Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
ISSN 1476-413X
Portuguese
147–154 ‘Open the social sciences: To whom and for what?’, by Michael Burawoy
José Madureira Pinto
155–169 ‘Fascist lackeys’? Dealing with the police’s past during Portugal’s transition
to democracy (1974–1980)
Journal of
Diego Palacios Cerezales
171–191 From Porto to Portadown: Portuguese workers in Northern Ireland’s
labour market
Martin Eaton
Social Science
193–211 Minority representation in Portuguese democracy
André Freire
Review
213–219 Francisco Javier Luque Castillo
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Willem Doise – University of Geneva, Switzerland
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Michael Burawoy – University of California, Berkeley, USA
ISSN 1476-413X
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PJSS-6-3-01-Burawoy 3/15/08 2:18 PM Page 137
Abstract Keywords
The Gulbenkian Commission Report (1996) on the restructuring of the social sci- social science
ences disavowed anachronistic disciplinary divisions, Western universalism and Gulbenkian
methodological positivism, and instead proposed the unification of all scientific Commission
knowledge under what it called ‘pluralistic universalism’. It exposed its own scholas- public sociology
ticism, however, in failing to address for whom and for what is scientific knowledge policy sociology
produced. With these two questions as points of departure, this article develops a dis- critical sociology
ciplinary division of labour, and thereby distinguishes among professional, policy, professional sociology
public and critical knowledge. Examining the form and relations among these four
types of knowledge allows one to recognise the real basis of divergences among disci-
plines, and within disciplines across nations and history. A global perspective on the
social sciences today examines the specific responses to market fundamentalism
from different disciplines and different places in the world system.
It is exactly ten years since the Gulbenkian Commission published its * This is a revised
version of the lecture
report on the restructuring of the social sciences. Chaired by Immanuel to the Portuguese
Wallerstein, the Commission consisted of ten distinguished scholars from Sociological
the natural sciences, humanities and the social sciences. Their report, Association delivered
at the University of
Open the Social Sciences, was widely publicised throughout the world as Lisbon’s Institute of
innovative, pointing towards a future that would dissolve outdated discipli- Social Science (ICS-
UL) on 30 March
nary divisions within the social sciences, while making their unification 2006. I would like to
the locus of an ambitious reconciliation of the humanities and natural sci- thank João Ferreira de
Almeida, Elisio
ences. The Commission attributed the backwardness of the social sciences Estanque, José Virgilio
to a lingering attachment to ideas, methodologies and divisions that Pereira, José
Madureira Pinto,
marked their birth in the 19th century. These antiquated notions, the Boaventura de Sousa
Commission noted, began to break down after 1945 laying the founda- Santos and Anália
tions for an anticipated integration of all scientific knowledge. Driving this Torres for their
comments.
rupture with the past would be the rational development of social science,
unhindered by false epistemologies and vested interests.
The Commission flattered scientific knowledge with its own autonomous
history. For such autonomy is illusory – a distorted expression of the privi-
leged existence that prevails only at the pinnacle of Western academe, and
of little relevance to most social scientists, embedded in contexts increas-
ingly driven by what I call third-wave marketisation. The Gulbenkian
Commission was the project of an elite cut off not only from the actual
practice of the social sciences, but also from the real world problems
those sciences are designed to investigate: not to mention from the people
affected by those problems. Rather than opening the social sciences,
the Gulbenkian Commission was effectively closing them off, not only to
the global south but also to most of the global north. Head stuck in the
sand, the Commission was disarming the social sciences as it faces search-
ing challenges to its viability.
Settling accounts with the Gulbenkian Commission is long overdue.
We need to rethink the social sciences, not from the top down but from the
ground up, rooting them in the multiple contexts of their production. We
need to dispense with imaginary utopias divorced from everyday practices
and explore the concrete division of labour within and between the social
sciences. We cannot quarantine the social sciences, refusing their dissec-
tion for fear of disturbing a hornet’s nest. We cannot exempt ourselves
from the investigative eye we so gleefully turn upon others. If sociology, in
particular, can disclose to others the public issues that underlie their
private troubles, why can it not do the same for itself, turning private
antagonisms into public debate. To transcend the divisions that divide us,
or, at least, turn those divisions in a constructive direction, we have to
trace them to different locations and trajectories within and through the
scientific field. Spelling out the parameters and dimensions, the patterns of
domination and interdependence within and among scientific fields
should foster a more effective presence in the world beyond.
We begin, therefore, by endorsing the Gulbenkian Commission’s identifi-
cation of three problems that beset the social sciences, and the Commission’s
identification of three corresponding empirical trends. We then reinterpret
those trends not from the rafters of the ivory tower but from the grounded
laboratories of social science production – laboratories understood as fields
of force operating in a world historical context.
reform. Indeed, in part because it had a more radical and public agenda, in
1905 it broke with the American Economics Association within which it
had developed. As the 20th century unfolded, however, sociology under-
went its own professionalisation, becoming ever more inner directed as it
competed with the other social sciences for a permanent place in the aca-
demic hierarchy. With notable exceptions, such as Edward A. Ross, sociol-
ogists removed themselves from the public eye as they became more
oriented to their peers.
The field of sociology has a different disciplinary configuration in other
countries, reflecting different historical trajectories, patterns of higher edu-
cation and relations among economy, state and civil society. Thus,
Scandinavian sociology possesses a strong policy moment compatible with
the demands of a welfare state. The sociology of some Soviet regimes, such
as Poland and Hungary, were marked by a subterranean critical moment.
Authoritarian regimes, such as those of South Africa and Brazil that fell to a
burgeoning civil society developed a powerful public sociology. Along these
lines the division of labour in Portuguese sociology is especially interesting.
As a late developer, sociology in Portugal shows an especially vibrant
relation among the four types of knowledge. Portuguese sociology began in
earnest towards the end of the Salazar dictatorship and really took off only
after 1974. Entering so late, it could borrow from the traditions of profes-
sional and critical knowledge in other countries, especially from France and
the United States. This was no mechanical adoption, however, but an imag-
inative adaptation to the Portuguese circumstances – circumstances that
called on sociology not only to tackle questions of policy, but also to foster a
societal self-consciousness. With alacrity, sociology took up the challenge to
reconstitute the very social fabric of post-revolutionary Portugal.
Some 30 years after the dictatorship sociology is still very much in the
public eye. Sociologists are regular commentators in the media: newspa-
pers, television and radio. Extended lecture series on sociology have
appeared on public radio. Especially interesting are the open city confer-
ences organised by the Portuguese Sociological Association, which bring
sociologists into dialogue and debate both with one another and with
diverse publics about local and national issues. Sociology’s high profile can
be attributed, at least in part, to the duality of professional sociology. A
sociology degree is not merely a stepping-stone to some other degree but
provides a meaningful identity and distinct occupation in all manner of
organisations: in municipalities, schools, trade unions, media and so forth.
In other words, sociologists are professionals not just in the academy or
research institutes, but in all realms of state and civil society.
Its close association with ‘socialist’ governments has advanced sociol-
ogy’s policy and public roles. Sociologists have entered the political arena as
ministers, parliamentary deputies, trade union leaders and at all levels of
the civil service, while those who remained in the academy became advi-
sors to the leaders of the country from the president down. Entry into the
European Union in 1985 gave rise to a new impetus for policy sociology –
Sociology has now entered its third wave, a reaction to third-wave mar-
ketisation, more popularly known as neo-liberalism, and more euphemisti-
cally as globalisation. In the present era, defending civil society through
national social policy becomes less viable, and so sociology turns increas-
ingly to the public for its audience, not only on a national scale but also on
a local and global scale. With third-wave marketisation’s assault on
national civil societies, with the retrenchment of labour and social rights,
sociology’s task in its third wave, I argue, lies in the defence of human
rights (which includes labour and social rights) through the organisation
of a civil society of global proportions. This third-wave sociology does not
emanate from the advanced capitalist societies of the north, but from the
countries of the south – latecomers to sociology. Countries that look both
to the south and to the north, countries such as South Africa, Brazil and
Portugal become the fertile ground of a new publicly oriented sociology:
the epicentre of third-wave sociology.
The impetus for a third-wave sociology with its valorisation of public
sociology may spring from such semi-peripheral countries as Portugal, but
it must still operate under the hegemony of the United States and Western
Europe. The sociologies of these countries of advanced capitalism, especially
the United States, command enormous influence, prestige and resources
within the context of global sociology, and thereby shape the possible reali-
sation of public sociology on a world scale. It becomes especially important,
therefore, that alternative models for the division of sociological labour,
such as the one found in contemporary Portugal, gain recognition and
support within the United States for example, where sociologists think their
disciplinary model is the only one, and where those with critical and public
intent are overpowered by professional sociology. Third-wave sociology
must sweep back against the ramparts of second-wave sociology.
We can now restore the Gulbenkian Commission to its historical context
and recognise the source of its myopia. Even though it was written only ten
years ago the Commission’s academic detachment still reflected the period
of second-wave marketisation in which state regulated capitalism protected
the autonomy of universities and their disciplines. But this era has passed
as states are bent on fostering markets – the commodification of research
and the privatisation of higher education – and subjecting the academy to
political surveillance. The confidence in the resilience of academic auton-
omy, taken for granted by the Commission, now looks sadly misplaced as
universities across the globe come under assault from state and market. So
long as the social sciences are differentially implicated in this offensive their
unification becomes more remote and the proposals of the Gulbenkian
Commission more utopian. In an important sense, we are, ironically,
returning to the laissez-faire world of the 19th century and what seemed to
the Commissioners to be an anachronistic past is now a haunting present.
The Gulbenkian Commission’s linear history – social science before
1945, after 1945 converging on a unified historical science – has to be
replaced by a combined and uneven history. By its silence about the very
References
Wallerstein, I., Juma, C., Keller, E.F., Kocka, J., Lecourt, D., Mudkimbe, V.Y.,
Miushakoji, K., Prigogine, I., Taylor, P.J. and Trouillot, M.-R. (1996), Open the
social sciences: Report of the Gulbenkian Commission on the restructuring of the
social sciences, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Suggested citation
Burawoy, M. (2007), ‘Open the social sciences: To whom and for what?’, Portuguese
Journal of Social Science 6 (3): 137–46, doi: 10.1386/pjss.6.3.137/1
Contributor details
Michael Burawoy is a sociologist in the Department of Sociology at the University
of California, Berkeley. His interests are in work organisation and working class
consciousness under capitalism and socialism. Contact: Michael Burawoy,
Department of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley. CA 94720, USA.
