COPING WITH PEACE AFTER A DEBACLE

This article analyzes a situation when the war was actually over and society began to recover. The government faced a severe challenge after the war. These serious problems will be analyzed in the light of the Great Northern War (1700–1721). The plans of the central government to stabilize society will be analyzed, as will the different kinds of planning activities undertaken by the authorities. The critical nature of the situation led the government to concentrate solely on short‐term planning. The government had no proper strategies; there were just a couple of exceptions to this rule. Firstly, the problems in Finland were repeatedly concrete and tangible. This made them both easy to address and essential to redress. Conditions in Finland became an issue of the first order. Even here decisions were dictated to a great extent by short‐term goals. Another strategy was connected with notion of the ‘primacy of the economy’. The government tried to deal with the problems by granting tax exemptions and reliefs, or correspondingly by cut‐backs in areas other than those that had been devastated. The machinery of government was not able to create anything new after the war, but its supervision of existing activities was excellent. This was important with respect to the allocation and use of the meagre resources.