This year marks the 50th anniversary of the military coup that overthrew the Estado Novo in Portugal on 25 April 1974. It was then that the ‘Carnation Revolution’ against the authoritarian regime of Marcelo Caetano—a regime founded in 1926 by the military and consolidated by António de Oliveira Salazar—was itself overthrown by a military revolt that was motivated by corporate issues of seniority and promotions. Democracy was only restored in Portugal on 25 November 1975, after 18 months. Historically, it was known as the PREC (Revolutionary Process in Progress). This system, in which the communists and leftists dominated, nationalised the main industries and banks and imprisoned hundreds of opponents without charge. In 2024, 50 years after the military coup, the political situation in Portugal seems to be reaching unexpected levels of tension, with early elections scheduled for the 10th of March. The absolute majority government of Socialist Prime Minister António Costa recently fell in the wake of a series of political and financial scandals that affected the highest levels of government. Costa took the initiative to submit his resignation to the president of the Republic, who then organised general elections. These elections come against the backdrop of acute economic and social crises, which the government, despite being supported by a media community dependent on subsidies and credits from the government, can no longer disguise.
The problem with the continuation of half a century of ‘restoring democracy’ is that Portugal is far from what was originally promised to the Portuguese. In its propaganda, the revolutionary military nucleus of the Armed Forces Movement (MFA)—a group inspired and dominated by the radical left—proclaimed as its programme the famous ‘Three Ds’: Decolonisation, Democracy, and Development. But 50 years later, the reality is far from euphoric: the decolonised countries, Angola and Mozambique, have lived through long civil wars; and, despite the official introduction of democratic regimes, they are still governed by the same independence party movements: the MPLA in Angola and FRELIMO in Mozambique. In Guinea-Bissau, President Sissoco Embaló recently staged a coup d’état, dissolving parliament and dismissing the government. Under the aegis of the presidency, human rights abuses such as arbitrary arrests, torture, and the abduction of opposition figures are commonplace.
Development, the third ‘D,’ is another lie. Recently, a historian and professor at the University of Manchester, Nuno Palma, published a book on the economic history of Portugal in which he demonstrated with statistics in hand that it was in the final years of Salazar’s Estado Novo—the ‘dictatorship’ —that Portugal came closest to the developed countries of Europe.
Today Portugal is beset by challenges in all areas, the results of many years of bad government: wages are the lowest in Western Europe, the National Health Service (which was once excellent) is in deep crisis; the streets of Lisbon are full of homeless people; young people with qualifications are emigrating from a country where they have no jobs, no housing, and no future; and public services are struggling. All of this ends up having an impact on politics, which leads us to the second ‘D,’ Democracy, the last of the ‘Ds’ which has proven a disappointment since 1975. Until two years ago, Portugal was the most left-wing country in Europe. It could even be said that it had no right wing, or that it had only the right wing of the Left. Suffice to say that, until recently, centre-left Social Democracy was the party where the Right in Portugal could vote.
But the situation is changing in Portugal due to the same kinds of causes that have led to the growth of the political right in Europe. This is a political right of the national-conservative or national populist or popular type, which already governs in Italy and Hungary, which dominates the opposition in France and the Netherlands, and which has recently grown in Sweden, Finland, and Germany. These new ‘right-wingers’ have been growing for reasons of national identity and reaction to immigration, and above all because of the dysfunctionality of the political system, which has been unable to respond to the problems created by globalism: deindustrialisation, mass immigration, and a fall in the standard of living for the working and middle classes.
Portugal didn’t suffer from Maghreb immigration or separatism, as Spain did. But it did have an absence of the Right in party politics for half a century. It was this political vacuum that a young dissident from the PSD, Professor André Ventura, filled with his new Chega party. In 2019, Chega won 1.29% of the vote and elected one MP, André Ventura himself; but a year and a half later, in the elections for the presidency of the Republic, Ventura won 12%. In the 2022 legislative elections, he passed 7% and came third after the PS and the PSD, with 12 MPs.
Ventura declares himself a political nationalist, a social conservative, and an economic liberal with social justice concerns. Despite a slanderous campaign by the media and other parties, who have accused him of xenophobia, racism, homophobia, and all manner of other ‘phobias’, his popularity, and that of the Chega party, has only grown. The latest poll on February 19th gave Chega 18% of the national voting intentions; the AD (Democratic Alliance) coalition has 30% and the PS (socialists) 27.5%. The extreme-left BE (Left Block) falls to 4.2% and the CDU (communists) practically disappears, with 2.6%. Another new party, the IL (Liberal Initiative), liberal in the economy, globalist, and liberal in ethics and mores, is expected to get 5.5%.
The only way to make a government out of the Left will be with the participation or support of Chega. Heavily influenced by the prevailing atmosphere of political correctness, PSD leader Luís Montenegro has already declared that he will not accept an alliance with Chega. The Left is in the minority. As a result, Portugal will most likely be in the midst of political instability during the celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the April coup, and the Portuguese Left, which has always liked to present itself as the sole representative of the democratic will, looks like it will have the people against it.
