On 14 December 2018, the Forum “Latvian State, Land and People — Retrospection into the Past with the View to the Future”, was held, which was dedicated to the lecture of the Latvian economist, statistician, demographer, politician and theologian, Professor of the University of Latvia, Kārlis Balodis at the National Theatre on 22 December 1918. It was organised by the Latvian Association of Economists in cooperation with the Latvian Academy of Sciences and the Luther Academy.
Kārlis Balodis was a person whose academic activity and ideas gained recognition and were implemented in Germany, Russia, Palestine, his works are being read also nowadays. Popularisers of Kārlis Balodis state that the ideas of K. Balodis can still be made use of when forming the future of Latvia, basing on effective national economy. Also, the members of the Forum wished that the scientific heritage of K. Balodis and its interpretation would be available more extensively and longer, therefore the idea arose of publication of a compilation of reports in the issue of autumn 2019 of LZA Vēstis. A daļa (Proceedings of the Latvian Academy of Sciences, Section A). This is dedicated to the academic lecture of K. Balodis “The Idea of Eternal Peace and Distribution of World Land among Nations” which he gave on the event of opening the Latvijas Augstskola (Latvian Institution of Higher Education, now — University of Latvia) on 29 September 1919. In this way the collection of articles about Kārlis Balodis was created, which is published in this issue.
In this article information about Kārlis Balodis and his publications has been summarised, and evaluation of his work as well as its reflection in encyclopaedic publications, scientific researches and biographic and bibliographic datatbases in Latvia and abroad.
