How a remote and dreary village in Finland became world famous by advertising its pessimism.

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We walk through the woods for hours. Occasionally, there is a lake, farmland or a group of houses along the way. Suddenly a gigantic, bright yellow sign breaks the monotony. «Puolanka,» it says. Under the village name is embalzoned an evocative warning about our destination: «You can still turn back.»

Puolanka has a reputation, but not a good one. Some say it's the most desolate town in Finland. Among them are some of the 2500 or so residents of Puolanka. «There was a time,» says Tommi Rajala, a resident, «when Puolanka figured prominently in virtually every negative statistic. Whatever the issue — unemployment, disease, rural depopulation, aging — Puolanka was featured.»

When pessimism reigns

In 2006, frustrated by the lack of prospects, a group of people from the village got together and, with typical Finnish dark humor, said that if pessimism was all that was left, at least they wanted to be world class in it. And thus the Pessimistic Society was born. To celebrate their pessimism, they declared «pessimistic days.» The events would be celebrated every year, the entire year.

The Pessimist Society quickly gained notoriety far beyond Puolanka. But after attendance at the previously well-frequented meetings started to dwindle – in the end, only a handful of members were left – the society was on the verge of dissolving. They hadn’t even gotten the pessimism right.

But the Puolanka local council recognized an opportunity from the early success of campaign «pessimistic days:» the pessimism brand might have national appeal. Tommi Rajala, who had just returned from a long stay abroad, was tasked with reanimating the Pessimist Society. An IT specialist by training who spends most of his time filming documentaries and videos proved to be a good choice.

Rajala was bubbling with ideas. Today, Puolanka not only has a «House of Pessimism» complete with café, but also a pessimist musical that has achieved national fame and performs to a full house in the summer – or at least as many patrons as Covid 19 rules allow at the moment. There is an online shop with fan articles for pessimists, such as T-shirts, hoodies, coffee mugs or calendars, which all sell like hot cakes and largely finance Pessimist Society activities.

Humorously cryptic videos about Puolanka and its desolation, all professionally produced, have achieved cult status on social networks and get hundreds of thousands of clicks. Ever since broadcasters such as the BBC and Canada's CBC reported on the «dreary backwater in the middle of nowhere», Puolanka has become famous.

«The pessimists are the reason we love spending the summer here again,» say two twenty-somethings, Oskari and his bandmate Santeri. Oskari is an aspiring music teacher and drummer in a band. Santeri is the band’s guitarist, whose day job is in advertising. Both grew up in Puolanka, but then moved away to Oulu, a big city at the northern end of the Gulf of Bothnia, about a two-hour drive away.

The rural exodus continues

However, Puolanka’s basic problem remains. Although the village does not look run-down, it is obvious that there is little to distract the mind and that employment options are limited. In addition to a small service sector, the forestry and agricultural industries are the main sources of employment. They have become highly mechanized in recent decades. They are now more efficient, but require fewer workers. This is one reason Puolanka's population has shrunk from 7,000 in the 1980s to just over a third that today.

«That's why we need every job we can grab,» says Harri Peltola, the town’s mayor. Tourism offers some opportunities. The area lakes are well visited in summer and the snow attracts sports enthusiasts in winter. «Because we still have real winter here,» he says, with a dig at the south of Finland. International tourists also come. The visitors, plus people who own holiday homes in Puolanka, help to prevent the service sector from drying up completely — even if they only stay for a short time.

However, the mayor, Harri Peltola, is worried about the administrative reforms that have been set in motion by the central government. To streamline government resources for social services and health care, it plans to shift responsibility from the municipal to the regional level and to provide services in a less fragmented way. Peltola is less than enthusiastic about the plan. No one wants to drive a hundred kilometers to the dentist, for example.

Should we «shrink sensibly?»

Finland's aim to provide government services at a «uniform national standard» across the country collides head-on with the reality of a country of such a large landmass. There is a sharper contrast between Finnish metropolitan areas and remote settlements than between small villages and big cities in Central Europe, for example.

Urbanization experienced a significant boost in the 1990s, a time Nokia when rose to the status of a global corporation. There was an exodus from rural areas, says Rasmus Aro, who studies demographic trends at the Finnish Regional Development Agency (MDI). Unlike the first such exodus in the 1960s, this trend is no longer offest by high birth rates in rural areas. The main drivers of the rural exodus are the good training opportunities in cities, Aro says. Jobs in the countryside are not only limited, they are also lopsided – there are few options for women.

This is a relatively recent change, says Janne Antikainen, MDI director. When he was a student, there were roughly the same opportunities across the country. But today's generation is confronted with a widening gap between what is on offer in urban and surrounding areas. Some people see hope in remote work opportunities; the Covid 19 pandemic has proven that a home-office can work. But there is no single fix to stop the rural depopulation.

Perhaps the trend can’t be stopped at all. The government must then think about how it might help the affected areas shrink in a sensible way.

«An opportunity like no other»

A sensible idea, even if it is «just» pessimism, can launch a career. Santeri, the guitarist, tries his best to conceal his general disdain for Puolanka when discussing the village. But the Pessimism Society, born out of sheer desperation, now offers him creative opportunities he might never have had elsewhere, he says.

Tommi Rajala, who now earns a living from the project as a «full-time pessimist,» expresses a similar sentiment. It had never been his plan to return to Puolanka, and in fact he never wanted to live here. But his work gave him so much satisfaction and what he achieved with the project was so immense that it was more than worth the sacrifice. «The best time to be a pessimist is yet to come!» he says, laughing.

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