Harmony Centre
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Harmony Centre (, SC; , ЦC) was a
social-democratic Social democracy is a social, economic, and political philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy and a gradualist, reformist, and democratic approach toward achieving social equality. In modern practice, socia ...
political alliance A parliamentary group, parliamentary caucus or political group is a group consisting of members of different political parties or independent politicians with similar ideologies. Some parliamentary systems allow smaller political parties, who a ...
in
Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...
. It originally consisted of five political parties: the National Harmony Party, the Socialist Party of Latvia,
New Centre The Centrists (, , ), known as The Centrists – New Centre ( , ) since 2018, formerly known as New Centre (, ) and European Social Liberal Party ( , ), is a centre-right political party in France formed by the members of the Union for French Dem ...
, the Daugavpils City Party, and the
Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...
. Through a series of mergers they were eventually reduced to two:
Social Democratic Party "Harmony" The Social Democratic Party "Harmony" (; , S),The party officially translates its name as ''Social Democratic Party "Concord"''. also commonly referred to as Harmony (''Saskaņa''), is a social-democratic political party in Latvia. It was the larg ...
and the Socialist Party. Ideologically a catch-all grouping of
centre-left Centre-left politics is the range of left-wing political ideologies that lean closer to the political centre. Ideologies commonly associated with it include social democracy, social liberalism, progressivism, and green politics. Ideas commo ...
and
left-wing Left-wing politics describes the range of Ideology#Political ideologies, political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy either as a whole or of certain social ...
parties, the alliance also aimed to represent the interests of
Russians in Latvia In Latvia, Russians have been the largest ethnic minority in the country for the last two centuries. The number of Russians in Latvia more than quadrupled during the Soviet re-occupation of Latvia in 1944, Soviet occupation of Latvia when the s ...
.


History

Founded on 9 July 2005, Harmony Centre emerged from For Human Rights in a United Latvia, an electoral alliance formed by the National Harmony Party, the Socialist Party and Equal Rights, that partially dissolved in 2003. Equal Rights represented the interests of the Russian minority and the Russian language in Latvia. The National Harmony Party, New Centre and the Daugavpils City Party joined at foundation, the Socialist Party in December 2005 and the Social Democratic Party in January 2009. The alliance aimed to consolidate the Latvian centre-left and promote Latvian-Russian amity. The first chairman was the head of New Centre Sergey Dolgopolov who was replaced in Autumn 2005 by
Channel One Russia Channel One ( rus, Первый канал, r=Pervý kanal, p=ˈpʲervɨj kɐˈnal, t=First Channel) is a Russian Television in Russia, federal television channel. Its headquarters are located at Ostankino Technical Center near the Ostankino To ...
Journalist Nils Ušakovs. In 2010 and 2011 the National Harmony Party, New Centre, Social Democratic Party and Daugavpils City Party merged to form the
Social Democratic Party "Harmony" The Social Democratic Party "Harmony" (; , S),The party officially translates its name as ''Social Democratic Party "Concord"''. also commonly referred to as Harmony (''Saskaņa''), is a social-democratic political party in Latvia. It was the larg ...
, which continued in alliance with the Socialist Party until 2014. In its nine years of existence, Harmony Centre became the most popular political force in the Latvian Parliament but remained in opposition. Various positions on Latvia's National Question, citizenship law and close relations with
United Russia The All-Russian Political Party United Russia (, ) is the Ruling party, ruling List of political parties in Russia, political party of Russia. As the largest party in the Russian Federation, it holds 325 (or 72.22%) of the 450 seats in the St ...
, perceived by the centre-right as incompatible with Latvian national interests, led to the alliance being excluded from government. In 2014, Harmony and the Socialist Party participated separately in the European election of that year. In the 2018 parliamentary election Harmony once again received the most votes, securing 23 out of 100 seats in the Latvian parliament, but was left outside the coalition.


Election results


Legislative elections


European Parliament elections


Political positions

Social democracy, progressive income taxation, minority rights, participatory democracy, internationalisation of higher education, good relations with Russia. Economically, Harmony Centre supported increased social spending, in order to boost the economy and increase general welfare.


