Authors

• Grönlund, Kimmo (Åbo Akademi University. Institute for Finland-Swedish Sociological Research)

Keywords

Swedish-speaking Finns, constituencies, language, parliamentary elections, political attitudes, political participation, political support, voting

Abstract

The election survey was collected after the 2003 parliamentary elections in Finland. First, the respondents were asked how often they discussed politics with others, and how interested they were in politics. They were presented with a set of attitudinal statements on using Finnish and Swedish, status of mother tongue, Sweden, Swedish People's Party in Finland, and the composition of the Government. The respondents were also asked whether they primarily identified with Finns in general, Swedish-speaking Finns, Finnish-speaking Finns, or other nationalities or language groups. In addition, they indicated which language was used in their home and how well they could speak Finnish.

In view of the elections, the respondents were asked whether they had voted in the 2003 parliamentary elections, how self-evident they considered voting, and whether choosing a party and candidate had been easy or difficult. They were also asked which party they had voted for, whether the party or the candidate had been more important to them when deciding on how to vote, whether they had voted for the same candidate before, and whether they personally knew the candidate they had voted for.

Background variables included the respondent's gender, age, education, occupation group, social class, marital status, household size, religiosity, region and municipality of residence, language proportion in municipality of residence, and electoral district.