Tel: +1 510 643 1958. Fax: +1 510 642 0659.
E-mail: burawoy@berkeley.edu
Commentary
Portuguese Journal of Social Science Volume 6 Number 3. © Intellect Ltd 2007.
Review article. English language. doi: 10.1386/pjss.6.3.147/4
Abstract Keywords
This text tries to demonstrate that Portuguese sociology has been built on a set of Portuguese sociology
virtuous relations between four poles of sociological activity: the theoretical prob- Portuguese
lematisation pole, the observational research pole, the reflexivity pole and the pro- sociological
fessionalisation pole. It is suggested that this specific dynamic was favoured by a association
series of political-institutional and organisational conditions (the dominance of a applied rationalism
critical/applied rationalism in university training, the active role of the Portuguese public sociology
Sociological Association in the promotion of a creative interaction between acade- social intervention
mics and ‘field professionals’, the political engagement of Portuguese sociologists, sociological training
the relatively successful opening-up of the labour market to professionally trained
sociologists, etc.) The text is, of course, punctuated with comments – largely con-
cordant, but sometimes critical – on Michael Burawoy’s theses about the evolu-
tion and specificity of Portuguese sociology and the need to re-invent public
sociology and reformulate the scientific agenda of the discipline.
I
Portuguese sociology started to take shape as a project of autonomous dis- * The commentary
status of this article
ciplinary affirmation about 40 years ago. The argument that will be devel- meant that its author
oped here, in close dialogue with the positions taken by Michael Burawoy could not develop
on the same issue, is that if this project had been achieved with a significant more fully some
angles of the
degree of overall success, this was due to a set of circumstances which can evolution of
be analysed by means of the relations indicated in Figure 1 below.1 Portuguese sociology,
which could have
The vertices of the square represent four poles of activity which, interact- better accommodated
ing with one another in the form of a virtuous tension, have in our view stim- the positions
supported here. For a
ulated a qualifying dynamic in the field of Portuguese sociology. They are: more thorough study,
see (Pinto 2007,
Chap. II), which
1. the theoretical problematisation pole (T), representing the set of efforts includes the analysis
which, in the scientific domain in question, seek to encourage theoret- of Michael Burawoy’s
ical updating and discussion in a systematic way; theses on the need to
reformulate the
scientific agenda of 2. the observational research pole (O),
sociology (Burawoy relating to the analysis of concrete
2005).
social situations through theoreti-
1 The fact that Michael cally and methodologically informed
Burawoy himself
frequently makes use procedures for gathering and pro-
of this kind of graphic cessing empirical information;
devices in his texts
was an incentive to 3. the reflexivity pole (R), embracing
opt for this solution. critical and self-critical questioning
on positions of principle and founda-
tions of the methodological-theoreti-
Figure 1: Activity dynamics grid. cal options and technical operations
required by sociological work;
4. the professionalisation pole (P), over-determined by the demands of social
intervention in relatively circumscribed ‘practical’ contexts and in
contact with specific ‘lay publics’.
II
The TO and OT vectors represent two fundamental components of scientific
work and together they correspond to what Michael Burawoy regards as
the distinctive outlines of professional sociology (academic sociology), taken
as the place which guarantees the sustainable affirmation of a specific sci-
entific point of view and the institutional consolidation of a discipline.
The TO relation represents the epistemological principle which in
Portuguese sociology has been termed, coherently with its critical perspec-
tive on the empiricist model of knowledge, the command function of
theory in scientific research. Meanwhile, the reciprocal relation (OT
vector) indicates the demand – which is also a genetic mark and persistent
ambition of the ‘scientific spirit’ – to confront interpretative hypotheses
raised by the movement of theoretical problematisation with the results of
observational research of real social situations.
This engagement in controlled systematic observational tasks has been
one of the most important factors in the development of Portuguese soci-
ology, not just because it involves the ‘progressive’ reformulation of theo-
retical frames of reference (countering the ‘normalising’ tendency of
paradigmatic affirmation), but because it is a sort of reserve ready to act
against formalist theoreticism. The fact that research on concrete situa-
tions has been instituted in Portuguese universities as an essential condi-
tion for earning academic degrees and gaining scientific credit has
III
It is widely agreed by authors engaged in the analysis of the origins of the
institutionalisation of Portuguese sociology that its protagonists partici-
pated and invested strongly in the epistemological debate (always political,
to some extent) which, since the mid-1960s particularly, agitated the field
of the social sciences as a whole. It has equally been noted in what
measure this ‘virtue’ actually arose out of ‘necessity’ (as so often occurs in
social life): in this case, in a country without sociology there was a need
for the group of candidate sociologists (coming from a wide diversity of dis-
ciplinary areas) to promptly and justifiably reconvert their original univer-
sity training.
Having adopted a highly critical perspective in relation to the principles
and procedures of a predominantly empiricist nature (then still very much
ingrained in this field of knowledge) and unreservedly accepting that the
scientific approach of social phenomena always contains a reference to
values and never exempts itself from the effects of partly insurmountable
theoretical-ideological conflicts, the heritage of reflections which was being
consolidated from this time (RT and RO vectors) found fertile ground for
dissemination among apprentices and practitioners of sociology, first at
graduate level and afterwards in postgraduate university courses.
Critical rationalism, as an epistemological model and as a practical
principle for producing knowledge, managed to assert itself as dominant
stream, notwithstanding the influence that ‘post-modernist’ hypercriti-
cism, and, at the other extreme, some positivist manifestations came to
exert in certain sectors of Portuguese sociology. On the other hand, an
(epistemologically non-ingenuous) opening-up to theoretical pluralism
was being imposed on the domestic scientific community, and this was still
anchored in the ‘cultural goodwill’ of the first apprentices.
The rate at which several works on epistemology and methodology,
guided simultaneously by the critique of empiricism and a prudent demar-
cation vis-à-vis hypercriticism, are being republished is in itself a fair indi-
cator of the degree of dissemination of the ‘automatisms of reflexivity’
(even if there is in this expression a contradiction in terms) in the socio-
logical practice of successive generations of Portuguese sociologists. But to
make a deeper assessment of the virtuous effects of these automatisms, it
is worthwhile to bear in mind the agility with which extensive and inten-
sive analytical methodologies intersect in Portuguese sociology – the
former, particularly prone to characterising the structural conditionings of
social practices, and the latter, close to the ethnographic observation pole,
more able to highlight relevant details and singularities.
Accepting this view leads us to believe, in light of the distinction proposed
by Michael Burawoy in the lecture commented on here, that in Portugal
‘Open the social sciences: To whom and for what?’, by Michael Burawoy 149
PJSS-6-3-02-Pinto 3/15/08 2:19 PM Page 150
IV
Another pertinent, and to some extent, original, aspect of Portuguese sociol-
ogy is undoubtedly the connection and reciprocal interaction, which occur
between the academic world and professional practice in (extra-academic)
organisations, in which the aims of social intervention tend to surpass those
of scientific interpretation/validation.
The adjustment between these two worlds is represented in the square
by the OP/PO and TP/PT vectors. It is due, as Michael Burawoy properly
notes, to the importance reached early on in shaping the field of sociology,
by the characterisation and promotion (mostly through the Portuguese
Sociological Association) of a professional culture among sociologists as a
culture that associated ‘science’ and ‘practice’. The popularity of postgrad-
uate training among ‘professionals’ has also operated in favour of the con-
vergence of working interests and environments mentioned earlier.
V
The reflexivity pole (R), in its essentially methodological and meta-theoretical
components (reflexive knowledge directed overwhelmingly at academic
audiences, that is, critical knowledge according to Burawoy), has always
been responsible for establishing certain criteria to protect scientific work
from coarse bias (here, every adjective is in a sense inadequate, and has to
be considered in relation to what the results of scientific practice indicate as
provisionally acceptable in the corresponding field of knowledge). But there
is nothing to stop it from also playing an active role in the definition –
subject to public scrutiny, and not only to the one of experts and peers – of
the relevant domains (problems) to be appropriately explored by scientific
work (public knowledge).
But if the idea can be ventured here that Portuguese sociology exhibits
some comparative advantages in relation to other national contexts, then
this is because it has, from the very start, ‘naturally’ incorporated into its
normal activity (particularly in mainstream academic sociology) both the
political dimension of reflexivity and a open-minded nearing to the speci-
ficities of social intervention (P).
‘Open the social sciences: To whom and for what?’, by Michael Burawoy 151
PJSS-6-3-02-Pinto 3/15/08 2:19 PM Page 152
VI
Contrary to what the internalist visions of the history of science suggest,
there is no production of scientific knowledge that is led in a social
vacuum – that is, completely immune to the logic of restrictions or incen-
tives of a financial-economic nature, to the influence of ideological
assumptions, albeit implicit, or to the interplay of relatively dissimulated
political interests. In fact, none of the operations in concrete scientific
activity is sheltered from the influence of ‘external’ factors.
Keeping a constant eye on the positions of Michael Burawoy, we have
already pinpointed in this paper a certain number of political, institutional
and organisational conditions that favoured (or at least did not impede) a
sustainable ‘virtuous’ development of sociology in Portugal. Let us turn
them more explicit.
One of those ‘exogenous’ determinants refers to the nature of sociolog-
ical training at graduate level, almost always organised around solid
learning in the spheres of theory, epistemological reflection and the
methodology of observational research. With the replication of such a
demanding model at postgraduate level, it has been possible to reproduce
a set of research procedures and professional routines globally inspired by
an ‘applied rationalism’ adaptable to the specificities and great changeabil-
ity of Portugal’s social reality.
The role of the Portuguese Sociological Association (APS) is another
institutional ingredient which may be taken in account when we deal with
the specificity of the field of Portuguese sociology. A high proportion of
academics and professionals are members of this organisation, which reg-
ularly invites them to discuss the various implications and difficulties of
sociological work at well-attended conferences or seminars.
