It’s time to fare forward towards a more responsible future in which each and every person is cared for as they are, says the Christian Democrats’ presidential contender Sari Essayah.

I JOINED the presidential campaign because of my conviction that Finland needs a clear sense of direction if we are to ensure a good, equal standard of life for future generations. The path we need to take leads towards a more cohesive, caring society, where the weakest are cared for and no one is left behind.

Most people forget that Finland has a long history of multiculturalism and ethnic minorities going back centuries.

When writing this column, another December day has passed without hardly any light, a drizzle dripping from the sky from morning till night, and a fairly nasty wind blowing from the sea. These are the days when the thought occurs why anyone would voluntarily move to my dear homeland.

Helsinki Times will publish Viewpoints from each of the presidential candidates from now until 19 January, three days before the presidential election. Next week’s Viewpoint is by Eva Biaudet (SFP).

Internationalism has been good to Finland in the past, and it is in everyone’s interest that we do not turn our backs on the wider world in times of crisis, argues National Coalition Party presidential candidate Sauli Niinistö.

A country that is in danger of losing sight of its core values and of losing hope in the future needs a head of State who can reunite and reinvigorate the country, says presidential candidate Paavo Lipponen.

IT’S A QUESTION I have been frequently asked on the campaign trail in recent weeks: Why do I want to be President? The inquirers usually soften the question, along the following lines: Why, now that constitutional amendments have left the President with precious little power?

For all the reforms that have been made, the office of the President of Finland still carries enough clout to rectify governmental misinterpretation of the Constitution. The incoming President should not be afraid to exercise these prerogatives, argues Paavo Väyrynen.

MANY TAKE the view that since the constitutional amendments, the office of the President of Finland has been weakened. That is not necessarily so. According to the Constitution, the President is still the leader of Finland’s foreign policy. This extends also to the shaping and implementation of both foreign and security policy.

Helsinki Times speaks to Professor Nils Erik Forsgård, who has recently published a book about the American author and journalist Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961).

Why did you choose to write about Hemingway?

Well, I needed to make peace with Hemingway. I have been reading his books and about him since I was 12. He has been following me for almost four decades, and I needed to get him out of my system. And it’s also been 50 years since he died. The initial starting point was to have a kind of Scandinavian perspective on Hemingway.

Western sentiment for the Dalai Lama’s view of Tibet overlooks the broader perspectives of the country’s history, geography and present-day economic realities, writes Rigzin Losel.

Regrettably, seldom are the views of educated and non-monastic Tibetans in China heard outside China. Since they joined the rest of China in political and economic development in 1959, more and more Tibetans have become educated, modern and middle class. They are the majority of Tibetans, whose voices should matter. Yet, their intellect, integrity and independence are questioned by their exiled ...

In an increasingly globalised world economy Europe must capitalise on its uniquely rich cultural heritage and convert it into a source of economic growth and prosperity, writes István Szabó.

The motion picture – the film – developed into the most important means of communication in the second half of the 20th century. As it recorded the events in action and motion, we can call it the memory of the 20th century, the chronicler of its culture. If culture is an active form in which different behaviours, attitudes and tradition-based morality appear, then films can record these in their original reality. But apart from documenting reality, films...

The Nordic stereotype of the body beautiful is slowly filling out with age and Finns must not be complacent about a serious and growing public-health problem, writes Eliot Baker.

I was splashing in the knee-high water lapping against the sugary sand of Pori’s Yyteri beach when I glanced down at my belly, a little ashamed at how unprepared I was for the scorching-hot summer. I surveyed my fellow beach-goers’ mid-sections to see how far behind the eight ball I actually was, conscious of the fact that I was representing America: “Home of the Gluttonous, Land of the Fat.”

In these difficult times, Europeans need to reflect on how far we have progressed as a union. Now is not the time to fan the flames of dissent and social agitation that last swept through Europe in the 1930s, writes Minister Pär Stenbäck.

When you try to dive into a subject you find important, the first thing you often do is to open the web. I did it. I searched for the subject, “The Relevance of Europe”, and I expected to find vast quantities of articles, dissertations, opinion polls and so on.