Finnish minister Sanna Marin, 34, to become world's youngest PM(bbc.co.uk)
bbc.co.uk
Finnish minister Sanna Marin, 34, to become world's youngest PM
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-50709422
12 comments
That seems insanely young. I'm in my mid-40s and don't feel like I have enough life experience to run a neighborhood, much less a country.
What life experience would qualify you to do this?
Having a person lead a country that will have to live for a longer time with their decisions doesn't strike me as bad.
Through the history, there were lots of young leaders and I don't think that age had much to with how successful they were.
Having a person lead a country that will have to live for a longer time with their decisions doesn't strike me as bad.
Through the history, there were lots of young leaders and I don't think that age had much to with how successful they were.
She does have a Masters degree in political administration and experience at various levels of government. It's not like she's come in from the cold.
On some level it could help getting another approach to governing a country.
60~70 yo people also don’t have nearly enough knowledge and/or wisdom to operate at that scale, and if we’re speaking about impacting the lives of millions of people the difference between 34 and 70 is marginal I think. It should all come down to the system they operate in and how they use it, at the end of the day.
60~70 yo people also don’t have nearly enough knowledge and/or wisdom to operate at that scale, and if we’re speaking about impacting the lives of millions of people the difference between 34 and 70 is marginal I think. It should all come down to the system they operate in and how they use it, at the end of the day.
Aside from experience, there's also the notion of a change in demeanor, to something more pragmatic and measured, that happens later in life.
I don't know if there's credible research that confirms it, but it seems true...of course with notable exceptions.
I don't know if there's credible research that confirms it, but it seems true...of course with notable exceptions.
In my forties there many things I know now. How to pick fights, how to see danger signs of projects (too many dependencies, too many teams involved, unclear goals), how to keep things simple, how to speak to developers and managers.
In the United States, the minimum age was set to prevent "dynasties." Which means that today, they may have set the age even older, because of extended lifetimes.
your lack of confidence is actually a positive indicator if you take into account the inverse of dunning-kruger
Agreed. For a long time I had thought the age requirement for being president in the US was kind of dumb - why don't we just get the right person for the job, no matter the age? But as I've grown older I realized what you have - it's extremely difficult to run anything, and I would prefer leaders that have been in extremely high, laborious, and difficult leadership positions before over those who are outlier-level young (such as Mrs. Marin). But then again I'm basing this judgement purely on age and not on many other factors so this is a very shallow analysis.
jkhrjkew(5)
There's a list of the youngest world leaders since 1900 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_youngest_state_leaders...
Oh, and also the current youngest:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_state_leaders_by_ag...
Number 2 and 3 after Sanna Marin are Oleksiy Honcharuk, Prime Minister of Ukraine at 35 and Kim Jong-Un of North Korea at 36.
Oh, and also the current youngest:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_state_leaders_by_ag...
Number 2 and 3 after Sanna Marin are Oleksiy Honcharuk, Prime Minister of Ukraine at 35 and Kim Jong-Un of North Korea at 36.
> Mr Rinne stepped down after a plan to cut wages for hundreds of postal workers led to widespread strikes
great to see a politician actually facing consequences for their actions
great to see a politician actually facing consequences for their actions
He is still the leader of the democratic socialist party and prime minister by proxy. Actual concequences would be having a new election and reforming the government. Obviously the current government is against that since they know they are unpopular for their incompetence.
Not true. If Marin decided to call an early party confress Rinne would be pretty much automatically ousted as the party leader. Because everyone knows the outcome, I believe it was decided Rinne could continue as party leader until next party conference in summer 2020. But by all means Marin holds the true power in her party, unless you know something the public doesn't (which I doubt not least because you misspelled the party's name).
Congratulations to her but it seems like age is seen as less of a factor in these countries. From an outside perspective, the Nordic countries have a very by the book form of government. Meaning the government/prime minister isn’t the result of the hopes and dreams of the constituents but more of how do we get things done with the least amount of turmoil. Kind of like how your local city government is run, where things seem more administrative and less political. Maybe that is the secret to their success.
Perhaps that is because many of the Nordic countries are about the population of a large metro area. Finland, for instance, has about 5 million people.
Yep, that's over a million people less than the Houston metro area and nearly two million less than the Dallas metro area.
Most US states have a population of less than 5 million.
According to this[0], there are 23 states with a population of 5 million or more. So, roughly half of US states have a population as large as the country of Finland. Also, according to this[1], there are 9 metro areas in the US with a population of 5 million or more.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories...
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_metropolitan_statistic...
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories...
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_metropolitan_statistic...
Well, that's my point. It's about the same size as the average US state. Any time a nordic country is mentioned, there's this same comment that it is obviously easier to do XYZ there because of the small population. Well, it must be equally easy to do it in a US state, right?
