In Finland, all men are subject to a mandatory service. Women can join in voluntarily but the numbers have been really low number, to no surprise.
The service can either be military training (at least 6 months) or civil service (pacifist option but it's twice as long, which is criticized internationally by Amnesty). About ten percent of young men are dismissed each year: some for a real reason (medical, psychological, other), some for "other" reasons.
While officially never admitted, the system is heavily geared towards re-enacting Finland's WW2, that is, defence against Russia, Finland's eastern neighbour. It's a collective wartime trauma in constant replay.
It's an archair system that will turn into something more modern in a couple of generations or the coming decades, if not for anything else then for the lack of funding.
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Not necessarily related to this article, but doesn't Finland also require every citizen to enlist in their military for a few years?
I remember reading about it in some Linus Torvalds interview, seems like an interesting policy.
In Finland, all men are subject to a mandatory service. Women can join in voluntarily but the numbers have been really low number, to no surprise.
The service can either be military training (at least 6 months) or civil service (pacifist option but it's twice as long, which is criticized internationally by Amnesty). About ten percent of young men are dismissed each year: some for a real reason (medical, psychological, other), some for "other" reasons.
While officially never admitted, the system is heavily geared towards re-enacting Finland's WW2, that is, defence against Russia, Finland's eastern neighbour. It's a collective wartime trauma in constant replay.
It's an archair system that will turn into something more modern in a couple of generations or the coming decades, if not for anything else then for the lack of funding.