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Despite the finance industry's growing interest towards and crucial role in pursuing sustainable development, scholars' interest in the connection of finance and sustainability, the Circular Economy's nature as a possible enabler of sustainable development, and the research presenting multiple financial barriers to Circular Economy Business, there has been significantly little interest and detailed research about how finance can affect the large-scale transition to a more Circular Economy. The main purpose of this study was to contribute to filling that gap in the literature and hereby provide researchers and practitioners answers through the following objective. The twofold objective of this study was to identify what financial factors drive and/or inhibit transitioning to and operating by CE principles and how, and what characteristics of CE business and CE companies drive and/or inhibit their attractiveness as an investment or a debtor and how. Towards addressing the research objective, an explorative and qualitative study of the underlying issues was carried out. As a choice of analysis methodology, an iterative thematic analysis utilizing systematic combining and an extremely diverse set of both primary and secondary data was conducted. The data set consisted of Focus Group Discussions, observation data, secondary interviews and meetings, practitioner research reports and media data, originally produced between 2013 and 2020. The sources of data included experts amongst both practitioners and researchers from various relevant stakeholder groups: e.g. academics, CE company executives, regulators, legislators, financiers, NPOs and different kinds of interest groups were represented in the data. As a result, a framework of the identified financial factors affecting both transitioning to and operating by CE principles and CE business's attractiveness as investment was constructed. Also, a total of 44 propositions were derived on how each factor drives and/or inhibits the said subjects, indicating that there currently are more financial inhibitors than drivers to CE. The factors and the propositions were categorized into Sources of financing, Criteria for financing and Subjects of financing, of which the Criteria for financing contained the most driving and/or inhibiting factors. The study provides also pragmatic guidance on what practitioners can do to contribute to CE becoming a better-established paradigm of operation. To address regulators and legislators, the role of the public sector in making the playing field level for CE businesses using financial incentives, public funding organizations, procurement, legislation, and taxation is highlighted. For company executives operating by or planning to operate by CE principles, the results imply that they should pay significant attention to the profitability and financial viability of their Circular Business Models and to recognizing and mitigating the risks typical to CE business, such as market, technology, cash flow, supply chain, regulatory and end-client credit risk. For financiers, it is implied that the currently used financial risk and value assessment models used are in the need of renewing due to their unfitness for assessing CE business and that CE contains a potential business opportunity to be exploited. For the agenda of future research, it is recommended that the specifics behind the prevailing financial models' unfitness to CE, the means to distribute investments, other resources and risks fairly within Circular supply chains and the relationship between Socially Responsible Investing and CE are investigated further.

PurposeOpinions towards social security reflect the interests and ideologies that individuals have. The earlier population‐based opinion studies of the welfare state can be utilised when we are creating a theoretical background for examining the physicians' opinions but also physician‐specific indicators are needed. The purpose of this paper is to analyse physicians' opinions on social security. Opinions are compared to those of citizen‐level groups.Design/methodology/approachThe 2,000 working age physicians' random survey sample was picked from the register of the Finnish Medical Association (n = 1,092, response rate 54.6 percent). The data were analysed using frequencies and multinomial logistic regression analysis.FindingsCompared to all other citizen‐level groups, the physicians think that the level of social security is too high. Physicians want to target cuts somewhere else than social or health services. Female physicians support higher social security. Young doctors and specialists think more often that social security is too high. Left‐wing political orientation is the clearest predictor of all opinions.Originality/valueThe results are important because physicians are a big and powerful occupational group in the welfare state. The opinions of physicians towards the social security have not been studied in countries with large social security systems or countries where physicians are mainly public sector employees.