Another factor favouring the development of Portuguese sociology
concerns the opening-up of the labour market to professionally trained
sociologists: hard at first, but afterwards relatively successful. Contrary to
the somewhat pessimistic forecasts, employability in this area has in fact
remained at acceptable levels from the mid 1980s to the start of the new
century. The factors that helped here were access to European funds
linked to social intervention programmes, plus, later on, the political
option of national and local governments to broaden the spectrum of
measures and policies directed towards the building of a welfare state, at
the time still highly incipient, and, finally, the creation of a demand for
sociological knowledge based on movements and institutions of ‘civil
society’, itself in expansion due to the democratisation process underway
in Portugal.
Another of the forces that Portuguese sociology can rely on is the
consolidation of its research apparatus, at first closely linked to the university
system, but which has subsequently achieved a significant degree of eman-
cipation. Having started early on by seeking spontaneous paths of interna-
tionalisation (initially based on a desire for theoretical updating not
confined to any of the hegemonic centres of international sociological
References
Pinto, J.M. (2007), Indagação científica, aprendizagens escolares, reflexividade social,
Oporto: Afrontamento.
Burawoy, M. (2005), ‘For public sociology’, American Sociological Review 70: 4–28.
‘Open the social sciences: To whom and for what?’, by Michael Burawoy 153
PJSS-6-3-02-Pinto 3/15/08 2:19 PM Page 154
Suggested citation
Pinto, J. (2007), ‘“Open the social sciences: To whom and for what?”, by Michael
Burawoy’, Portuguese Journal of Social Science 6 (3): 147–54, doi: 10.1386/
pjss.6.3.147/4
Contributor details
José Madureira Pinto is a professor at Faculty of Economics (Social Sciences
Department) and research member of the Institute of Sociology of the Faculty of Arts
(University of Porto). He has published several books on the methodology of social sci-
ences, sociological theory and sociological analysis of education, symbolic processes
and cultural practice. He is editor of Cadernos de Ciências Sociais. Contact: Faculdade de
Economia, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4200-464 Porto, Portugal. Tel: +351 225 571 100.
Fax: +351 225 505 050.
E-mail: jmp@fep.up.pt
Abstract Keywords
When a dictatorship is overthrown and a transition to democracy begins, the police revolution
force’s place in the new regime becomes a contested issue. Can they be trusted? Are police
they to be held responsible for having enforced the dictatorship’s rules? The April regime change
1974 Carnation Revolution put an end to Europe’s longest right-wing dictator- transition to
ship. The Armed Forces Movement, in order to consolidate its power after the revo- democracy
lution, dismantled the political police (PIDE) and imprisoned its officers. Other military
police forces were ordered to remain in their headquarters and wait for ‘democratic’ social upheaval
reorganisation. During the two revolutionary years that followed, the provisional
governments could not count on the police and did not exercise effective authority:
workers occupied factories, shanty town dwellers occupied empty houses and
angry mobs destroyed the headquarters of political parties. How could the new
authorities deal with the ‘people’s’ disruptive mobilisations if ‘repression’ was the
mark that stigmatised the overthrown ‘fascist’ dictatorship? The post-revolutionary
governments had to devise a new interpretation of the police’s repressive practices,
learning to distinguish which were a mark of ‘fascism’, and which could simply be
understood as the exercise of ordinary public order duties.
‘Fascist lackeys’? Dealing with the police’s past during Portugal’s transition to . . . 157
PJSS-6-3-03-Cerezales 3/14/08 2:34 AM Page 158
1 Durán Muñoz (2000) public authority. The public order system had collapsed; making it possible
compares the workers’ for any group that was determined enough bring about almost any form of
repertoire of collective
action in the Spanish collective action (Durán Muñoz 2000).1
and Portuguese
transitions, noting
that the Portuguese Repression as stigma
repertoire was much In order to understand the collapse of the public order system we have to
more radical. After
examining some other take into account at least four related topics: the association of police coer-
hypothesis – political cion with ‘fascist’ repression; the competition among political actors in the
culture, organisational
strength – he
post-coup environment; the legitimating role of popular action; and
concludes that the the dilution of discipline within the armed forces. These issues resulted in
crisis of state the political cost of repression being dramatically increased.
authority in Portugal
was the main factor The police had been the dictatorship’s trademark, and its repressive
that explained activities were the stigma that demonstrated how the authoritarian
worker’s recourse to
radical means. regime was unpopular, unjust and based on the coercion rather than the
2 Regulamento de consent of the governed. In Caetano’s Portugal, the primary task of the
Informação da police forces was to maintain the political system and safeguard its opera-
Polícia de Segurança
Pública, despacho do
tion, while all democratic activities were denounced as international com-
ministro do interior, munist subversion.2
15 December 1962. There were three main police forces, all of which were militarised to
These confidential
instructions different degrees: the PIDE,3 the Public Security Police (Polícia de Segurança
determined the Publica – PSP) and the National Republican Guard (Guarda Nacional da
political role of the
PSP and also República – GNR). The PIDE had around 2500 agents, and relied on some
explained that one 20,000 informers (Gallagher 1979), the PSP had 10,500 agents com-
of the communist’s
main goals was to manded by 137 army officers, while the GNR had 9900 officers who
make people lose their patrolled rural areas and garrisoned the main cities with strong infantry
faith in the police.
and cavalry units. In addition to these main forces, there were also two small
3 PIDE changed its specialist forces: the Fiscal Police (Guarda Fiscal – GF) and the Judicial Police
name to the Security
Directorate General (Polícia Judiciária – PJ). The various police forces were complemented with
(DGS, Direcção Geral the regime’s party militia, the Portuguese Legion (Legião Portuguesa – LP),
de Segurança) in
1969, although its which, whilst it had its own security agency and shock troops, dealt mainly
previous name with civil defence matters.
continued to be
widely used.
Following the 1974 coup, Portuguese society experienced feelings of col-
lective liberation (Oliveira 2004). ‘I don’t know what democracy means,
what communism means’, one policeman declared to the press, ‘but every-
thing has changed in the last two days. It’s the first time I feel something like
that. It’s good: the people don’t need to be beaten in order to behave’ (Jornal
de Notícias, 2 May 1974). Nevertheless, the police was in shock and on the
losing side. Its world had turned upside down: the regime they had sworn to
defend had been overthrown and its political elite and senior officials were
being dismissed, while democratic, socialist and communist political activists
who had previously been persecuted were being released from prison,
returning from exile and being honoured as freedom fighters. These former
‘enemies of the state’ even sat in the cabinet and in provisional town coun-
cils. Would the dictatorship’s police ever find a place in this new Portugal?
One of the JSN’s first decisions was to dismantle both the LP and the
once all-powerful PIDE-DGS (Decree-Law 171/74, 25 April 1974). Both
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PJSS-6-3-03-Cerezales 3/14/08 2:34 AM Page 160
4 After the Revolution, ‘fascist lackeys’ and therefore police officers were not to be obeyed. In
previous resistance order to be integrated in the new political system, the police would have
to the ‘fascist regime’
became a legitimating to receive the full support of the new authorities, and words and speeches
factor, with even are not enough when actions suggested otherwise. In fact, neither the gov-
the democratic
Constitution stating ernment nor President Spínola was in real control of the state machinery:
the ‘MFA overthrew the MFA co-ordinating committee maintained its structure and wanted to
the regime as a
culmination of the guarantee the implementation of its programme and prevent the emergence
Portuguese people’s of any counter-revolutionary movements. This represented a significant
resistance to fascism’
(CIHAEP-SP, 1992:
problem for the police: the new civil and military authorities were fighting
291). one another in a battle in which anti-fascist credentials were an essential
5 Interview with asset in order to participate in the new political scene. Consequently,
author, 20 June no-one wanted to taint their symbolic democratic capital by associating
1999.
themselves with the remnants of a ‘fascist’ police.4
Although police officers, with the exception of those who served with
PIDE, were neither imprisoned nor dismissed, and the demands for a political
trial were relatively few, the police forces were nevertheless on their own: a
fact they were to learn very quickly. When they first attempted to deal
with picketing strikers or popular commissions that intended to occupy
empty houses, they discovered the public’s usual obedience to police
orders had transformed into open resistance. This was not unexpected;
however, if they attempted to use force to overcome resistance, their supe-
riors in the civil authorities and the MFA would denounce them as ‘fascist
brutes’ and demand they be held responsible. The traditional cover-up or
‘grey check’ the police used to perform their duties no longer functioned,
meaning that they learned it was wiser and safer to remain passive.
Two months after the revolution, Luis Filipe Madeira, who was a young
lawyer and a well-known democratic activist who became civil governor
for the Algarve, discovered that the PSP agents in the region had all become
demoralised. The public no longer obeyed police instructions, made fun of
them and denounced them as ‘fascists’ whenever they became involved in
any civil dispute. In these conditions, police officers simply refused to
patrol the streets. In the words of Madeira, ‘they were not policemen, but
empty uniforms’.5 There are similar accounts of police demoralisation all
over Portugal. On the other hand, the appearance of the army at a trouble
spot, where they were quite often sent to rescue police officers, was gener-
ally met with cheers. The military’s involvement in social conflicts was
usually welcomed – at least until the summer of 1975, when political
polarisation began to affect even its popularity.
President Spínola and the MFA first clashed on the issue of decolonisa-
tion, and the police were part of this power struggle. Spínola wanted to put
an end to the social turmoil and ensure the rapid reconstruction of law
and order. He counted on the support of the police. With the intention of
reinstating police authority, Spínola had to display his confidence in the
police. In early June 1974 he ordered that the police be supplied with mil-
itary issue automatic rifles; however, the chief of staff of the armed forces,
General Costa Gomes, sided with the MFA and blocked Spínola’s decision.
