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Miksi lapset eivät osallistuneet kampanjaan?

Miksi lapset eivät osallistuneet kampanjaan?
Why didn't the children participate in the campaign?
From Lesson 85:Active past participle plural (-neet)·Finnish

Questions & Answers about Miksi lapset eivät osallistuneet kampanjaan?

How is the word osallistuneet formed here?
It comes from the verb osallistua (to participate), which is a Type 1 verb. To form the plural past participle for a Type 1 verb, you drop the final -a or -ä and add -neet. It is used here with eivät to form the negative past tense.
Why is kampanjaan used instead of kampanjassa for 'in the campaign'?
In Finnish, the verb osallistua requires the illative (into) case, not the inessive (in) case. Even though we say 'participate in' in English, Finnish expresses this as directing your participation 'into' the event. That is why kampanja gets the ending -an.
Why do we use eivät instead of just ei?
The negative verb in Finnish must match the subject. Since the subject lapset (the children) is plural, we use the 'they' form of the negative verb, which is eivät. Both the negative verb and the main verb (osallistuneet) show that the subject is plural.
Since this is a negative sentence, why isn't lapset in the partitive case?
It is a common mistake to put everything in the partitive in negative sentences! However, only the object of a negative sentence goes into the partitive. The subject (the one doing the action, or in this case, not doing it) stays in the basic nominative plural form. Here, lapset is the subject, so it remains lapset.

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