STOMACHING CHANGE: FINNS,FOOD, AND BOUNDARIES IN THE EUROPEAN UNION

The relationship between boundaries, national identity, and food in the European Union is examined empirically in relation to social trust, banal nationalism, and scale. 212 articles published in 2002 in Finland's leading newspaper are examined as deep texts, addressing five juxtapositions: openness/closure; exports/imports; collectives/individuals; fear/opportunity; and defence/promotion. These articles, about food safety and changes in manufacturing and retail, reveal a concern over Finland's “national interest”; the fluidity of the sense of safety; a strong belief in the superiority of “Finnish ways”; and a need to defend “Finnishness” locally and nationally against globalization. The results show that perceptions of trustworthiness and shifting loyalties steer people's behaviour in a way that affects supranational, national, and regional entities. The study confirms the value of examining quotidian elements in the geographical study of boundaries and social trust. The results highlight the importance of considering the reproduction of nations in the geographical assessment of nationalism.     

THE BODY AS A BATTLEFIELD: APPROACHING CHILDREN'S POLITICS

This article discusses the active role of children in everyday politics. Distinct from empowerment, it is suggested that children can be political on their own terms. The article focuses on revealing the social production of childhood, which takes place in the confrontation between child policy and children's own politics. Children's bodies are found to be both the main focus of policy practices and a central avenue of children's own agency. Hence, children are understood to be not only objects of policy, but also embodied political subjects. Using the example of Finnish child evacuees' experiences during the Second World War, it is shown that, despite their positions in policy fields, children do act as political selves. Using the ideas of Michel de Certeau and Carl Schmitt, it is argued that there is an autonomous politics to children which can be recognized as a significant means of coping in their everyday lives. On these grounds, the article sets out to use Pierre Bourdieu's concept of political struggle in considering childhood spatialities in more detail. Overall, children's politics are understood as a wider geographical concept which requires further examination.