Social Democratic Party "Harmony"


The Social Democratic Party "Harmony", also commonly referred to as Harmony, is the largest party seeking to represent the Russian-speaking population of Latvia. The party was founded in 2010 as the merger of the National Harmony Party with New Centre and the Social Democratic Party, a breakaway from the Latvian Social Democratic Workers' Party. At that time, all three were members of the former electoral alliance Harmony Centre. The alliance also included the communist Socialist Party of Latvia. The Daugavpils City Party merged into the party in 2011.
The former chairman of the party, Nils Ušakovs served as the Mayor of Riga from 2009 to 2019 and was the "Harmony" candidate for the office of Prime Minister of Latvia in 2014. In the Saeima the party has 24 out of 100 seats after polling 23% of the vote at the 2014 parliamentary election. Its parliamentary group is therefore the largest among the six groups in the Latvian Parliament, and the leading opposition group. Internationally, "Harmony" is a member of the Progressive Alliance and the Party of European Socialists. After the 2014 European Parliament elections its sole MEP, Andrejs Mamikins, sat in the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats group in the European Parliament. In 2018, after disagreements with Ušakovs, he defected to the Latvian Russian Union and the party lost its representation in the European Parliament until the 2019 elections, when Ušakovs and his ally, former Vice Mayor of Riga Andris Ameriks were elected.
"Harmony" is currently the governing party on the Riga City Council in coalition with Honor to Serve Riga!, the successor to the centre-right Latvia's First Party/Latvian Way which dissolved in 2011. "Harmony" is the largest party seeking to represent the Russian-speaking population of Latvia.
On social policy, the party contains strong conservative elements in line with its voter base and setting it apart from the contemporary European social-democratic mainstream. The parliamentary membership is not uniformly socially conservative.

International relations

The party has strong ties with the Russian parties, in particular with Putin's United Russia and A Just Russia. These ties were strongly criticized by Latvian liberals and nationalist parties, which have consequently ruled out the possibility of an alliance with Harmony.
The party has been a member of the Progressive Alliance since its inception and was an observer member of the Socialist International from 2014 until its withdrawal in 2017.
In an attempt to improve its image, in 2017 Harmony joined the Party of European Socialists and announced that its cooperation agreement with United Russia has lapsed and had not been renewed.

Election results

Parliament (''Saeima'')

European Parliament

Symbols and logos