Costa Gomes argued that ‘the GNR and the PSP are not mentally fit to 6 Spinola’s own project
participate in the revolution’, insinuating that they could be used in a for Africa was a kind
of confederation.
counter-coup: he suggested that the PSP be disarmed and provided with He was opposed to
wooden truncheons instead (Spínola 1978: 149–50). the recognition of
the armed liberation
Spínola began a campaign to rally conservative social forces and mili- movements as the
tary officers. The MFA feared that if Spinola managed to rebuild the state’s former colonies’
representatives. His
authority, he would be able to impose his own programme for a presiden- plan to organise a
tial constitution, no economic transformation and a long and controlled political consultation
in the colonies needed
process of decolonisation along federal lines that would result in the army the backing of an
remaining in Africa for many years to come.6 In July 1974, Costa Gomes armed force capable
and the MFA outflanked Spínola on the matter of maintaining public order of controlling the
situation, but after
when they obtained his support for the creation of a special operations the coup, soldiers
commission, COPCON, which was to be responsible for public order. The refused to combat.
armed forces thus became the principal force for public order. The police 7 Mainland Portugal
was divided in four
was effectively cast aside – insulted even – because the decree mentioned military regions:
their ‘inability’ and ‘inconvenience’ in respect of maintaining public order: North (based in
Oporto), Centre
it was clear that the police did not enjoy the confidence of the political (Coimbra), South
leadership (Decree-Law 310/74, 8 July 1974). From then on military units, (Évora) and Lisbon.
such as the Military Police (Polícia Militar – PM), Lisbon’s artillery regi-
ment, the naval infantry and Queluz operational infantry became the
forces of public order in the capital, while regional military commanders
were attributed with the responsibility to maintain public order in their
zones.7 COPCON also controlled Portugal’s elite commandos, paratroops
and marines: forces that would be critical in putting down any attempted
counter-coup. All this power became tangible when, in late September
1974, Spínola attempted to strengthen his position by organising the
demonstration of the ‘silent majority’, in emulation of De Gaulle’s moves
following the events in Paris in May 1968. Order-loving Portuguese from
throughout the country were called to a rally in Lisbon where they could
show their support for Spínola’s policies, their rejection of the strikes and
social disorder and to show that the communists and the socialists who
were monopolising the public arena were not representative of the
Portuguese people.
This call worried the left-wing groups, particularly since there were
rumours that Spinola was seeking to ban the Portuguese Communist
Party (Partido Comunista Portuguesa – PCP) and that he would use the
meeting to launch a counter-coup. In response, the popular commissions
and trade unions mobilised against this demonstration by barricading the
entrances to Lisbon. Cars were stopped and searched for weapons, while
people on their way to attend the demonstration were turned back. In
order to counter these illegal popular blockades, Spinola asked COPCON to
clear the roads and guarantee the rights of the demonstrators; however,
COPCON took the side of the ‘people’, reinforced the barricades and over-
whelmed those military and police forces that had followed Spinola’s
instructions. The general was forced to resign, his supporters were dis-
missed and General Costa Gomes was appointed president.
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PJSS-6-3-03-Cerezales 3/14/08 2:34 AM Page 162
be democratic, it had to change its internal organisation, its culture and the 8 The few military units
way it dealt with the public. This re-definition attempt was also taking place that were politicised
contrary to the
in the armed forces. As we have already noted, the MFA was neither a prevailing ideology
coherent nor a disciplined body, but a coalition of junior officers. It had to of the surrounding
social area – such
undermine the traditional hierarchies and purge ‘counter-revolutionary’ as Vila Real Infantry
officers in order to maintain their grip on the armed forces, so they created Regiment (left-wing in
a conservative area)
co-ordinating structures that bypassed formal command chains and several or the commandos
participatory mechanisms inside the units which diluted the discipline. The in the Lisbon area
(right-wing in the
MFA fostered internal assemblies in every military unit, in which officers, ‘Lisbon Commune’)
non-commissioned officers and men were supposed to discuss the unit’s life had a special part to
and promote the political awareness of the military. Young, educated, leftist play in the following
events (Palacios
officers used to dominate the assemblies, in particular when the unit had Cerezales 2003:
its barracks in urban, industrial areas and in areas of large agricultural 167–9, 182–9).
estates, while in northern rural Portugal the conservative outlook of the 9 The PPD later
changed its name to
surrounding society limited the leftist appeal.8 A similar participatory Social Democratic
process was promoted within the police: non-hierarchical assemblies were Party (PSD – Partido
Democrático Social).
held in most districts, with each nominating delegates to a national assem-
bly at which re-organisation was to be discussed. The first police assembly
at a national level took place 11 June 1975. The order of the day shows
that they discussed political purges of fascist police officers, the principles of
the fusion with the GNR and the way in which there could be built a so-
called ‘alliance of the security forces with the people’. As long as the issues
at stake were the destruction of fascism, popular mobilisation and the con-
struction of a new society, those in command were no longer to exercise
their functions by virtue of the authority ascribed to them from above, but
by the consent of those serving under them and the will expressed by the
so-called ‘popular masses’. A far-right critic would latter recall these experi-
ences as a process of terrorising police officers, undermining hierarchy and
handing over the Police to the PCP (Barreto 1978). A second gathering was
scheduled for August, but the political process was changing at a very fast
pace and it never took place.
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PJSS-6-3-03-Cerezales 3/14/08 2:34 AM Page 164
Vasco Gonçalves and the MFA radicals who were in office resisted, with the
PCP supporting their position: they claimed the MFA embodied a ‘revolu-
tionary legitimacy’ that was higher than the political parties’ ‘electoral
legitimacy’. Some military officials even went so far as to claim the MFA
would have won the election had it had presented its own candidates,
and dismissed the high turnout, claiming that since the rural poor and
illiterate masses of the north did not yet understand the principles of the
revolution, their votes were not as meaningful as the votes of the class-
conscious industrial areas. The north may have voted for centre-right
parties, but that was only the dead weight of 40 years of obscurantist dic-
tatorship (Correia, Soldado and Marujo undated).
This clash of legitimacies – electoral and revolutionary – broke the
broad political coalition that had supported the MFA. Far-left organisations
and some members of the armed forces accused the communist-leaning
government of trying to control the popular struggles, so they began to
fight for popular power and to organise autonomous workers’ and soldiers’
assemblies. The PS also began to organise large demonstrations against the
government, and called for the primacy of electoral legitimacy. The centre-
right parties followed this strategy, taking part in PS initiatives. Throughout
this ‘hot summer’ of 1975, the hitherto silent conservative majority in the
north began to mobilise under the leadership of the Catholic Church, which
organised meetings, pilgrimages and demonstrations. Anti-communism
became the rallying cry for a new broad political coalition of conserva-
tives, democratic socialists and former Salazarists, while angry crowds
sacked the offices of left-wing local authorities throughout the region.
During two months of violence, approximately 80 of the PCP’s local offices
were destroyed (Palacios Cerezales 2003: 141–73). This radicalisation was
on the increase, and the government and the MFA began to lose control of
the northern districts. Some hard-line MFA officials pressed for ‘strong
repressive action’ in order to save the revolution from ‘reactionary’ and
‘terrorist’ forces. Nevertheless, most of the military did not want to resort
to shootings or to be associated with violent repression.
The maintenance of public order was a hot issue, and some regional mil-
itary commanders tried to transfer those duties to the police forces; however,
as one GNR commander explained, he could not ask his men to stop the
angry crowds, because force could be necessary and if a guard killed
someone in the line of duty, the political authorities would charge him with
murder and label him a fascist (Comércio do Porto, 23 September 1975).
COPCON purchased anti-riot equipment, including tear-gas, rubber
bullets, protection shields and water tanks, but did not have sufficient time
to train its troops how to use it. It also sent some hard-line marine units to
the most violently anti-communist districts, but after killing two demon-
strators who attacked a PCP headquarter in Fafe, near Braga, they were
asked to withdraw. Most of the MFA’s men were unwilling to assume the
costs of repression since, as General Costa Gomes claimed, ‘[it] did not
have a repressive vocation’.
At this point the MFA split into three factions: radicals, who favoured a
military-controlled transition to socialism; populists, who supported the
autonomous popular struggles; and moderates, who called for an agree-
ment with the PS while manoeuvring to form an alliance with conserva-
tive officers and take control of the military apparatus. As most military
units demonstrated their lack of repressive will against anti-communist
crowds in the north, the radicals discovered they were unable to govern.
The 5th provisional government, which had been the most radical to date,
was forced to resign in favour of the 6th and final provisional government
that counted on support from the moderate parties.
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PJSS-6-3-03-Cerezales 3/14/08 2:34 AM Page 166
The police resumed its usual functions: former Spínolists were nominated
as police commanders, and the anti-riot equipment purchased by COPCON
was transferred to the police. In March 1976 the new anti-riot police, the
Intervention Corps (Corpo de Intervenção – CI) was publicly announced,
although its existence was yet to be approved by law. Most of the officers
who were employed in this corps had previously been officials of the
authoritarian regime’s anti-riot Mobile Police. The commando regiment,
which had been in charge of public order in Lisbon since the 25 November
coup, was allowed to return to barracks: the return of the police thus may
well be the moment symbolising the end of the revolution.
Epilogue
During the years that followed, Portugal’s democratic regime became
increasingly stable. The new lines of police modernisation in Portugal
would take Western European standards as its benchmark. During the late
1970s, the PSP was demilitarised and a special school for police officers
was established. The GNR evolved more slowly, and continued to use
firearms against collective rural collective throughout the period during
which the agrarian reform was dismantled. Nevertheless, in the early
1980s they were provided with less-lethal weapons, and in 1986 the
GNR’s special anti-riot unit was created.
After the political transition, the police forces had to deal with a double
legacy: that of the dictatorship and that of the revolution (Pinto 2001).
In the public’s reconstructed recollection, only the PIDE remained associ-
ated with the fascist repression: the PSP and GNR were integrated as pro-
fessional police forces that were responsible to the law rather than to any
particular political regime. Moreover, in the sub-culture of the police, the
memory of the revolutionary period’s social turmoil became a kind of alibi
for their previous devotion to the authoritarian regime.
Thirty years on, the generational replacement and dramatic increase
in police numbers have diluted the presence of old-school police officers.
Those police officers who had willingly participated in the revolutionary
reorganisations of 1975 were cast aside, but there remained a desire to
change some internal hierarchical and professional problems that expressed
itself in the long-standing struggle for union rights within the police
(Colaço and Gomes 2001). The aspiration of police officers for civic rights
is often expressed as the need to ‘bring the revolutionary principles of
25 April’ into the police forces.
References
Barreto, M. (1978), História da polícia em Portugal: Polícia e sociedade, Braga: Braga
Editora.
Carrilho, M. (1985), Forças armadas e mudança política em Portugal no século XX: Para
uma explicação sociológica do papel dos militares, Lisbon: INCM.
