Governor-General of Finland

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(Redirected from Governor General of Finland)
Jump to: navigation, search

Governor-General of Finland (Finnish: Suomen kenraalikuvernööri; Swedish: Generalguvernör av Finland) was the military commander and the highest administrator of Finland sporadically under Swedish rule in the 17th and 18th centuries and continuously in the autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland between 1808 and 1917.

After the final abolishment of the Duchy of Finland and related feudal privileges in the late 16th century, King of Sweden sporadically granted most or all of Finland under a specially appointed governor-general, who took care of the matters in the eastern part of the country more or less according to his own best judgement. Best known of these officials is count Per Brahe whose reign is still referred to in Finland as the "count's days" (kreivin aikaan), meaning something positive that happens just in time.

During the time when Finland was a part of Russian Empire, governor-general's position was permament. He was the vicar of the emperor, who was not personally present in Helsinki, but resided in St Petersburg, just outside Finnish borders. Thereby, governor-general was constitutionally the chairman of the Senate of Finland, the government in the autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland (the chairmanship, with two votes, belonged constitutionally to the Grand Duke of Finland). The governor-general was the highest representative of the Russian Tsar/Grand Duke of Finland and received his instructions directly from the Tsar.

Finnish citizenship was not required of the governor-general, contrary to all other highest positions such as senators (members of the senate) and Finnish Minister Secretary of State. Most governors-general, and all he later ones, were Russians, men whom the emperor trusted as counterparts of potential Finnish separatism. Many of them, up to baron Rokassovski, however were made also Finnish subjects, by granting them a Finnish nobility rank.

Many of the governors-general were disliked by the Finnish population. The first man on the post, Sprengtporten, resigned after only a year and Bobrikov was assassinated in 1904 by Finnish nationalist Eugen Schauman. Ot the other hand, several governors-general worked in a way that guaranteed the Finnish autonomy in face of interests of ministers of Russian general government.

Governor-general Prince Menshikov (1831-55) sojourned his entire term in St Petersburg, being simultaneously the Russian Minister of Navy. Gubernatorial duties in Helsinki were cared for by the deputy governor-general. For most of the term, in that position was general Alexander Amatus Thesleff.

v • d • e
Governors of Grand Duchy of Finland
Sprengtporten • Barclay de Tolly • Steinheil • Armfelt • Steinheil • Zakrevskiy • Menshikov • von Berg • Rokassovski • Adlerberg • Heiden • Bobrikov • Obolenski • Gerhard • Boeckmann • Seyn • Stahovich • Nekrasov
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governor-General_of_Finland"
Advanced Search
Included Web Search Engines


Safe Search

close

Top Matching Results

Occasionally Search.com will highlight specialized results that are based on the context of your query. Examples of specialized results include specific links to news, images, or video.

Top Matching Results may highlight information from other Search.com pages, content from the CNET Network of sites, or third party content. The listings are based purely on relevance. Search.com does not receive payment for listings in this section but our partners that provide this data may get paid for listing these products.

Sponsored Links

This section contains paid listings which have been purchased by companies that want to have their sites appear for specific search terms and related content. These listings are administered, sorted and maintained by a third party and are not endorsed by Search.com.

Search Results

Search.com sends your search query to several search engines at one time and integrates the results into one list which has been sorted by relevance using Search.com's proprietary algorithm. You can customize the list of search engines included in your metasearch from the preferences.

The search engines that are used in your metasearch may allow companies to pay to have their Web sites included within the results. To view the Paid Inclusion policy for a specific search engine, please visit their Web site. Search.com does not accept payment or share revenue with any search engine partner for listings in this section.