Vjačeslavs Dombrovskis (; born 27 December 1977 in

Riga Riga ( ) is the capital, Primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Latvia, largest city of Latvia. Home to 591,882 inhabitants (as of 2025), the city accounts for a third of Latvia's total population. The population of Riga Planni ...

) is a

Latvian Russian 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 occupation of Latvia when the size of the community grew from 8.8% of ...

politician and

economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...

, who has previously served as the Minister for Education and Science and as Minister of Economics of Latvia. Dombrovskis has a bachelor's degree from the

University of Latvia University of Latvia (, shortened ''LU'') is a public research university located in Riga, Latvia. The university was established in 1919. History The University of Latvia, initially named as the Higher School of Latvia () was founded on Se ...

in economics and finance and a doctor's degree from

Clark University Clark University is a private research university in Worcester, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1887 with a large endowment from its namesake Jonas Gilman Clark, a prominent businessman, Clark was one of the first modern research uni ...

in economics. He also attended

George Mason University George Mason University (GMU) is a Public university, public research university in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States. Located in Northern Virginia near Washington, D.C., the university is named in honor of George Mason, a Founding Father ...

as Visiting Fulbright Scholar. Dombrovskis gained Latvian citizenship through

naturalization Naturalization (or naturalisation) is the legal act or process by which a non-national of a country acquires the nationality of that country after birth. The definition of naturalization by the International Organization for Migration of the ...

in 1997.

Science career

Vjačeslavs Dombrovskis started his career as a Visiting Researcher in the Center for European Economic Research ZEW in Germany. In 2003 he joined The Baltic International Centre for Economic Policy Studies as a Research Fellow and worked there for almost nine years. From 2003 he also became a member of the Board of Soros Foundation Latvia. Since 2003 he was assistant professor at

Stockholm School of Economics in Riga The Stockholm School of Economics in Riga (''SSE Riga'' or ) is a business school in Riga, Latvia. It is a subsidiary of the Stockholm School of Economics (SSE). The school was founded in 1994 by the Stockholm School of Economics with the suppo ...

until 2011. In 2015 he founded CERTUS Think Tank, where he was a chairman of the Board till 2018.

Political career

Dombrovskis entered politics in 2011, when he joined the newly founded

Zatlers' Reform Party The Reform Party (), formerly known as Zatlers' Reform Party (, ZRP) until April 2012, was a centre-right political party in Latvia founded by former President Valdis Zatlers on 23 July 2011. It won 22 seats in the Saeima in the 2011 election. ...

and was elected as a member of the Latvian parliament. For the following two years he was the leader of the Zatlers' Reform Party parliamentary fraction. Dombrovskis was appointed Minister for Education and Science of Latvia in May 2013, after the resignation of previous Minister Roberts Ķīlis. He vowed to continue to focus on the five education and science priorities set by his predecessor. He joined the Harmony party in 2018 and was nominated by

Nils Ušakovs Nils Ušakovs (; born 8 June 1976) is a Latvian politician, former mayor of Riga and former journalist. He was the board chairman of the left-wing party alliance Harmony Centre (2005–2014) and afterwards board chairman of the Social Democrati ...

and

Jānis Urbanovičs Jānis Urbanovičs (born 23 March 1959) is a Latvian politician and author. He has been a member of the Saeima since 1994. From 2005–2010 Urbanovičs was chairman of the National Harmony Party and from 2010–2014 and again since 2019 the chai ...

to be the Harmony party's Prime Ministerial candidate at the 2018 parliamentary elections. In September 2020, Dombrovskis was excluded from ''Harmony''. In January 2021, Dombrovskis announced that he planned to found a new party in the first half of 2021.

References

1977 births Living people Politicians from Riga Latvian people of Russian descent Reform Party (Latvia) politicians Social Democratic Party "Harmony" politicians Ministers of education and science of Latvia Deputies of the 11th Saeima Deputies of the 12th Saeima Deputies of the 13th Saeima Latvian economists University of Latvia alumni Clark University alumni Academic staff of the Stockholm School of Economics {{Latvia-politician-stub