Finnish Socialist Workers' Republic

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The Finnish Socialist Workers' Republic was a short-lived socialist government, established by a revolution just prior to the Finnish Civil War and in the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution. It did not assume this name until January 28, 1918, by decree of the Helsinki Soviet (then called the People's Council of Helsinki).

The revolution was initiated by the pro-Bolshevik faction of the Social Democratic Party of Finland. People’s Councils (kansanvaltuuskunta), which would today be called Soviets, were organized by Finnish Socialists, with the Soviet of Helsinki as the seat of government. The new state negotiated a treaty of friendship with Soviet Russia which was finalized on March 1 and signed in Petrograd. The Finnish Reds were defeated in the end of April 1918 in the Finnish Civil War by the Finnish White Guards supported by the armed forces of Imperial Germany.

The Socialist Republic's program and draft constitution, written by Otto Ville Kuusinen, was influenced by social democratic ideals, by the generally liberal ideas of the United States Declaration of Independence, and by the Swiss cantonal system. The main goal was social reform, and the declared means to achieve this was parliamentary democracy based on the principle of sovereignty of the people and of national self-determination. The Marxist concept of proletarian dictatorship was absent from the program, despite the interest among some Finnish Social-Democrats in establishing one. The Finnish Socialist Workers' Republic was nevertheless supported by the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic, which also supported moderate Communist governments in Hungary and Bavaria. The Finnish Socialists began the war almost completely in control of the country's industrial south, while their White enemies controlled the larger, but sparsely populated northern regions. The entry of German-trained White Finns, and the German army itself, into Finland forced the Finnish Socialist Workers' Republic to rely heavily on Soviet aid, military and economic, which was sparse as the RSFSR was busy with the Russian Civil War. The Reds were defeated and tens of thousands of Social-Democrats fell victim to the White Terror, the rest going underground or fleeing the country. In the months that followed, the party split with a faction of refugees forming the Communist Party of Finland in exile in Moscow.