Colaço, A. Bernardo and Gomes, A.C. (2001), Sindicalismo na PSP: Medos e fantas-
mas em regime democrático, Lisboa: Cosmos.
‘Fascist lackeys’? Dealing with the police’s past during Portugal’s transition to . . . 167
PJSS-6-3-03-Cerezales 3/14/08 2:34 AM Page 168
Suggested citation
Cerezales, D. (2007), ‘“Fascist lackeys”? Dealing with the police’s past during
Portugal’s transition to democracy (1974–1980)’, Portuguese Journal of Social
Science 6 (3): 155–69, doi: 10.1386/pjss.6.3.155/1
Contributor details
Diego Palacios Cerezales is an assistant professor and doctoral researcher at
Madrid’s Complutense University (UCM). He obtained his masters degree in social
sciences at the University of Lisbon’s Institute of Social Sciences (ICS/UL). He has
published O poder caiu na rua: Crise de estado e acções colectivas na revolução portuguesa
(Lisbon: Imprensa de Ciências Sociais, 2003), and several articles on contempo-
rary Portuguese history. He is currently completing his doctorate on the history of
public order policing in Contemporary Portugal (1834–2000). More information
can be obtained at http://www.historiadelpensamiento.es/dpc.html. Contact: Diego
Palacios Cerezales, Departamento de Historia del Pensamiento y de los Movimientos
Sociales y Politicos, Facultad de Ciencias Políticos y Sociología de la Universidad
Complutense de Madrid, Campus de Somosaguas, 28223 Madrid, Spain. Tel:
+34 91 394 27 83. Fax: +34 91 394 28 57.
E-mail: dpalacio@cps.ucm.es
‘Fascist lackeys’? Dealing with the police’s past during Portugal’s transition to . . . 169
PJSS-6-3-03-Cerezales 3/14/08 2:34 AM Page 170
PJSS-6-3-04-Eaton 3/15/08 2:27 PM Page 171
Abstract Keywords
While North-Western Europe remains the principal destination for Portuguese Portuguese
emigrants, post-millennium flow has seen the United Kingdom (UK) and North- migrant worker
ern Ireland (NI), in particular, emerging as a focal point. As part of a changing employment agent
labour market demand and supply process, several thousand migrants have now Northern Ireland
been recruited by agencies to work in the region’s rurally based food processing rural labour market
industries. This article quantifies the resurgence of Portuguese emigration trails,
explores their recent distribution patterns, and evaluates the role of employment
intermediaries in facilitating the flow. Using qualitative discursive techniques the
experiences of these players are examined before determining their impacts on the
local labour market. Results show that benefits have been brought to a number of
localised economies suffering from shortages and working patterns based on sub-
stitution and segmentation have been fundamentally altered. At the same time,
some small towns have struggled to adapt to this influx and concerns have been
raised in relation to work-based problems and the pace of developmental change
associated with the growing numbers of Portuguese emigrants in Northern
Ireland.
Introduction
In summer 2006 as the Portuguese soccer team enjoyed success at the
World Cup, residents of the small provincial town of Portadown in
Northern Ireland gathered to cheer them on. In a display of inter-community
support, both locals and immigrant workers came together in their
support for a team that carried the hopes of two, small, semi-peripheral,
part industrialised countries located on the fringes of the European Union
(EU). It was a union, in part, inspired by their mutual rivalry with the
England football team and demonstrated some of the progress that has
been made in integrating Portuguese workers into Northern Irish society.
The Portuguese in this part of Ulster represent a small proportion of an
emigrant community numbering at least 4.5 million worldwide (Lawless
2005). This mobilisation was based upon exploration, colonisation, and
more recently, economic emigration to seek a better life. Migrant flows
have curtailed since the peak period of the 1970s when hundreds of
From Porto to Portadown: Portuguese workers in Northern Ireland’s labour market 173
PJSS-6-3-04-Eaton 3/15/08 2:27 PM Page 174
1 The longevity Europe: driven out by a repressive political regime. At its height in 1970,
associated with 173,000 individuals (Serrão 1977) left this part of the Iberian Peninsula;
Portuguese
immigrants and their most heading for jobs, and potentially more rewarding and safer destina-
relative integration tions in France, Germany, Luxembourg and Switzerland (Branco 2001).
into British society is
reflected in the second In addition, untold numbers emigrated illegally, anxious to avoid conscrip-
highest level of British tion and embroilment in the ultimately ill-fated attempt to control
citizenship being
granted. In 2004, for Portugal’s African colonies (Corkill 1999: 25). After the revolution in
example, 545 1974, more relaxed societal controls led to large numbers of emigrants
Portuguese nationals
were confirmed with
returning home. Some were forced back (as retornados) from the former
this status (Home colonies whilst others travelled home voluntarily (as regressos) from north-
Office 2005). ern Europe (Rato 2001). These returnees, along with increasing numbers
of immigrants from the Cape Verde islands, Brazil, Angola, China, and
parts of north-western, central and eastern Europe, contributed to a turn-
around in the country’s migration balance. Researcher’s attentions shifted
to evaluate this net-inward migration of flows (Fonseca 2001; Eaton
2002) while generally ignoring the continued outflow of the domestic
population. This was unfortunate because as a renewal of economic reces-
sionary conditions impacted in the first half of the current decade, emigra-
tion from Portugal re-emerged at rates of between 21,000 and 27,000 each
year. Indeed, since the start of 2000, over 96,000 Portuguese (almost 1 per
cent of the total domestic population) have left their country of birth (INE
2000–2003). Many have been forced to leave as a result of home labour
market difficulties including growing unemployment, limited job opportu-
nities, higher interest rates, the rising cost of living, wage freezes and other
austerity measures imposed by successive governments (Economist
Intelligence Unit 2004) (Table 1).
As a result, Table One shows that, in the new millennium, almost
83,000 (86 per cent) Portuguese emigrants continued to follow the modern
route by migrating to central North-Western Europe. Switzerland and
France remained the principal destinations (Malaurie 1998; Marques
2001) but the United Kingdom had come to account for one in ten of all
emigrants. Indeed, the United Kingdom outstripped Germany (Bauer et al.
2002), Spain and Luxembourg as a main receiver of Portuguese migrants.
Seventy-three per cent of emigrants were classified as temporary (less than
one year), short term or seasonal migrants, but in the British case, the
ratio was significantly different with 43 per cent being labelled as long-
term, permanently settling (more than one year) emigrants. Almost 10,000
migrants were recorded as having travelled to the United Kingdom between
2000 and 2003, and the rate of outward movement was accelerating. When
coupled with voluntary Portuguese consular registrations it was clear that
Britain had gained significantly in its attraction.1 Nevertheless, it is impos-
sible to derive an accurate total not least because Portuguese citizens are
allowed to circulate freely around the EU. Almeida (2006: 6) recognised
the usefulness of the British labour force survey, which suggested that
there were 85,000 Portuguese citizens living in the United Kingdom in
2005. However, some commentators believed there to be nearly 110,000
Year
2000 2001 2002 2003 Total (2000–2003)
Area/Country of
3/15/08
Destination Tem. Per. Tot. Tem. Per. Tot. Tem. Per. Tot. Tem. Per. Tot. Tem. Per. Tot.
North Western Europe 13,561 3855 17,416 13,473 4359 17,832 15,308 6922 22,230 19,347 5909 25,256 61,689 21,045 82,734
Switzerland 4718 1113 5831 3558 247 3805 6038 2240 8278 3879 907 4785 18,193 4507 22,699
France 2431 609 3040 3444 2229 5673 4124 1838 5962 6550 849 7399 16,549 5525 22,074
2:27 PM
United Kingdom 1416 675 2091 1441 501 1943 984 881 1865 1705 2187 3893 5546 4245 9792
Germany 1495 1064 2559 X X 1970 X X 986 1443 955 2398 2938 2019 7913
Spain X X 1177 X X 1175 2524 404 2928 X X 2247 2524 404 7527
Luxembourg X X X X X 1415 X X 704 1266 770 2036 1266 770 4155
Page 175
Other N. West
European countries 3501 394 2718 5030 1382 1851 1638 1559 1507 4504 241 2498 14,673 5380 8574
Other countries
worldwide 3080 837 3917 1354 1403 2757 3237 1891 5128 974 778 1752 8645 4909 13,554
Total for all emigrant
destinations 16,641 4692 21,333 14,827 5762 20,589 18,545 8813 27,358 20,321 6687 27,008 70,334 25,954 96,288
Tem., temporary emigration for a period of less than one year; Per., permanent emigration for a period of more than one year; Tot., total of temporary and permanent emigration;
X, information not available.
Source: Instituto Nacional de Estatística (2000–2003).
2 Registration of Portuguese resident (Anon 2005) although, in turn, the real figure
Portuguese nationals (according to the Portuguese Consulate General in London2) could
at the Consulate
General (PCG) is a be more than twice as high at around 250,000 nationals (Almeida
voluntary activity and 2006: 12).
the figure of 250,000
immigrants reflects Whatever the true figure, it is clear that the Portuguese have been spa-
speculation on the tially drawn to two main locations. The first of these is the Channel
part of the PCG
(Almeida 2006). Islands. Most emigrants found jobs in the horticultural and tourism indus-
tries of Jersey and Guernsey, where employment of Madeiran emigrants in
the hotel trade remains important (Anon 2004; Beswick 2005). Today,
Jersey has a population of around 6000 Portuguese, which grows to
10,000 annually as a result of seasonal employment fluctuations. There
has also been a pattern of emigrants locating in central London, and more
especially the boroughs of Kennington, Lambeth and Stockwell, where
employment in cleaning and domestic service remains a significant
feature (Campos and Botelho 2001: 3). This capital based community is
well established and can be considered a socially coherent entity number-
ing up to 27,000 (Benedictus 2005). Indeed, it mimics traditional
Portuguese enclaves found in parts of France (Volovitch-Tavares 1999)
even to the extent that they have produced their own version of the Yellow
Pages commercial telephone directory – as Páginas Portuguesas – detailing a
myriad of Portuguese owned but British based services (Ramalho 2006).
These included café-bars, restaurants, delicatessens, lawyers, doctors and
hairdressers, as well as fostering community centres, social clubs and an
expatriate football league. Many luso-families have produced first and
second generation offspring who attend British schools (Abreu et al.
