general election 2027 objectives

At the time of writing, there are over 90,000 intercultural families living in Finland. These families consist of a Finnish partner and of a partner who has moved to Finland. About half of these families have children. Additionally, there are around 90,000 families where both partners are from abroad. Out of these families, around 17,000 consist of two people who are from different countries. Finally, there are over 150,000 people under the age of 30 with intercultural backgrounds. Out of these, around 110,000 are under the age of 18.

Family reunification has maintained its role as the most important reason for applying for all types of residence permits, and therefore, the number of intercultural families, couples, and adolescents is likely to keep growing. The needs of this growing and heterogeneous group need to be taken into account in political decision-making, especially in the national family, social, integration, and immigration policies. It is imperative for us to build an antiracist and equitable society, and for that, we need to increase knowledge and understanding about the needs of the intercultural families living in Finland.

​Ahead of the general election of 2027, it is necessary to take into account different aspects that affect intercultural families’ wellbeing, sense of safety, and the sense of belonging. It is crucial that we dismantle discriminatory and racist procedures and structures and replace them with ones that actively promote and ensure belonging, safety, security, and a good life for intercultural families. 

1. Antiracist Finland
2. Multilingualism and Integration in Finland
3. Finland Needing Integration

1. Antiracist Finland 

We propose:

• Long-term and index-bound funding for Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) doing antiracist work. 
• Funding allocated to diversifying the imagery of Finnishness for the culture sector. Dismantling white normativity and building diverse imagery through different intersections. 
• ​​Create and enact a new national action plan against racism (NAPAR) with support from civil society and CSOs. 
• The creation of an antiracism panel (cf. The Finnish Climate Change Panel) comprised of scientists and civil society representatives to monitor and guide in matters related to the NAPAR. 
• It is imperative for the Finnish national overall safety that the people living in Finland can trust the Finnish society, officials, and administration. Building an antiracist society from the top of the Finnish political decision-making is therefore crucial so that the people who have dealt with racist discrimination can trust the Finnish administration. Trust, on the other hand, helps with the national overall safety. 
• Ensuring funding for relevant research.
• Implementing a national campaign to further an antiracist society and recognising racism in its different forms. The goal is for white Finns to better understand different forms of racism, how to dismantle people’s own racist ideas, ideologies, ways of conduct, and to recognise all the good people who have migrated to Finland bring. On the other hand, the goal is also to make sure that BIPOC people know their rights and know what to do in situations where they face racist behaviour or actions. 
• Building an antiracist Finland also means dealing with discrimination. Experiences of discrimination affect people’s sense of belonging negatively, meaning that the sense of belonging is weakened by experiences of discrimination.
• ​Building an antiracist Finland is also important for the youth. In the 2025 Youth Barometer, 9% of the youth had been discriminated against because of language, and it was the third most common reason for discrimination. Additionally, 7% had been discriminated against because of their ethnic background.  
• The youth’s sense of belonging influences their mental health, and therefore building and fostering a sense of belonging is also mental health work. 
• ​Building national channels where experiences of racism can be reported and the reports will lead to action, without making it a police case. For example, Tampere has made such a channel online. 

Explanation

Based on the 2023 report “Being Black in the EU”, Finland is one of the top countries when people from African backgrounds were asked about their experiences with racism in Finland. Furthermore, according to the Migration Institute of Finland, men from West Asia (also known as the Middle East) are considerably more likely to get a rejection when applying for a residence permit based on family reunification. It is time to reverse these kinds of developments and make Finland the most antiracist country in Europe.

​Firstly, this means dismantling racist structures and secondly, a more active approach to the every day racism BIPOC people encounter. Furthermore, we call for the decolonisation of Finnish politics. In 2025, the first steps were taken in the form of the new Act on the Sámi Parliament, the final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Sámi was published, and Prime Minister Orpo stated that Finland needs to apologise to the Sámi. This development needs to continue and needs to be supported. Decolonisation needs to be furthered in Sápmi (Sámi homeland), as well as in Finnish foreign policy, and any arms trade with Israel needs to be cancelled. 

