At the turn of the century, the country’s institutions were under a real threat of dissolution. At the same time, however, real democratic development begun. In 1907, universal suffrage was introduced and the first democratically elected parliament was elected. First women parliamentarians in the world were also then elected. Finland proclaimed its independence in December 1917, shortly after the Bolshevik coup in Russia.
In January 1918 a bloody civil war broke out between "whites" and "reds", with Bolsheviks supplying assistance to the reds, and Germany to the whites. Politically, the issue was whether Finland should follow Russia on the road to revolution or not.