2003) and are culturally and dialectically assimilated into the host com-
munity. More recently still, there has been spatial distribution of the
Portuguese emigrant population towards peripheral regions of Britain.
Trails have developed, for example, towards East Anglia to help in agricul-
ture (John 2003), and towards north-west England (around Manchester)
where the Portuguese work mainly in food production factories. In a post
millennium shift, workers have also begun gravitating towards Wales, the
Scottish Borders and Northern Ireland (Corkill and Almeida 2007).
From Porto to Portadown: Portuguese workers in Northern Ireland’s labour market 177
PJSS-6-3-04-Eaton 3/15/08 2:27 PM Page 178
Interviewee C, for example, was unequivocal on this topic: Local people don’t
want to work in this (chicken processing plant) environment. Moreover: We
can’t get local people to do the work so if it weren’t for foreign workers the
company would not be able to operate. We have such high productivity and
market demand that if we failed to meet it, the factory would close down and
(all of us) would be out of jobs.
From Porto to Portadown: Portuguese workers in Northern Ireland’s labour market 179
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The food industry has unpredictable hours at best . . . (this factory) starts at
seven and does not finish until production has stopped. For local workers
with families to support, this is not seen as an acceptable condition.
However, it is perfect for foreign nationals who (in his perception) . . . have
no families to support in the immediate area.
D argued:
the migrants have been able to work overtime in the past when it was not
wanted (by the local workers), for instance, at Christmas and New Year holidays.
F who said that his factory had been able: to use a large population of
(Portuguese) workers keen to work at any time, any holiday to maximum
effect, and as:
B affirmed: we have (Portuguese) agency workers who come in to do
shifts we have trouble filling at night.
The role of the labour agents and the agencies they represented was
clearly very strong and often extended from pre-arrival through to their
initial location in Northern Ireland:
A’s narrative appeared typical of many and explained that: I had to give
(name of employment agency) a cheque for £250 in order to secure my
plane ticket . . . On arrival, (name of agency) had organized accommodation
for us but it was rough with no heating, oil, electric and very little
furnishing.
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Interviewee A, for example, alleged that: Portuguese people and other for-
eigners . . . were complaining that (Mr X) was bullying and threatening
them . . . I knew of them to put Portuguese out of their homes which they
were renting off (Mr X), during the night if they were going to shift jobs that
were not a part of the (named) agency.
C, for example: If foreign workers have trained to a higher level and are
working through an agency they still only receive(d) the basic rate, so in
some cases they were exploited through their agency.
This scenario was, however, complex and relative to the individual’s cir-
cumstances since one person’s ‘self-exploitation’ represented another
person’s ‘trade-off ’. Interviewee H, for instance, was previously a car
mechanic in his native Brazil and:
made more money than most but this only allowed (him) to have a basic
standard of living (at home). It is nothing compared to what (he made) now
(in Northern Ireland). H explained that he currently had a specialist (food
processing) job that meant he: received a higher salary.
A: I know a Portuguese guy who had a bottle smashed over his head. Also
(name of NI labour agent deleted) and his crowd treat Portuguese like slaves
and carry out wrongful beatings which I would class as racial.
H, for example, stated that: (he) had one or two problems with local people . . .
mainly occurring on nights out in (a nearby) town.
A claimed that: one (Portuguese) guy was called a monkey because he
was black and people call us smelly and think we are diseased. (Some) homes
are targeted with petrol bombs.
D spoke of: some resentment towards the migrant workforce.
It appears that the harassment was not exclusively, therefore, the domain
of the local resident/worker against the immigrant but more a two-way
process reflecting confrontational attitudes on the part of some of the
immigrant population (agents/supervisors/workers) against each other. A
complicated picture was clouded further by the alleged involvement of
local paramilitary vigilantes (BBC 2004) looking to ‘control’ what they
considered to be ‘their’ communities.
Interviewee E stated: Most attacks are from . . . youth mobs that are linked to
paramilitaries and it is the paramilitaries who control the attacks. Some of
the houses, which are rented to Portuguese people, are paramilitary owned
and these people . . . (then) demand £20 per week from the Portuguese who
From Porto to Portadown: Portuguese workers in Northern Ireland’s labour market 183
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live in them to ensure their windows stay in . . . and that they receive no
attacks.
Community responses
A further complication emerged, since the process of adaptation by
Portuguese immigrants to the local society, and indeed, by local communi-
ties to the Portuguese (and other immigrant communities) has been slow.
Mobilisations by organisations such as the Northern Ireland district coun-
cils and agencies like the Citizens Advice Bureaux, to help local integration
efforts were only a very recent development. Relative invisibility within the
community meant it was difficult for the region’s social services, for
example, to help the workers. A simple lack of knowledge of an exact
number of immigrants resulted in resource issues often being ill informed
and poorly determined. It was initially difficult to overcome factors such as
efficient provision of English language classes, the proper distribution of
interpreting and translating services, or improved access to health ser-
vices, education systems, welfare benefit offices, and so forth.
The situation has, however, changed with greater recognition and
involvement through, for example, local councils providing translators
and translations of documents. Several simple but far-reaching transitory
arrangements emerged.
C noted that: Within personnel we have a Portuguese girl who assists in the
(worker) interviews and also checks identity cards (against false representa-
tion and fraud).
There are more than two communities in Dungannon: the Portuguese are
now a sizeable group and an important part of life in Dungannon.
When Interviewee A was asked: what factors made her decide to leave
Portugal, her answer was emphatic and echoed the views of most: money.
everything keeps going up in price . . . but the salary stays the same so it
becomes unaffordable to live there (Interviewee A, again).
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All of these favourable conditions, therefore, had the potential to allow further
improvement of the familial situation. Once again, they helped to justify the
trade-off associated with many of the immigrant’s work experiences and their
apparent willingness to tolerate the more negative aspects of their existence.
Discussion
In conclusion, we have tentatively examined the scale, experiences and
impacts of Portuguese migrant workers in Northern Ireland’s labour
market. Our analysis argued that employment of Portuguese migrants, in
Portadown, Dungannon and other regional market towns, was signifi-
cantly driven by employment agencies. This process has provided factories
with a stable workforce and counteracted many of the labour shortages
associated with the rurally based food processing sectors. As a result,
working patterns based upon substitution and segmentation, have been
fundamentally altered. Equally, the role of agencies have brought adverse
consequences for some migrants in terms of reduced pay and inferior
working and living conditions compared to other (non-migrant) workers.
However, it appeared that this was a conscious decision-making process on
the part of the migrant worker to ‘trade-off ’ personal inconveniences in
deference to remunerative reward, remittances, and savings, which could
all be used to improve familial circumstances, both in Portugal and in
Northern Ireland. As such, many Portuguese appeared to tolerate the
dualistic operating conditions that they faced as well as the slowness asso-
ciated with the pace of developmental change and the process of adapta-
tion to, and on the part of, many local communities.
Consequently, the future for these types of immigrant is difficult to
surmise. It may be that with growing levels of migrant labourers and
increasing evidence of family reconciliation then greater integration can
be expected. Integration can take two forms, first, in terms of the commu-
nity. As we have observed, first-generation immigrant children are now
settling in Northern Ireland’s primary schools and with time will move
into the secondary (and tertiary) education sectors. It is likely that com-
munity groups/associations will be established, and continue to grow.
Hypothetically, they may come to mirror (on a smaller scale) the estab-
lished Portuguese social communities found in London. Fledgling exam-
ples already exist in Dungannon where the weekend use of a local
community centre together with a Portuguese owned restaurant and a
managed public house forms the hub for a local socialisation/integration
process to take place. Portadown has a public house with a strong
Portuguese clientele base, and a coffee house and shop selling Portuguese
goods, which acts as an informal drop-in support-centre offering mutual
advice and translation services. More importantly, these initiatives are
contributing to a relatively positive information chain that constitutes a
key part of the strong worker migration trail that has now developed 3 There is debate over
between Portugal and Northern Ireland. whether there are a
finite number of jobs
Second, greater levels of integration can be anticipated in terms of the local available in the food-
labour market. Progress has been made with some migrant workers now processing sector of
Northern Ireland. It
being directly employed by the factory (rather than continuing to be linked to may be that
a labour agency), thus benefiting from bonus payments, training opportuni- saturation point is
being reached.
ties, language attainment, access to trade union membership, and closer Equally there were
immersion in the workforce and local economy. However, there is also a down- inferences from the
survey (interviewees
side because if labour agencies are not carefully regulated (Concordia 2006: B and E) that some
12) then problems of discrimination/exploitation demonstrated in the article local areas have been
could render the Portuguese immigrants as a vulnerable group in a society regenerated and the
contributions of
not characterised by its tolerance of ‘outsiders’. The omnipresent spectre of migrant workers have
violence is unlikely to go away completely and it is a disturbing prospect; one helped to improve
trade and produce re-
orchestrated by criminal paramilitary elements (both Republican and Loyalist) investment, increases
exerting what they see is ‘control’ over ‘their’ communities. in jobs and sustained
growth of factories
Equally, as segmentation in the labour market continues and potential (DETI 2007).
saturation point3 is neared with migrant workers continuing to enter
Northern Ireland and take up jobs that local workers are reluctant to take
on, then it is possible that conflict will develop. There is already some
observational evidence of friction developing between different groups of
immigrant workers (Portuguese and eastern Europeans, for example)
competing for the same job vacancies in mid-Ulster and this may be exac-
erbated in the longer term in a three way-internecine tension between the
local, Portuguese and East European working groups.
On the other hand, with time, co-operation and a level of tolerance, the
Portuguese workers and their families could be a welcome addition to
the establishment of multiculturalism and a multi-ethnic society within
the region. Such a community already typifies large urban centres in the
rest of the United Kingdom (i.e. London and to a lesser extent, the Channel
Islands and around Manchester) but is a process still in its infancy in
Northern Ireland. Moreover, it is a largely unknown concept in many
rural market towns, and more economically peripheral parts of the
province. This lack of experience of immigrant labourers and their contri-
butions will be a key factor in changing community relations and percep-
tions of the Portuguese workers. It is a feature that time will change but
one which will require all parties to come together to discuss their similar-
ities and differences. Given past experience, there is no guarantee that this
will happen. As a result, Portuguese workers in Northern Ireland remain
in a classical state of migratory flux. Many live in a hidden, partially
understood, sometimes abused, but important, gradually evolving, and at
the micro-employment scale, an increasingly influential community.