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to examine the attitudes of street-level bureaucrats from different agencies and sectors of the Finnish welfare state, namely municipal social workers, diaconal workers of the Lutheran church, benefit officials of the Social Security Institution and officials of private unemployment funds.Design/methodology/approach– The authors are interested in the following questions: What are the attitudes of street-level bureaucrats towards the labour market allowance? What is the impact of individual characteristics? The study utilised the unique national survey data of different groups of street-level bureaucrats from the year 2011 (totalN=2,313). The dependent variables focus on legitimacy of the basic level of labour market allowance and sanction policies. Analyses are built around five independent variables which measure professional, personal interest and ideological factors.Findings– There are differences both between and within groups of Finnish street-level bureaucrats with regard to their attitudes concerning the labour market allowance. Social and diaconal workers believe more often than officials that the level of labour market allowance is too low, and offer less support for the idea that an unemployed person should take any job that is offered or have their unemployment security reduced. The results show that the attitudes of bureaucrats are explained by length of work history, economic situation and ideological factors.Originality/value– There have been very few analyses comparing attitudes among different groups of bureaucrats. The present study is intended to fill this gap in the literature.

This article explores institutional change and the role of ideas in Finnish public sector reform from the late 1970s to 2007. The main purpose of the study is to explore the ideas advanced in favour of legislative reforms – what have been the objectives behind them and to what extent have the objectives and arguments changed. The analysis illustrates that there have been ideational changes behind the public sector reforms and that they have served as policy blueprints, ideological weapons and cognitive locks. The article shows that ideas are an important locus of policy development and a source of institutional change.

This article explores institutional change and the role of ideas in Finnish public sector reform from the late 1970s to 2007. The main purpose of the study is to explore the ideas advanced in favour of legislative reforms -- what have been the objectives behind them and to what extent have the objectives and arguments changed. The analysis illustrates that there have been ideational changes behind the public sector reforms and that they have served as policy blueprints, ideological weapons and cognitive locks. The article shows that ideas are an important locus of policy development and a source of institutional change. Adapted from the source document.

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the association between political party preference and trust in knowledge-based institutions, while also considering how political trust facilitates the association. The authors focus on the opinions of supporters of the six largest parliamentary political parties in Finland.


Design/methodology/approach
The data are based on a population level survey. First, the authors compared party supporters' trust in universities and YLE media. Second, the authors analyzed how political trust contributes to party supporters' trust in knowledge-based institutions by estimating predicted probabilities. Third, the authors derived the partial correlations from the non-linear probability models incorporated separately between trust in YLE, Universities and political trust, and compared the correlations across the parties. Finally, the authors conducted the logit models from which the authors post-estimated the predicted probabilities of having high trust in YLE and Universities according to the levels of political trust separately for each party.


Findings
The results showed a cumulation of trust, reflecting especially on the attitudes of the populist party supporters who tended to have lower trust in knowledge-based institutions and distrust was highly associated with low political trust. This cumulation of trust shows an interesting dynamic in how closely institutions are linked together in terms of attitudes on their legitimacy.


Originality/value
This study assesses the cumulation of distrust, while providing an alternative political spectrum to the US two party system that has been the major focus of past research. Furthermore, the study fills a gap in the research by being the first to assess the intersection of the trust dimensions.

PurposeThe study utilises unique survey data gathered from 12,427 party members. The dependent variable measures party members' in-party commitment and is based on willingness to donate money, to contribute effort, the feeling of belonging in the party network and social trust in the party network.Design/methodology/approachIn this article, we study how different extra-parliamentary online and offline activities are associated with in-party commitment amongst political party members from the six largest Finnish parties. We especially delve into the differences between members of the Finnish parties.FindingsWe found that extra-parliamentary political activity, including connective action through social media networks and collective action through civic organisations, is highly associated with members' in-party commitment. Additionally, members of the newer identity parties more effectively utilised social media networks, whilst the traditional interest parties were still more linked to traditional forms of extra-parliamentary political action.Originality/valueBy employing the sociological network theory perspective, the study contributes to ongoing discussions surrounding the impact of social media on political participation amongst party members, both within and beyond the confines of political parties.

