The World's Youngest Female Prime Minister: The Generation of Leaders Shaping the Future

Humble origin

Sanna Marin was born in Helsinki, Finland, in 1985 and lived in several cities before her family settled in the southern city of Tampere. In Tampere, Marin was raised in a same-sex household with a female mother and her mother’s partner. In a 2015 interview with Finnish website Menaiset, Marin said she always felt invisible because she couldn’t talk openly about her “rainbow family” – which was not recognized as a real family.

Portrait of the world's youngest female Prime Minister. Photo: Getty

After her mother and partner split up, Sanna Marin was raised by her mother. She was always supported by her mother and believed that “you can do anything if you want to”. Her mother’s upbringing had a profound influence on Marin’s later political activities. “For me, everyone was equal. It was not a matter of opinion. It was the basis of everything,” Marin said, but as a child she never dreamed of becoming Prime Minister. “I could never imagine that. Politicians and politics seemed so far away from me,” she said of her family’s working-class life. Marin was the first in her family to attend university and soon became involved in politics. “It’s not because I come from a rainbow family that I got into politics. I got into politics because I thought the older generation wasn’t fully addressing the big issues of the future. I needed to act.”

Her career began in 2012, when she was elected to the city council of Tampere, Finland’s third-largest city. When councillors were torn over whether to build a high-speed tram in the city, Marin asked the council to decide – her first major political success. Running Tampere taught Marin the importance of consensus. “You can only get things done with the cooperation of others. This is the most valuable thing I have learned over the years,” the prime minister said.

Marin was soon elected to parliament, and when the center-left Social Democrats, led by Antti Rinne, won the April 2019 elections, Marin was appointed transport minister. That December, after a two-week postal strike that spread to other industries, Prime Minister Rinne lost the support of one of his coalition partners and resigned. The Social Democrats elected Marin as their replacement. Sanna Marin, then 34, becameYoungest Prime Minister in Finnish Historyand the world's youngest female head of state. That status has put her and her coalition government, made up mostly of young women, in the spotlight on the world stage. But for Marin, the country's challenges have kept her focused on more than the feeling of victory. "Sanna didn't have a political honeymoon after taking office, but she adapted quickly. By implementing a lockdown in March 2020, Sanna kept the Covid-19 infection rate in Finland lower than any other European country. She has proven that good leadership does not depend on age," said Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg.

Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin (6th from left) takes a photo with European leaders. Photo: CNN

Symbol of future and hope

Ms Marin currently heads a government in which 12 of the 19 Cabinet positions are held by women. But inFinland, a country that has had two female prime ministers before and has consistently been at the forefront of gender equality, it is no surprise. “We have long been pioneers in gender equality,” the prime minister said of her country, which was also the first European country to give all women the right to vote.

But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing left to do on gender equality. Marin’s government is still working to close the gender pay gap (which in Finland is close to 20%) and to convince men to make parental leave a priority. Before taking office, she also expressed support for a four-day work week, which would give parents more time to spend with their families.

Climate change is also a key pillar of the young Prime Minister's agenda. Her government has pledged to achieve carbon neutrality by 2035. If successful, Finland would be one of the first countries in the world to do so.net emissionsnet zero – an ambitious goal to combat global warming. Transport emissions will be cut by 50% by 2030, she said, through a combination of public transport initiatives, subsidies for renewable fuels and the development of new technologies. All of this is aimed at making Finnish society not only economically and socially sustainable, but also environmentally sustainable.

Prime Minister Sanna Marin (center) with some members of the cabinet. Photo: EPA

Finland is famous for its cleanliness and has been listed by the United Nations as one of the happiest places in the world. It may sound magical, but “Finland is not a dream world,” Marin said. “We have problems.” It is a clear fact that, like many countries across Europe, Finland has seen the rise of populist politics. The far-right Finns Party is now the second largest party in parliament and saw its popularity rise in the 2019 election. It is a big challenge for Ms. Marin to preserve Finland’s long-standing liberal society. However, so far, the young Prime Minister’s reputation and support have been maintained.

Finnish journalist Jasmin Ojalainen said that her supporters and the younger generation have high hopes for the leader. “It seems that most people have a positive impression of her, as someone who is approachable, driven and principled,” Ojalainen said. Sanna Marin’s success also proves that the long-standing political paradigm is changing, opening up progress and empowering women.