Furthermore, most countries in the world have a population less than 10 million. Finland is a normal sized country - it's the US that's anomalous in that it's more like 50 normal sized countries in a union.
Furthermore, most countries in the world have a population less than 10 million. Finland is a normal sized country - it's the US that's anomalous in that it's more like 50 normal sized countries in a union.
I would guess that if you look at the northern midwestern states (which were heavily settled by people from the Nordic countries) with a population around 5 million, most of them are as well run as Finland.
What's the most powerful political position in a US state, comparable to the prime minister in European countries? Speaker of the House of Representatives? At least Michigan has a 31 yrs. old Speaker of the House currently. Or is it more like state governor is like both the European prime minister and president combined?
Governor is the highest position in US state governments. They're basically the president/prime minister of the state.
Ok, youngest current governor seems to be 41.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_governor...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_governor...
Also an insanely homogenous population
People keep saying that and it's incredibly wrong, those are the countries that took more refugees per capita than about anyone else.
Economic migrants. Besides, it damaged the homogeneous culture and now crime is in the rise.
Less so in recent years. But Finland’s neighbor, Sweden, has been seeing a sharp rise in crime as a result.
At least in the US city councils there is often a hotbed of politics and corruption it seems. I consider the city-council/property-developer interface to be the greatest scale of corruption in the US.
if old people are not fighting to get the job, there 's probably not a lot of power involved
It's not that there is no power, My experience is that the Finns (working with them) always came to a consensus when making difficult decisions. Everyone has a voice. Just a different style of Leadership than most of the US Companies I have worked for.
The US' bent toward authoritarian power can be traced directly to our history of colonialism and slavery. It's written into our laws and constitution.
[deleted]
Of course, there is a law that the USA president must be 35+
William Pitt the younger, one of the most influential British Prime ministers of all, assumed office when he was just 24.
Currently youngest. Sebastian Kurz, former (and very likely future - he's been reelected and currently in coalition talks) chancellor of Austria, is younger.
He technically isn't a Prime Minister, but Chancellor.
But yes, definitely a head of government.
So the headline is literally correct, but factually wrong.
But yes, definitely a head of government.
So the headline is literally correct, but factually wrong.
I really don't get HN sometimes. The russian doping ban article was flagged fore political, yet this one stays up even tho I feel this is more political https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21742239
And before everyone says "Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate". I'm not complaining just observing situations like this + HN lacks appropriate open ways for meta discussion (which Reddit actually does better), you can only do this in submission comments
And before everyone says "Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate". I'm not complaining just observing situations like this + HN lacks appropriate open ways for meta discussion (which Reddit actually does better), you can only do this in submission comments
The doping article is more likely to stir up drama. People have strong feelings about Russia, drugs, the olympics, etc. This article is just interesting - it may involve political figures but there's not really much politics at play. To quote the on-topic guidelines: "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity".
To be fair (I'm the submitter) I thought of it as more of an interesting article about social progress and the leadership in some areas of countries not always in the news - rather than being a political story per se.
From the guidelines:
Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon.
(My emphasis, and I've clipped the addendum about if it would be featured on TV news it might not be relevant here).
From the guidelines:
Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon.
(My emphasis, and I've clipped the addendum about if it would be featured on TV news it might not be relevant here).
HN, like any subreddit, has inherent bias in its moderation. I suspect the fact that Russia was involved prompted the removal of the other story -- if I were a moderator, I would just expect any thread involving Russia and international politics to be a dumpster fire. Finland is a bit easier for Americans to avoid passionate political opinions with.
Moderators didn't do anything to either that submission or this one. Users flagged them.
I did change the title on this one to match what the article currently says; that's all.
I did change the title on this one to match what the article currently says; that's all.
Fwiw The original title as I recall also reflected the title of the article (which seems to have changed since I submitted it); I clipped the "Finnish" prefix as it exceeded HN permitted length.
No worries, and yup, I had a feeling that happened. (That's why I said "currently".)
I would like a left vote/right vote.
Would be interesting to see the posts where both counts cancel under a Header of Neutral (non polarizing) content.
Similarly content(posts AND comments) getting "high" left and right counts can be sent off under separate Headers for the respective fan clubs to feast on.
Would be interesting to see the posts where both counts cancel under a Header of Neutral (non polarizing) content.
Similarly content(posts AND comments) getting "high" left and right counts can be sent off under separate Headers for the respective fan clubs to feast on.
I mean, you've effectively described Facebook's news feed so I don't think HN needs to build it.
Well, this sounds like Ice Town all over again.
Hmm, I don't know how it is in other countries, but in the USA retired presidents receive a yearly salary for life. Get yourself elected at 35. Screw around for 4 years. Retire at 39 with a good enough yearly pension to do nothing for the rest of your life. Brilliant.