Unity (Latvia)

The party was founded as an electoral alliance of the New Era Party, Civic Union, and the Society for Political Change on 6 March 2010. It was reportedly founded in a bid to form a counterweight to the left-wing Harmony Centre alliance,[11] which had been strengthening in polls and elections, while the other right-wing parties (People's Party, For Fatherland and Freedom/LNNK and LPP/LC) were below the electoral threshold of 5%.[12]

The alliance, led by incumbent Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis from New Era, achieved a victory in the 2010 parliamentary election, despite the austerity measures enacted by his cabinet during the Great Recession of the late 2000s. Unity led the coalition with ZZS as junior partner until 2011.[13][14]

On 6 August 2011 the alliance was transformed into a single political party.[15] In the 2011 snap elections, the party came in third, but held on to the PM post in a coalition with the Zatlers' Reform Party and the National Alliance.

After five years in office, Valdis Dombrovskis resigned as PM after the Zolitūde tragedy in early 2014. He was succeeded by party colleague Laimdota Straujuma, who brought ZZS back into her coalition. For the 2014 general election, Unity announced an electoral pact with the Reform Party, which was later followed by a full absorption in March 2015.[16] The party improved on its previous result, coming in second at the polls and gaining 3 extra seats.

The second Straujuma cabinet, however, lasted only for about a year. After the demise of the Straujuma cabinet in late 2015, the party suffered from internal conflicts and defections of MPs to other political parties, undermining its ratings.[17][18][19][20] Nevertheless, it remained as the largest parliamentary party in the ZZS-led Kučinskis cabinet and it held 5 ministerial portfolios from early 2016 to 2018.

Before the 2018 elections the party formed the New Unity (Latvian: Jaunā Vienotība, JV) electoral party alliance (the party itself is still registered as Unity)[21] in April 2018 together with the regional Kuldīga County Party, For Valmiera and Vidzeme and For Tukums City and County parties, joined by the Jēkabpils Regional Party in June.[22][23] The Latgale Party, a previous partner of Unity, initially was uncertain whether to join New Unity, since a faction of the party supported a partnership with the Latvia's Regional Alliance,[24] ultimately signing a cooperation agreement in July.[25] An offer to join the list was also extended to the liberal Movement For! and the center-left Progressives party, but both parties eventually declined.[26]

New Unity alliance logo

While the JV list performed poorly, surpassing the 5% threshold only by 1.7% and becoming the smallest party in the parliament, the subsequent failure of the candidates for PM from the New Conservative Party and KPV LV to form a government by early January 2019 urged the President of Latvia, Raimonds Vējonis, to offer the opportunity to JV's candidate, former MEP Krišjānis Kariņš. The Kariņš cabinet, consisting of JV, the New Conservatives, KPV LV, Development/For!, the National Alliance was approved by the Saeima on 23 January 2019.[27][28][29]