The survey, conducted this year, asked respondents whether they feel proud to live in Latvia. 61% of Latvian residents, where the family speaks Russian, said that as a whole they feel proud to live in Latvia. 59% of residents from Russian speaking families also said that Latvia is independent, and 51% of Russian speakers consider themselves Latvian patriots as a whole.
The highest percentage are Russian speakers who consider themselves patriots of Latvia as their place of residence, which was 83% of respondents. The figures as a whole were lower than the average and those of Latvian speakers.
According to the survey 80% of residents, where the family speaks Latvian, are proud to live in Latvia, 84% are proud that Latvia is independent, 81% percent of Latvian speakers consider themselves patriots, and 88% are patriots of Latvia as their place of residence.
Only 26% of residents from Russian speaking families feel that Latvian state institutions are interested in listening to the opinions of residents. This percentage is only slightly higher for Latvian speakers 35%. Residents consider that municipal governments are more interested in listening to the opinions of residents.
As previously reported, at the end of 2017 Latvian was the mother tongue for 60.8% of Latvia’s population, according to data released by the Central Statistical Bureau, published on August 2. The mother tongue data are closely correlated to ethnic composition statistics: at the start of 2018, ethnic Latvians accounted for 62.2% of the population.
Also in 2015 LSM.lv reported that a survey of Latvia’s minority language schoolchildren found that they largely identify themselves as belonging to Latvia and link their futures to this country rather than considering themselves tied to Russia in any way.
