The voice of society in healthcare politics in Latvia

Ieva Bikava,Ilga Kreituse,Andris Skride

doi:10.1051/shsconf/20208501001

Abstract

It is impossible to imagine contemporary democracy without society participation in the process of developing regulations and implementation of changes that have a significant impact on society. The opinion of the society is represented by social communities, interest groups, and other non-governmental organizations, which unite people with similar views and ideas and serves as a representative of common opinion to government. The principles of good governance demand cooperation and collaboration with society in all phases of developing, implementing and assessing changes in any policy. The article represents the research on evaluation of cooperation and collaboration practice, as well as an assessment of used lobbying strategies and evaluation of their results in Healthcare politics in Latvia. The research is based on in-depth interviews with the representative of main actors presenting the NGO sector, as well as the representatives of the Ministry of Welfare. The research results indicated that actors that operate in Healthcare sector use all of the possible lobbying techniques with various outcomes. The achieved results are dependent on the skills and available resources of Interest groups, on the desire and possibilities to follow good governance principles in state authorities, as well as of the topical issue.

Highlights

Latvia is a state in transition or a “new democracy”, located in the Baltic Sea region in Northern Europe
The collaboration of Medical Nurse Association (MNA) and the Ministry of Health showed an excellent example of the good participatory governance in the case, when the non-governmental organizations (NGO) has the knowledge and expertise and is open to discussion, and can provide state institutions with initiatives that have a well-prepared background and can solve actual problems
Summarizing the research results – Latvia is a democratic state that is governed according to contemporary governance principles, providing the participatory and collaborative governance and appropriate normative base to provide civic participation in every phase of the regulations, from problem defining and change initiation, through decision making and implementation, and till the implementation and evaluation phase

Summary

Introduction

Latvia is a state in transition or a “new democracy”, located in the Baltic Sea region in Northern Europe. Direct lobbying includes all the methods used in direct communication with the governmental decision making – writing letters, meeting in person, working in workgroups, attending the meetings of committees, submitting the opinion over the policy drafts, bringing the topical issue, providing the data, expertise, and information, working on research projects, etc All those activities are included in terms of “cooperation” and “collaboration” among the state and non-state parties. In the process of developing government goals and guidelines, or evaluating existing policies, NGOs can raise the importance of the issue by attracting the attention of politicians and the media They can cooperate with the Prime Minister candidate and political parties (at the time of drafting the Declaration of the Government), with ministers and ministries of the new Cabinet of Ministers during the preparation and implementation of the Government Declaration Action Plan and keep track of declared tasks, plans and activities.

The assessment of lobbying tools used by NGOs

Research results

Conclusions