ABSTRACT
This chapter presents Lithuania profiles of longstanding democracies and of the European Union, and provides essential detail on history, electoral system, political parties and cleavages, and governments. Lithuania was one of the leading states of medieval Europe. It merged with Poland in the sixteenth century and was absorbed by Russia in the eighteenth century, during the period of Polish partitions. Lithuania was independent between the World Wars. Unlike Estonia and Latvia, the minority populations in Lithuania are small – ethnic Lithuanians make up over 81 percent of the population – though still relevant in the case of the Poles. The initial political opposition in Soviet Lithuania was the Lithuanian Reform Movement–Sajudis. This broadly based middle-of-the-road movement was equivalent to the Popular Front in both Estonia and Latvia. Starting with the 2000 election there has been a series of new major and minor political parties in Lithuania. In 2000 there was the social liberal New Union which came second in votes.
