Swedish-speaking authors in interwar Finland. We interrogate in which ways class interests overrode or challenged demands for ethnic unity, and what external and internal pressures affected the formation of an anti-fascist minority position. The findings demonstrate how anti-fascism functioned as a force of both cohesion and division – and eventually compelled the leaders of the Finland-Swedish minority community to reassess their political alignments.
