Language policy in Latvia

Articles 4 and 114 of the Constitution of Latvia form the foundation for language policy in Latvia, declaring Latvian to be the official state language and affirming the rights of ethnic minorities to preserve and develop their languages. Livonian language is recognized as "the language of the indigenous (autochthon) population" in the Official Language Law, but Latgalian written language is protected as "a historic variant of Latvian." All other languages are considered foreign by the Law on State Language (Official Language Law in other translations). Latvia provides national minority education programmes in Russian (the first language for over one third of the population), Polish, Hebrew, Ukrainian, Estonian, Lithuanian, and Belarusian.

The preamble to the Official Language Law includes as its goals "the integration of members of ethnic minorities into the society of Latvia, while observing their rights to use their native language or other languages; ndthe increased influence of Latvian in the cultural environment of Latvia, to promote a more rapid integration of society."

Legal framework

The official language (''valsts valoda'', literally ''state language'') in Latvia is Latvian; this status has been explicitly defined since 1988. In 1992, amendments to the 1989 Law on Languages strengthened the position of Latvian. All other languages, including the native Livonian language are defined as foreign languages in Section 5 of the Official Language Law of 1999. Section 3.3 stipulates that ' e State shall ensure the development and use of the Latvian sign language for communication with people with impaired hearing.'

Since 1998, the official status of Latvian has been written into the Constitution (Article 4); and since 2002, MPs have been asked to promise to strengthen Latvian as the only official language in order to take their seats (Article 18). In the Constitution's chapter on human rights, rights to get answers from authorities in Latvian are specified since 2002 (Article 104). The current Official Language Law Law was not amended since its adoption in 1999 (as at 2017).

In 1995, Latvia signed, and in 2005 ratified the Council of Europe's Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. When ratifying it, the Latvian Saeima (Parliament) made two declarations (worded as reservations) limiting the implementation of Articles 10 and 11. As at 2008, Latvia did not plan to sign the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

Language policy is implemented by a number of institutions: the State Language Commission (under the President) prepares proposals in this field; the State Language Centre (under the Ministry of Justice) executes control, imposes fines for administrative violations and translates documents of international significance; the Latvian Language Agency (under the Ministry of Education and Science) provides consultations and opportunities for learning Latvian and analyses the language situation.

Official use of languages

Since the Official Language Law came into force in 2000, submitting documents to the government (local included) and state public enterprises is allowed in Latvian only, except in cases specially defined in the law (emergency services, foreign residents, etc.), according to Section 10. From 1992–2000, authorities had to accept documents in Russian, German and English, too, and were allowed to answer in the language of the application.

Before the losses of the Latvian government in the cases '' Podkolzina v. Latvia'' ( ECHR) and '' Ignatāne v. Latvia'' ( UN HRC), a certain level of command in Latvian was asked for eligibility to Parliament and local councils. In practice, this had led to re-examinations of various candidates, at least sometimes unexpected, which prevented Ignatāne and Podkolzina (representatives of the Equal Rights party in the 1997 local and 1998 parliamentary elections) from participation. As of 2011, candidates do not need to prove language proficiency, but elected members of Saeima and local councilors can be deprived of mandate for insufficient command of Latvian.

Names and surnames in Latvian-issued documents are formed in Latvianized form, according to Section 19. These provisions were subject in ECHR cases ''Kuhareca v. Latvia'' and ''Mencena v. Latvia'' (both declared inadmissible in 2004), since the Latvian Constitutional Court had found them constitutional in 2001. An analogous application was submitted to UN HRC in 2007 and won by the applicant on grounds of privacy ('' Raihman v. Latvia'').

Toponyms are formed in Latvian only (on the Livonian coast in Livonian as well), according to Section 18 of the Official Language Law.

The Electronic Mass Media Law orders to use only Latvian in the first channels of public radio and television, and basically Latvian in their second channels (Section 66).

The government of Latvia in its policy documents refers to Latvia as a (democratic) nation state, constructing societal integration on the basis of Latvian, while respecting the diversity of languages. Unity block, comprising most of the governing coalition as of 2011, also describes Latvia as a nation state. The idea of the nation state, where "language = nation", is seen as the core and main engine of the language policy of the Latvian state. Critics draw parallels between measures of the Latvian government and the assimilation of linguistic minorities in various countries.

One critic, James Hughes, Reader in Comparative Politics at the London School of Economics and Political Science, has pointed out that Russian-speakers in Latvia constitute one of the largest linguistic minorities in Europe, therefore he considers Latvia's language laws to be denying Russophones their language rights, and thus they are contrary to international practice in the field of minority rights. Nataliya Pulina in '' Moskovskiye Novosti'' asserts that Latvia's Russophones are by percentage actually the largest linguistic minority in the EU whose language has no official status. Regarding the demographic arguments for Russian language rights in Latvia, the BBC
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