Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the role of the Vuoksi River in human-environment relationships. The Vuoksi is a field of political struggles, social construction and as a part of everyday practices. The picture is drawn from local and spatial contexts, from wider historical causes and effects and social processes.

Paper long abstract:

The Vuoksi is a place where ecological, economical, socio-cultural and political aspects are entwined. This paper discusses the changes of the Vuoksi River, the causes of these changes and the altering values of the water. Further, it deals with the place of the Vuoksi River in people's lives. The discussed changes have taken place in (1) the physical Vuoksi (2) the governance of the Vuoksi and (3) the significance of the Vuoksi. Physically, the Vuoksi as a currant has changed because of the construction of hydropower plants. The most dramatic changes in the governance of the Vuoksi took place when Finland ceded the area of Karelian Isthmus to the Soviet Union first after the Winter War 1940, and finally in 1944, after the Continuation War. The Vuoksi became a transnational resource of the Finland and the Soviet Union. The significance of the Vuoksi is strongly connected to the memories that the locals have from their everyday relationship with it.

This paper demonstrates that the long-term changes in both the governance and the physical river have had their effects on people's relationship with the Vuoksi. However, these changes have not altered the fact that the Vuoksi is important for the local people. Multiple changes have added new layers of narratives, new meanings and new dimensions to the Vuoksi River. Today there is a Vuoksi that is built by many different, but parallel—and sometimes even conflicting—narratives. Out of these narratives, a hybrid of continuity and change is formed.