On the occupation of Latvia

Both chairman of "Harmony Centre's" Parliamentary faction Jānis Urbanovičs and leader of the alliance Nils Ušakovs have rejected calling
Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940 The Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940 refers to the military occupation of the Republic of Latvia by the Soviet Union under the provisions of the 1939 Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact with Nazi Germany and its Secret Additional Protocol signed i ...
an " occupation", arguing that from the perspective of
international law International law, also known as public international law and the law of nations, is the set of Rule of law, rules, norms, Customary law, legal customs and standards that State (polity), states and other actors feel an obligation to, and generall ...
it was an "
annexation Annexation, in international law, is the forcible acquisition and assertion of legal title over one state's territory by another state, usually following military occupation of the territory. In current international law, it is generally held t ...
" instead, because
Kārlis Ulmanis Kārlis Augusts Vilhelms Ulmanis (; 4 September 1877 – 20 September 1942) was a Latvian politician and a dictator. He was one of the most prominent Latvian politicians of pre-World War II Latvia during the Interwar period of independence from N ...
actively collaborated with Soviet representatives in Latvia, and compared recognizing occupation of Latvia to repressions against the society. However, they admitted that "If it had been clearly stated already at the very beginning that recognizing the fact would in no way harm people who immigrated during the Soviet times, Harmony Center would agree to recognize even ten such occupations." Ušakovs has emphasized that "no doubt Latvia was forcibly annexed by the Soviet Union and it was followed by brutal Stalinist regime crimes against Latvia and its people", but also believed it's important to say that Soviet regime ended when the then-Russian Federation’s army left the country, claiming that otherwise, certain politic forces could bring up "de-occupation" again. Later Urbanovičs summarized similarly: "there were occupations in Latvia, there are no occupants". Both of them have also proposed to postpone the debate on national and historical issues and focus on the economic and social problems instead. MP from Harmony Centre Boris Tsilevitch has pointed out that no official documents testify Harmony Centre recognizing the occupation. MEP from Harmony Centre and chairman of the Socialist Party of Latvia, one of the parties making up Harmony Centre, Alfrēds Rubiks has also declared that he has never recognized Latvia’s occupation and never will, because he believes the country was not occupied by the Soviet Union.


On the Ukrainian crisis

Urbanovičs blamed the
Revolution of Dignity The Revolution of Dignity (), also known as the Maidan Revolution or the Ukrainian Revolution, took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capit ...
on what he believed were the "West's efforts to sabotage Russian plans for a
Eurasian Customs Union The Customs Union of the Eurasian Economic Union () or EAEU Customs Union () is a customs union of 5 post-Soviet states consisting of all the member states of the Eurasian Economic Union (Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia) wh ...
" and called the
Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation In February and March 2014, Russia invaded the Crimea, Crimean Peninsula, part of Ukraine, and then annexed it. This took place in the relative power vacuum immediately following the Revolution of Dignity. It marked the beginning of the Russ ...
"a desperate measure on the part of Russia in order to prevent economic and military imbalance in the contact zone of Southeastern Europe between NATO and Russia", citing the precedent of Abrene County as a partial justification. Ušakovs has said he fully supports Ukrainian
territorial integrity Territorial integrity is the principle under international law where sovereign states have a right to defend their borders and all territory in them from another state. It is enshrined in Article 2(4) of the UN Charter and has been recognized as c ...
, "including Crimea", but did not want to analyze who was to blame for what happened in Ukraine and called for an international investigation. He also criticised EU sanctions against Russia as ineffective and damaging for the Latvian economy. On 4 March 2014, 28 Harmony Centre deputies voted against a resolution of the
Saeima The Saeima () is the parliament of the Latvia, Republic of Latvia. It is a unicameral parliament consisting of 100 members who are elected by proportional representation, with seats allocated to political parties which gain at least 5% of the p ...
that strongly condemned Russia's military involvement and aggression in Ukraine.


References


External links


www.saskanascentrs.lv
{{Latvian political parties 2005 establishments in Latvia Defunct political party alliances in Latvia Russian political parties in Latvia Russian nationalist organizations Social democratic parties in Latvia