AbstractClass cleavage has been an important factor in forming the West‐European party systems, and class identification can still be considered one of the key types of social identity, especially among members of older parties. Nevertheless, previous research has ignored the importance of party members' class identifications. In this study, we hypothesise that party affiliation can form a context of social identity in which party members' class identification is also strengthened. By analysing unique survey data of 12,427 members of the six largest Finnish parties, we examine the extent to which party members' class identifications stem from their party affiliations and how the relationship is reinforced by their partisan identity. The results suggest that traditional class‐cleavage elements still appear within class identification among the members of older parties. Members of left‐wing parties identified with the working class, and conversely, upper‐class identification was more prominent among members of centre‐right parties. Among members of newer political parties, the class was less relevant compared to members of traditional class‐based parties. Furthermore, we found that working‐class identification was strongly related to the strength of partisan identity.

Class cleavage has been an important factor in forming the West-European party systems, and class identification can still be considered one of the key types of social identity, especially among members of older parties. Nevertheless, previous research has ignored the importance of party members' class identifications. In this study, we hypothesise that party affiliation can form a context of social identity in which party members' class identification is also strengthened. By analysing unique survey data of 12,427 members of the six largest Finnish parties, we examine the extent to which party members' class identifications stem from their party affiliations and how the relationship is reinforced by their partisan identity. The results suggest that traditional class-cleavage elements still appear within class identification among the members of older parties. Members of left-wing parties identified with the working class, and conversely, upper-class identification was more prominent among members of centre-right parties. Among members of newer political parties, the class was less relevant compared to members of traditional class-based parties. Furthermore, we found that working-class identification was strongly related to the strength of partisan identity. ; publishedVersion ; Peer reviewed

Social media provides new platforms for political participation and ideological categorization. However, little research has been done on how party preference is related to politically active social media use. We begin with a consideration of how political participation on social media has evolved between various socio-economic and demographic groups in advanced information societies and especially in Finland. In our empirical analysis we examine the general use of social media as well as its use for political purposes with the aid of a nationally representative dataset, collected in 2017–2018 from 3724 Finnish citizens. We argue that there are notable differences between parties when examining their supporters' social media use for political purposes. The differences are related to the digital divides and political extremes. The results confirmed the idea that new political movements made up of younger and more educated supporters have been successful by leveraging social media. The study also revealed that the ideological gap between party supporters is greater in social media especially when examining new kinds of politics based on cultural questions, identity issues, and post-materialist values. ; Peer reviewed

This study provides a new frame of reference for understanding intraparty dynamics by analyzing party members' representativeness with respect to party supporters regarding socioeconomic status and the ideological spectrum in a multiparty system, namely that of Finland. The analysis is based on a unique member-based survey of Finland's six major political parties ( N = 12,427), which is combined with supporter data derived from a nationally representative survey ( N = 1648). The clearest difference was found between supporters' and members' social status as members were generally in clearly higher social positions. However, there is a wider gap between parties when comparing supporters and members in terms of social status. Findings show that political opinions on income equality are still a key difference between traditional mass parties at the different levels of party strata, while incongruence within parties is relatively low. In contrast to the traditional parties, the newer parties, namely the Finns and the Greens, are ideologically close to their supporters in terms of attitudes concerning immigration and environment. Together, these findings provide an interesting landscape of the last decade's changes in the Finnish political spectrum and contribute to the ongoing discussion on the changing forms of political parties.

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the development of household spending on physical recreation and the structural distribution of spending over the years 1985-2012 in Finland linked to various contextual factors including education level, income and area of residence.


Design/methodology/approach
The study uses Statistics Finland's consumption research data in a quantitative analysis toward adding a new dimension to research on Finns' physical recreation spending.


Findings
Findings show that the amount of money spent on physical recreation equipment and services has grown steadily. Finns' spending on physical recreation continues to be relatively conservative relative to income, though there are notable differences between population groups. The link between education level and physical recreation remains strong. The largest difference between education levels is between those having completed basic level education and those with higher education degrees. Household type also explains a great deal of the difference in amount spent on physical recreation. According to the results, physical recreation spending is central to the leisure activities of highly educated family units.


Originality/value
Research on the stratification of consumption habits in Finnish society has not yet addressed physical recreation spending. Furthermore, research on income spent on such activity by various population groups at different times has not been carried out. This paper provides research on both of these themes.