“If we do not preserve the countryside, Latvia will cease to exist. A few large cities will remain and nothing more.”

President of Latvia Andris Bērziņš, BNS, 7 March

It has often been noted that the word “lauki” (countryside) in Latvian means more than just its technical definition – a territory outside the city with many fields, so to speak, such as arable land and meadows. It is not for nothing that American critic Sven Birkerts complains in his latest book of essays that the English word “fields” (the author does not mention the translation “countryside”, which I believe would be more accurate) does not evoke the same powerful emotions in him as the Latvian word “lauki”, which was used in Birkerts’ exile Latvian family. Indeed, the countryside is more of a mental construct, representing an idea important to Latvians of living closer to nature and its rhythms, of genuine and honest work, and of a slightly idyllic time when the Latvian way of life existed in a pure and primordial form.

When suggesting a trip to the countryside, a Latvian person hopes to “break away” from Riga and enter a different rhythm of life, one free from the negatives of the city. Going to the countryside is not merely moving from one geographical point to another – rather, it creates shifts in the individual themselves, triggered by the change of environment, where they can realise their true origins and sense of belonging, arriving in an environment that suits the Latvian mentality. It is said of New Yorkers that when they go out of the city, they take an iPod device with recordings of city noises and play them before sleep, because a true New Yorker cannot fall asleep in complete silence. Conversely, for a Riga-born Latvian, the peace and quiet of the countryside and an environment free from the modern world is like a spa for all the senses, helping them recover their strength. In the countryside, you, so to speak, do not let stress gnaw at you and you are who you are, without competing with anyone. At your country house or when visiting country folk, you are not judged by your ideas or erudition; there, no one has to prove anything. The Latvian in the countryside is, as it were, returning home, into a slightly childish environment celebrated in folk songs, finding themselves under nature's care and feeling especially welcome. In that sense, the Latvian countryside is the only place in the world where a Latvian is uniquely at home, without competition from strangers (this idyll might be disrupted only by some foreign land speculator).

The lack of competition is, of course, pleasant. Perhaps that is why President Bērziņš says that the countryside should be “preserved” rather than developed or modernised. Already, we see how modernisation is encroaching on the countryside – homesteads are being bought up by large entrepreneurs, owners of food-producing businesses oversee their holdings in an alienated way – from city offices, and herds of cows are being “consolidated” into large-scale farms. The influence of the modern world, even an assault on the countryside, is clearly not to the liking of the conservative President Bērziņš. It could be that in the President’s view, there is nothing more terrible than a landscape in the Latvian countryside where, near a large farm owned by foreigners, on a beautiful forest edge by a lake, there is a summer house belonging to two – or even three – Riga gays with a wine cellar and Wi-Fi.

Andris Bērziņš’ statement that Latvia will vanish if the countryside is not “preserved” belongs to the quite broad and slightly melancholic repertoire that tells of the threats of globalisation, the degradation of the modern world, and the demise of traditional society. It is an act of giving up. If cities cannot be protected from the interests of international business and the modern way of life, then the countryside must at least remain the final, untainted, truly Latvian value of the contemporary world that stands firm against the tide. If the countryside is to be preserved, it exists as a part of the past, a heritage that must be shielded from the uncertainty and risks of the future. Since the stakes of preserving the countryside in the President’s view are elevated to the survival of Latvia, we clearly see that Latvia as the countryside is being defined not in the light of the future, but in the light, or, excuse me, darkness of the past. The past in the countryside is something known and static, whereas the future in Riga and other large cities is associated with risk and uncertainty, hopes and disappointments, profit and loss. Defining Latvia as Riga requires daring and ambition; it is an opportunity to both win and lose. Defining Latvia as the countryside is the easier choice, which requires little effort.

Country folk often say that city dwellers who consume “country produce” as part of their daily diet live at the expense of the countryside. This opinion is particularly characteristic of those living in individual homesteads, who follow a rural lifestyle and provide a small amount of food products to buyers. One does not hear large food producers saying this. Large-scale producers do not live a rural lifestyle, but are engaged in a relatively profitable business in rural territory. The relationship between producer and buyer in a capitalist system assumes that it is not the producer in the countryside, but the buyer – mostly in the city – who is the decision-maker; it is the buyer who chooses, evaluates, and accepts the product by making the purchase. In that sense, it is not the city that lives at the expense of the countryside, but the countryside that lives at the expense of the city, because it is the city dwellers who pay for the products produced in the countryside. If there are no buyers in the cities, only uncultivated fields will remain in the countryside. In other words, to preserve Latvia as the countryside, one must develop the large cities.
Article first published in the April 2021 issue of the magazine Rīgas Laiks