THE RESTITUTION OF INDIVIDUAL AND COMMUNAL PROPERTIES IN LATVIA AFTER 1990

Latvia dealt with over 50 years of nationalization and forced seizure of properties. In the present paper I intend to approach property restitution in Latvia, after the 1990s, in the context of the law’s configuration factors, as well as the social and political framework. The first part of the paper will present aspects regarding the socio-historical context in Latvia up until its independence, the second part Latvian laws on individual and communal property restitution, while the last part is reserved for particular aspects that were noticed in the policy of property restitution. The present paper has a heuristic value, being, together with a series of other such papers, proof of the manner in which the process of property restitution in former communist countries involves both the adoption of an adequate legislation and a mobilization, a restructuring of societal resources in order to apply the adopted laws.