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Suggested citation
Eaton, M. (2007), ‘From Porto to Portadown: Portuguese workers in Northern
Ireland’s labour market’, Portuguese Journal of Social Science 6 (3): 171–91, doi:
10.1386/pjss.6.3.171/1
Contributor details
Martin Eaton is a Reader in the University of Ulster’s School of Environmental Sciences
and since 2003 has been an International Fellow of the Gilbert M. Grosvenor Center
From Porto to Portadown: Portuguese workers in Northern Ireland’s labour market 191
PJSS-6-3-04-Eaton 3/15/08 2:27 PM Page 192
PJSS-6-3-05-Freire 3/14/08 2:36 AM Page 193
Minority representation in
Portuguese democracy
André Freire CIES-ISCTE
Abstract Keywords
Using Lijphart’s framework concerning different models of democracy, the objec- representation
tive is to provide a very brief overview of the main social and political divisions in minorities
Portuguese society, and to present the main institutional features of Portuguese democratic model
democracy and the possibilities they offer for minority representation. The article Portugal
starts by looking at the main social and political divisions in Portuguese society.
Then, the main institutional characteristics of Portuguese democracy, as regards
the ‘executive-parties dimension’ and the ‘federal-unitary dimension’, and the
opportunities they offer for representation of minorities in Portugal, are presented.
The article uses a perspective which is both longitudinal (1974 to the present)
and comparative (Portugal in the context of Western Europe). The article ends
with some brief conclusions.
Introduction
Various different models can be found for democracy, both in normative * Paper prepared for
theories for democracy, and in the domain of empirical political science presentation at the
Seminar on ‘Minority
(Dahl 1998; Lijphart 1977, 1989, 1999; Beethem 2005; Held 2005). representation in
However, considering that our topic here is ‘minority representation in national parliaments’
organised by the
Portuguese democracy’, the theoretical model best suited to this type of Council of Europe,
analysis is that conceived by Arend Lijphart on majoritarian and consen- Committee on Rules
of Procedure and
sus democracies (Lijphart 1977, 1989, 1999; Horowitz 1985; Reynolds Immunities,
1999; Reilly 2001; O’Flynn and Russell 2005). Assembleia da
República, Sala do
In his various works on the subject, Lijphart starts out from the premise Senado, Lisbon, 29
that modern democracies are fundamentally representative. So if government September 2006. The
is not exercised (directly) by the people, the types of democratic regimes are author wishes to
thank the Deputy
basically differentiated by the varying answers to the question ‘who should Ana Catarina Mendes
govern’? According to the ‘majoritarian model’ of the Westminster type, for her invitation to
take part in this
the answer is the representatives of the majority of the voters – ‘the major- seminar.
ity’. According to the ‘consensus democracy model’, the answer is the rep-
resentatives of the largest possible part of the various segments into which
the electorate is divided – ‘as many people as possible’.
Each type of democracy is associated with an integrated set of political
institutions, which function as a system of incentives and constraints for
the activities of social and political actors. With regard to the election of
representatives and the decision-making process at central government
Consensus – ‘Who
Majoritarian – ‘Who governs? As many
Empirical dimensions governs? The majority’ people as possible’
Executive-parties Concentration of power Power-sharing within the
in the executive executive (‘enlarged’
(single-party coalition government)
government) Power-sharing between
Executive dominance of executive and
the legislature legislature
Bipartisan system Multi-party system
Majoritarian electoral Proportional electoral
system system (PR)
Pluralism of interest groups Neo-corporatism
Paradigmatic examples: UK, New Zealand (until Switzerland, Belgium,
countries, etc. 1996), Barbados European Union
Type of societies usually Non-plural societies (i.e. Plural societies (i.e.,
associated with each homogenous societies societies highly divided
type of democracy such as those divided along ethnic, religious
only along socio- and/or linguistic lines
economic or territorial ‘number of groups
lines) and their relative
dimension’)
Source: Lijphart (1999).
level, which the author calls the ‘executive-parties dimension’ of the insti-
tutional model (see Table 1a), majoritarian democracy is fundamentally
associated with the following characteristics: first, a majoritarian electoral
system and a political arena dominated by two major parties which take
turns in government and, second, the prevalence of executive power, nor-
mally exercised by a single party, over legislative power. Politics is here
envisaged as a zero-sum game in which the winner (in each election) takes
all (i.e. control of the fundamental decision making processes in central
government). This solution is therefore particularly well suited to homoge-
nous societies, in other words, societies with few ethnic, linguistic, reli-
gious or other divisions, and where the main dividing lines through the
electorate are socioeconomic. This is the sort of society where today’s
losers are most likely to be tomorrow’s winners, that is, where a system of
two alternating parties will work.
However, we should note that majoritarian systems at central govern-
ment level may co-exist with consensual type solutions at the level of the
state’s territorial organisation: the prime example of this is the federal
solution (as opposed to a unitary and centralised state) (see Table 1b). In
accordance with the second empirical dimension of his models of democ-
racy, which Lijphart calls the ‘federal-unitary dimension’, majoritarian
democracy tends to feature the following characteristics: unitary and cen-
tralised government (both as regards the powers conferred by the constitu-
tion, and as concerns the allocation of state revenues and expenditure), a
Consensus – ‘Who
Majoritarian – ‘Who governs? As many
Empirical dimensions governs? The majority’ people as possible’
Federal-unitary Unitary and centralised Federal and decentralised
government government
Concentration of power in Strong bicameralism
a unicameral parliament Constitutional rigidity
Constitutional flexibility Judicial review (and
Absence of judicial review strong amendment
(soft amendment procedures)
procedures) Independence of the
Central bank controlled by Central Bank
the executive Switzerland, Belgium,
Paradigmatic examples: UK (until devolution in European Union (USA,
countries, etc. 1998), New Zealand Canada)
(until 1996), Barbados Idem
Type of societies usually Idem
associated with each
type of democracy
Source: Lijphart (1999).
Index of
No religious
Countries Catholic Protestant Orthodox Others Religion fragmentation
1)
FRA 73.9 0.0 0.0 10.5 15.6 0.42
AUS 78.0 4.9 0.0 8.6 8.6 0.38
ITA 83.1 0.0 0.0 0.7 16.2 0.28
BEL 90.0 0.0 0.0 10.0 0.0 0.18
IRL 93.1 0.0 0.0 6.0 0.0 0.13
SP 94.9 0.0 0.0 5.1 0.0 0.10
POR 94.5 0.0 0.0 5.5 0.0 0.10
2)
NL 33.0 23.0 0.0 5.0 39.0 0.68
GER 35.3 40.2 0.0 2.1 22.3 0.66
3)
UK 13.1 72.0 0.6 4.8 9.5 0.45
DK 0.0 88.2 0.0 11.8 0.0 0.21
SWE 0.0 88.2 0.0 11.8 0.0 0.21
4)
GRE 0.0 0.0 97.6 2.4 0.0 0.05
Source: Lane and Ersson (1999: 46).
Notes: Catholic countries; religiously mixed countries; protestant countries; Orthodox countries;
within each group, the countries are listed in a descending order of religious fragmentation.
analysis. More recent data, from the United Nations Development Program,
show Portugal to be the most unequal country in the EU-25 (UNDP 2005).
This situation would appear to be related not only to the actual level of
development in the country (other fairly unequal countries are Spain and
Greece), but also to the population’s actual tolerance vis-à-vis inequality
(Cabral, Vala and Freire 2003) and, above all, to the ideological orienta-
tion, and consequent public policies, of the governing class (see in this
respect the position of the United Kingdom).
Socioeconomic inequalities in Portugal are not only fairly significant;
they also correspond to a fairly precise geographical demarcation. On the
one hand, there are areas of the country (Lisbon and the Tagus Valley,
Madeira and the Algarve) with greater control of socioeconomic resources
and above average earnings levels, whether measured in terms of
per capita GDP or in terms of per capita household disposable income
(see Table 6). On the other hand, with less control over socioeconomic
resources there are other areas of the country (north, centre, Alentejo and
the Azores), where earning levels are below average. Regions in the first
group are – as a rule – more densely populated, although certain coastal
areas of the north and centre also have a high population density (Freire
2001). Indeed, if the statistical data at our disposal allowed us to break
down the northern and central regions into coastal and interior sub-
regions, we would have an even clearer picture of the geographical pattern
of socioeconomic inequality: the interior outlying areas have much more
limited control over socioeconomic resources than the coastal areas,
2 The PS has always GDP per capita 2001 DHI per capita 2001
been a member of the
Socialist International NUTS (Thousand euros)
(Sablosky 1997: PORTUGAL 11.9 8.0
56ff.).
North 9.6 6.7
3 Until the 1990s, the Centre 9.7 7.2
PSD had been Lisbon and Tagus Valley 15.8 9.8
associated with the
Alentejo 9.6 7.0
European Liberal
Democratic and Algarve 12.4 8.6
Reformist Group Azores 9.4 6.9
(ELDR) in the Madeira 13.4 8.5
European Parliament.
Since the beginning of Source: Instituto Nacional de Estatística, Contas regionais (www.ine.pt).
the 1990s, however, it
has aligned itself with Table 6: Territorial inequalities in Portugal: GDP per capita and disposable
the conservative household income (DHI) per capita by NUTS II, 2001.
European People’s
Party (EPP) (Frain which are more central (from a social and political perspective, although
1997: 80ff.)
not necessarily from a geographical perspective) (Freire 2001). Finally,
4 Founded in 1921, the there is also a contrast between the two most remote Atlantic island
PCP was a member of
the Comintern until regions: Madeira and the Azores. Madeira has above average levels of
the collapse of this income, especially in terms of per capita GDP, whilst the Azores is the
organisation (Cunha
1997: 37). In the region trailing farthest behind the national average, in terms of per capita
European Parliament, GDP, and the second farthest behind the national average in terms of per
the PCP is a member
of the United capita disposable household income.
European Left/Nordic
Green Left (UEL/NGL)
parliamentary group.
