On 2 November 1995, the Saeima adopted the Law on Higher Education Institutions – the framework through which Latvia’s universities reorganized their life after the restoration of independence. The law established university constitutions, academic and professional study programmes, accreditation, and the Council of Higher Education. It was not just a bureaucratic text – it brought into lecture halls, departments, and rectors’ offices the requirement to prove quality, rather than simply continue the inertia of the Soviet period.

In the mid-1990s Latvia was reshaping its education system according to the logic of a restored state and the European academic space. The Law on Higher Education Institutions became one of the main pillars of that transition, defining both autonomy and responsibility for the quality of studies.