Popular Front of Estonia

The Popular Front of Estonia (Estonian: Rahvarinne), introduced to the public by the Estonian politician Edgar Savisaar under the short-lived name Popular Front for the Support of Perestroika, was a political organization in Estonia in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Edgar Savisaar introduced the idea of popular front during a TV show April 13, 1988. The idea was developed through the year and finally The Estonian Popular Front was established October 1, 1988 with a massively crowded congress which turned to a culmination of the first phase of the Singing Revolution.

It was to a significant degree the precursor to the current Estonian Centre Party, although with a much broader base of popularity at the beginning. It was a major force in the Estonian independence movement that led to the re-establishment of the Republic of Estonia as a country independent from the Soviet Union. It was similar to the Popular Front of Latvia and the Sąjūdis movement in Lithuania and a number of Popular Fronts that were created almost simultaneously in many parts of the USSR. The Baltic States were in a unique category among the constituent parts of the USSR in that they had been European parliamentary democracies in the interbellum and had been annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940. The Popular Front of Estonia was founded in 1988 by Marju Lauristin and Edgar Savisaar. Savisaar initiated the founding in April, 1988 in a live broadcast (Mõtleme veel) on Estonian TV, advocating support of Gorbachevian perestroika.

Popular Front organized series of much-crowded and well-published events and actions which stressed on Estonian national pride but on democratic values as well. Huge amount of prints and newspapers were produced to popularize PF movement. The top-leaders and sub-leaders of PF were everyday guests in every kind of media to talk about several kind of problems and ideas. Popular Front of Estonia made ideas of independent Estonia acceptable and possible for masses. The idea of independence had become a somewhat impossible and unbelievable dream for the majority of Estonians during decades under the Soviet Union.

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