PUBLIC TRUST AND PARTICIPATION DEPENDING ON ETHNICITY IN LATVIA

Abstract

Low public trust in public power institutions is still an urgent problem among the Member States of the European Union. According to the latest Standard Eurobarometer 80 data, the trust continues decreasing. In Latvia trust indicators are also markedly low - 17% residents of Latvia trust in the national parliament, 21% - in the government, but the indicator of trust in political parties is explicitly critical – it constitutes only 6%. Since the Eurobarometer research only includes citizens' opinion, we can assume that the trust indicators are even lower. The population of Latvia consists of the Latvians, who are the titular nation - 59.6%, the Russians - 27% and other national minorities, for instance, the Ukrainians and the Byelorussians. The issue of the integration of the Russian speaking people has been topical in Latvia since the mid 90ties, however, as a result of the unsuccessful integration policy, there is still an alarming number of non-citizens in Latvia, which, according t)