2. Multilingualism and Integration in Finland
We propose:

• Multilingualism as a mother tongue. Enabling people to register several languages as mother tongues in the Population Information System. According to a Ministry of Justice report, the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers has given Finland a recommendation to ease registering multiple languages in the Population Information System. In the same report, a proposal for registering multiple mother tongues in a non-hierarchical way. The equal treatment of a person’s all languages must be at the centre of registering multiple languages as mother tongues, and therefore we advocate for registering multiple mother tongues.  
• Language based discrimination was the third most common experience of discrimination among youth. As experiences of discrimination can have various detrimental effects, building a multilingual Finland supports the youth’s feelings of safety, sense of belonging, and mental health. 
• Ensuring funding for Liberal Adult Education. 
• Secure sufficient funding for integration services. This includes early services such as language teaching, but also long-term integration supporting services. 
• Integration-related language teaching must be available year-round and close to the people using the integration services.  
• Building a hybrid model that allows integration services customers to move partly into working life while continuing to learn a national language. Creating an economic incentive for people to continue learning a national language. 
• The integration services must centre the needs of the immigrants. This could mean funding and utilising the CSO sector, for the expertise CSOs have. 
• In language teaching, there have been positive experiences from Social Impact Bond-based language teaching, and possibilities to expand these kinds of services should be explored. At the moment, Springhouse Oy offers language teaching, where the company gets paid when students get employed. 
• Residence permit costs are made tax deductible.
• Ensuring the availability and accessibility of integration services. Integration services must be available where they are needed. Integration services must be accessible for all the people using them, and this can mean that they must be available in person. 
• Ensuring the availability and quality of heritage language teaching for children across Finland. Hybrid teaching models could be used in sparsely populated areas. 
• Increase the teaching of national languages in early childhood education. 
• Facilitating language learning for children whose mother tongue is not a national language in the form of language showers. Using expertise within the CSO sector through funding initiatives.  
• Developing teaching materials so that a parent who does not speak a national language can support their child with homework and learning. Utilising electronic learning materials that can be machine translated.
• The everyday realities at workplaces play significant roles in whether the integration and employment of a person who has moved to Finland are successful. Therefore, we should incentivise the private sector to hire and integrate people who have migrated to Finland.

Explanation

The goal of multilingualism and integration in Finland is to build a society in which all languages are treated equally and the people who have moved to Finland can integrate via a system based on the principles of two-way integration. People who have moved to Finland are encouraged to learn national languages, but the languages are not necessary to take part in the society. People are able to have several official mother tongues. The goal of the integration for the person to build a good life in Finland, if they choose to do so. While our first concern is ensuring a good life for people who have moved to Finland, people living a good life in Finland also benefit Finnish society. This means that adequate resources are given to integration and language training in the beginning of the integration process. The goal is for the customers of the integration services the goal is to reach level B1 on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR).

​However, a successful integration process is not dependent on the acquired language level. The target level functions as a guide for ensuring the adequate resources for integration and language training. Academic research suggests that investing in early language learning leads to better attachment in the labour market and higher income levels later. Ensuring the quality of language instruction throughout Finland. Additionally, ensuring that the formation of language instruction groups is based on, for example, previously acquired education, and not presumed cultural groups. Developing a national hybrid model of language learning while working, which allows people to work and studyFinnish or Swedish at the same time. The state should incentivize the private sector to a model where people can combine working and language learning. 
​
In conjunction with the investments put towards integration efforts to build a multilingual Finland must be made. The people who have moved to Finland vary, and not everyone is equally equipped to learn a new language. Regardless of the reason and the language skills, everyone has the right to take part and be a part of the Finnish society. Developing ways to support employers’ multilingual working environments, so that Finnish skills are not a reason not to hire someone if the work itself does not require a specific level of Finnish. Increasing the possibility to use English and machine translators in public services. For example, HUS uses AI-based translators. At the same time enabling multiple mother tongues in the Digital and Population Data Services Agency database and increase possibilities for learning heritage languages. 

3. Finland needing immigration
We propose:

• Removing the effects of social security and other benefits on the required time of being a resident when applying for a permanent residence permit or naturalization. 
• Recognizing that relationships and families come in many forms. Removing the requirement of monogamy in family reunification residence permits. 
• Removing the age requirement of 21 years from family reunification residence permits. 
• Recognizing that people who are part of sexual or gender minorities might not have the possibility to live together in either of their home countries, and therefore the requirement of having lived as a couple for two years cannot be applicable to them. 
• Removing the requirement of two years of cohabitation from unmarried couples in family reunification residence permits. Technically they would then be treated the same as married couples. 
• If a non-Finnish parent moves to Finland to be with their underaged child or children, they should be given a fast track to a permanent residence permit and to building a life in Finland. 
• Change the look for work time limit of workers residence permits from the current three and six months to six and twelve months.  
• In the fall of 2025, there was significant news coverage that non-EU students are recruited to Finland with false promises. Higher education institutions must be made responsible to inform incoming non-EU students about the realities of living in Finland. 
• Remove the requirement of having 9600 euros in a bank account from non-EU students in situations where their studies last at least a year. A clarification of how a student means to fund their life in Finland must be enough. The requirement for funds is unreasonable as most Finnish students do not have that. 
• Removing the requirement of two years of cohabitation in situations where one party of an unmarried couple has a refugee status, has a residence permit based on temporary protection, or is under subsidiary protection. This would mean returning to previous legislation. 
• Roll back the residency requirement, and increase the allowed time spent abroad to the prior levels regarding permanent residence permit requirements. 
• Roll back the residency requirement, and increase the allowed time spent abroad to the prior levels regarding naturalization. 
• Roll back the integrity requirements for naturalization. Cancel the changes that took effect on 17.12.2025. 

Explanation

Finland needs migration. People move to Finland for various reasons and we have a moral responsibility to support them as they build their lives in Finland. All the people deserve a good life and a future to believe in. For us, giving those things to the people who live in Finland is the easiest way to impact the lives of people. 
The government of Petteri Orpo has made changes to the Aliens Act and Nationality Act that have made the legislation significantly stricter. Additionally, it has changed the ideology of Finnish immigration policy in a profound way. These changes must be cancelled, and we propose the following changes: ​

more information

• Familia's Objectives for the General Election 2027