Portugal and the Rise of the Populist Right
Street Art depicting the Carnation Revolution, Lisbon. Photo by Jeanne Menjoulet / Flckr CC by 2.0 DEED
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the military coup that overthrew the Estado Novo in Portugal on 25 April 1974. It was then that the ‘Carnation Revolution’ against the authoritarian regime of Marcelo Caetano—a regime founded in 1926 by the military and consolidated by António de Oliveira Salazar—was itself overthrown by a military revolt that was motivated by corporate issues of seniority and promotions. Democracy was only restored in Portugal on 25 November 1975, after 18 months. Historically, it was known as the PREC (Revolutionary Process in Progress). This system, in which the communists and leftists dominated, nationalised the main industries and banks and imprisoned hundreds of opponents without charge. In 2024, 50 years after the military coup, the political situation in Portugal seems to be reaching unexpected levels of tension, with early elections scheduled for the 10th of March. The absolute majority government of Socialist Prime Minister António Costa recently fell in the wake of a series of political and financial scandals that affected the highest levels of government. Costa took the initiative to submit his resignation to the president of the Republic, who then organised general elections. These elections come against the backdrop of acute economic and social crises, which the government, despite being supported by a media community dependent on subsidies and credits from the government, can no longer disguise.
The problem with the continuation of half a century of ‘restoring democracy’ is that Portugal is far from what was originally promised to the Portuguese. In its propaganda, the revolutionary military nucleus of the Armed Forces Movement (MFA)—a group inspired and dominated by the radical left—proclaimed as its programme the famous ‘Three Ds’: Decolonisation, Democracy, and Development. But 50 years later, the reality is far from euphoric: the decolonised countries, Angola and Mozambique, have lived through long civil wars; and, despite the official introduction of democratic regimes, they are still governed by the same independence party movements: the MPLA in Angola and FRELIMO in Mozambique. In Guinea-Bissau, President Sissoco Embaló recently staged a coup d’état, dissolving parliament and dismissing the government. Under the aegis of the presidency, human rights abuses such as arbitrary arrests, torture, and the abduction of opposition figures are commonplace.
Development, the third ‘D,’ is another lie. Recently, a historian and professor at the University of Manchester, Nuno Palma, published a book on the economic history of Portugal in which he demonstrated with statistics in hand that it was in the final years of Salazar’s Estado Novo—the ‘dictatorship’ —that Portugal came closest to the developed countries of Europe.
Today Portugal is beset by challenges in all areas, the results of many years of bad government: wages are the lowest in Western Europe, the National Health Service (which was once excellent) is in deep crisis; the streets of Lisbon are full of homeless people; young people with qualifications are emigrating from a country where they have no jobs, no housing, and no future; and public services are struggling. All of this ends up having an impact on politics, which leads us to the second ‘D,’ Democracy, the last of the ‘Ds’ which has proven a disappointment since 1975. Until two years ago, Portugal was the most left-wing country in Europe. It could even be said that it had no right wing, or that it had only the right wing of the Left. Suffice to say that, until recently, centre-left Social Democracy was the party where the Right in Portugal could vote.
But the situation is changing in Portugal due to the same kinds of causes that have led to the growth of the political right in Europe. This is a political right of the national-conservative or national populist or popular type, which already governs in Italy and Hungary, which dominates the opposition in France and the Netherlands, and which has recently grown in Sweden, Finland, and Germany. These new ‘right-wingers’ have been growing for reasons of national identity and reaction to immigration, and above all because of the dysfunctionality of the political system, which has been unable to respond to the problems created by globalism: deindustrialisation, mass immigration, and a fall in the standard of living for the working and middle classes.
Portugal didn’t suffer from Maghreb immigration or separatism, as Spain did. But it did have an absence of the Right in party politics for half a century. It was this political vacuum that a young dissident from the PSD, Professor André Ventura, filled with his new Chega party. In 2019, Chega won 1.29% of the vote and elected one MP, André Ventura himself; but a year and a half later, in the elections for the presidency of the Republic, Ventura won 12%. In the 2022 legislative elections, he passed 7% and came third after the PS and the PSD, with 12 MPs.
Ventura declares himself a political nationalist, a social conservative, and an economic liberal with social justice concerns. Despite a slanderous campaign by the media and other parties, who have accused him of xenophobia, racism, homophobia, and all manner of other ‘phobias’, his popularity, and that of the Chega party, has only grown. The latest poll on February 19th gave Chega 18% of the national voting intentions; the AD (Democratic Alliance) coalition has 30% and the PS (socialists) 27.5%. The extreme-left BE (Left Block) falls to 4.2% and the CDU (communists) practically disappears, with 2.6%. Another new party, the IL (Liberal Initiative), liberal in the economy, globalist, and liberal in ethics and mores, is expected to get 5.5%.
The only way to make a government out of the Left will be with the participation or support of Chega. Heavily influenced by the prevailing atmosphere of political correctness, PSD leader Luís Montenegro has already declared that he will not accept an alliance with Chega. The Left is in the minority. As a result, Portugal will most likely be in the midst of political instability during the celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the April coup, and the Portuguese Left, which has always liked to present itself as the sole representative of the democratic will, looks like it will have the people against it.
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