Issue dimensions of partisan conflict in the Portuguese
party system
Prior to the relatively bloodless Carnation Revolution of 25 April 1974 that
initiated the so-called ‘third wave’ of worldwide democratisation, free and
fair elections with universal suffrage and a competitive party system were
unheard of in Portugal. Portugal’s transition was initiated by a coup led by
junior officers (Freire 2005, 2006a). Whilst the coup may have been
planned as a political revolution to liberalise society – overthrow a decrepit
regime and end the interminable colonial wars – it is important to note that
the military remained committed to holding constituent elections one year
from the date of coup. These elections were held on schedule on 25 April
1975, and obtained a 92 per cent turnout. One year later, on 25 April
1976, the first constitutional parliamentary elections took place.
A stable party system quickly emerged, and by 1976 four parties rep-
resented almost 90 per cent of the electorate. Apart from a brief period
during the mid-1980s when the centre-left Partido Renovador Democrático
(PRD) emerged and disappeared, the party system has remained relatively
stable. The general tendency is for the vote to concentrate with the two
centrist ‘catch-all’ parties: the centre-left Partido Socialista (Socialist Party –
PS),2 and the centre-right Partido Social Democrata (Social Democratic
Party – PSD), which, despite its name is a liberal party and not social
democratic.3 Alongside the PS and the PSD, the Partido Comunista
Português (Portuguese Communist Party – PCP)4 and the conservative
Centro Democrático Social (Social Democratic Centre – CDS) have become
the system’s main parties. Following its defeat in the 1991 legislative elec- 5 The CDS was founded
tions, the CDS changed its leadership, its ideological profile and its name, as a Christian
democratic party.
becoming the Partido Popular (Popular Party – PP).5 Some smaller parties Following accession
have obtained seats in parliament during the democratic period (Freire to the EU it joined the
EPP. In the early
2005, 2006a). Among these parties it is worth mentioning the Bloco do 1990s it began
Esquerda (Left Bloc – BE). This left-libertarian organisation was originally promoting an anti-EU
stance, leading to its
a coalition of two old extreme-left wing parties and a political movement expulsion from the
that was formed to compete in the 1999 legislative elections. Over the past EPP in 1992.
Following this, it
few years, however, it has come to be viewed as a single political party.6 joined the Union for
When competing for voters’ support, parties present different packages Europe of the Nations
of public policies, each with different levels of priority. Both the packages of Group (UPE). After
1997, the party’s
public policies and their relative priority are related to the issue dimen- stance on the EU
sions of partisan conflict. Lijphart emphasises the need to distinguish changed, culminating
with their return to
between the dimensions of policy competition, and ‘the characteristics of the EPP in July 2004.
the voters that parties represent’. In this respect, it is important to recall 6 The BE elected its first
the difference between ‘domain of identification’ and ‘space of competi- MEP at the 2004
European Elections.
tion’ that were introduced by Sani and Sartori (1983: 330). The former In the European
refers to which electors identify with the different parties, and which Parliament, the BE
dimensions of identification (ideological, religious, ethnic, linguistic, terri- (like PCP) is an
associated member
torial, etc.) are relevant in each case, while ‘space of competition’ ulti- of the UEL/NGL
mately addresses the query, along which dimensions lay the non-identified parliamentary group.
partisan or floating voters for which it is rewarding to compete (Sani and
Sartori 1983: 330). The two dimensions are complementary, but what it
does mean is that electors are usually distributed along multiple dimensions
of identification; however, this does not necessarily mean that political
parties compete along the same dimensions. Moreover, in spite of multiple
dimensions of identification, the space of competition can be one-
dimensional. Lijphart (1999, 1989) defines seven issue dimensions of policy
competition. Additionally, for each country and epoch, he classifies each of
them according to their importance for policy competition. In Table 7,
Lijphart’s analysis of the dimensions of policy competition in the Portuguese
case is presented for the periods 1975–86 and 1975–96. Updated data for
the period 1996–2004 has been added from our own analyses.
Table 7: Issue dimensions of partisan conflict in the Portuguese party system, 1975–2004.
political response to the 2003 Gulf War, which was opposed by all of the
left-wing parties and supported by the right-wing parties.
European integration is an issue that cuts across the ideological divide,
albeit in a rather less than straightforward manner. During the transition
to democracy, the PCP and other left-wing groups proposed alternative
socialist and Third World paths. This explains why European integration
was to become a major policy goal of the PS, PSD and CDS. From the mid-
1970s until 1992, political support for Europe was monopolised by these
largely pro-European parties, with the result that, from 1988 onwards
(the year of the first direct elections to the European Parliament), the PCP
was forced to significantly moderate its resistance to Europe (Cunha 1993).
Following its resounding defeat at the 1991 elections, however, the newly
renamed PP followed its new leader in adopting a much more sceptical
position towards the European Union and its proposals for a single European
currency. This change in direction was short-lived; however, following the
election of a new leader in 1997, the party accepted the inevitability of the
new currency. With the PP’s subsequent rise to power as part of the PSD-
PP coalition that formed the government in 2002, the party has assumed
a more prudent position. The position of the PP notwithstanding, it is a
fact that there is very little to separate the PSD and the PS on European
issues (Freire 2005, 2006a). One new element of left-right division over
European matters came to light in the wake of the European parliamen-
tary elections of 2004 when the opposition left-wing parties rejected the
EU stability pact that was defended by the governing right-wing parties.
The issues that provide the best overlaps in the left-right divide in
Portugal are, first, socioeconomic matters, and, second, religious affairs.
Whether as a domain of competition or of identification, both issues enable
us to split the parties into left- and right-wing, and to further order them
in a left-right continuum that ranges from the PCP on the left, through the
BE, PS and PSD to the PP on the right (Freire 2005, 2006a). In terms of
the domain of competition, the socioeconomic dimension (i.e., controver-
sies concerning socioeconomic equality and the role of the state in the
economy and society) is the most significant, with the religious dimension
having only medium significance. During the democratic transition, the
Catholic Church aligned itself with the pro-liberal democratic parties
against the radical left. During that period, religious polarisation was high.
Since then the religious dimension has barely registered as a domain of
policy competition except when policies concerning moral issues and/or
the Church’s interests are debated. This has been the case with proposals to
liberalise abortion legislation (which is supported by the left), or the proposal
to provide state finance for the Catholic University (which is supported by
the right) (Freire 2005, 2006a). As a dimension of identification, however,
the religious issue has always proved more significant than the socioeco-
nomic issue, with some studies of Portuguese electoral behaviour reveal-
ing that church attendance is a better vote predictor than social class
(Freire 2005, 2006a). Post-materialist issues are more pertinent to the
7 Madeira has six competition domain than they are to that of identification. They more or
deputies in the Lisbon less permit us to range the parties from left to right in terms of their policy
parliament, while the
Azores have five. proposals; however, they are a very poor predictor of voting alignments
8 Portugal, Spain, or of the individual citizen’s position on the political spectrum (Freire
Greece, France, 2005, 2006a).
United Kingdom,
Germany, Austria, On the one hand there is a very low potential for partisan conflict based
Italy, Holland, on ethnic and linguistic issues in the Portuguese party system, and indeed
Denmark, Belgium,
Sweden and Ireland.
these are not relevant dimensions of partisan conflict: on the other hand
The 1989 figures are social inequalities with a territorial base are fairly deep. Moreover, Portugal
based on the has two ultra-peripheral regions (the Azores and of Madeira – although
Eurobarometer 31A
survey data for all Madeira now has a level of individual and familial per capita incomes that
countries except are above the national average). However, even the issues related to these
Austria and Sweden,
where data from the latter divisions (i.e. social inequalities with a territorial base) are not rele-
‘Party Manifestos’ vant issues of partisan conflict at least at the national level. On the one
was used. The figures
for all countries in hand, this might be due to the fact that regional parties are forbidden by the
1999 are based on Portuguese constitution. On the other hand, although Portugal has a cen-
data from the
European Election
tralised system of government, there is a regionalised system of government
Study of that year (see for the Azores and of Madeira, with a regional parliament and government
http://www.european in each. Thus, these minorities – at least from the standpoint of the number
electionstudies.net/
EES%201999.htm). of inhabitants and the distance of the regions from the mainland – can
9 Only in Ireland we express their interests through the regional system of government, whilst
considered the two also being represented within the national parliament in Lisbon.7
major parties tout
court (Fianna Fail and
Leaving aside those issues that normally cut across the left-right divide,
Fine Gael) due to the we are left with the socioeconomic, the religious and the post-materialist
fact that these are the issue dimensions. What, however, is the strength of the left-right divide in
parties that usually
lead government’s Portugal in a comparative perspective in terms of the policy competition
alternation. domain? By using the electorate’s perception of the position of political
parties on the political spectrum in 13 countries in 1989 and 1999,8 the
following became apparent: in terms of standardised ideological distances
(i.e. the absolute distance between parties on the political spectrum,
divided by the maximum distance) between the two most extreme parties
represented in their respective parliament, France, Portugal and Greece
had the most polarised political systems both in 1989 and 1999. In both
Portugal and Greece this is due mainly to the presence of orthodox
Communist parties. When considering the standardised ideological dis-
tance between the two major parties (one from the left ideological bloc,
and the other from the right9) in these countries, the opposite conclusions
can be drawn for the Portuguese case. In 1989, Portugal, Austria and
Ireland were the least polarised systems, while in 1999 Portugal, Belgium,
the United Kingdom, Austria and Ireland were the least polarised. Using
data from surveys conducted during 1989 and 1993, the conclusions arrived
at were very similar (Freire 2005, 2006a).
of 23 countries and 24 political systems (France counts twice: the 4th and
5th Republics) in terms of the profile of the respective political systems in
the ‘executive-parties’ dimension and in the ‘federal-unitary’ dimension.
There is no need here to go into methodological details, suffice to say that
for each dimension the authors constructed a compound index that aggre-
gates the information for the various items characterising each of the two
dimensions (see Tables 1a and 1b above). Both as regards the ‘executive-
parties’ dimension and the ‘federal-unitary dimension’, the highest scores
refer to the majoritarian and unitary characteristics, respectively. At the
other end of the scale, the lowest scores point to profiles characteristic of
consensus and federal democracies, respectively.
Before continuing with an analysis of the data in Table 8, we should
point out the d’Hondt highest average system of proportional representa-
tion is used in Portuguese parliamentary elections. Votes are converted
into parliamentary seats by party with a view to ensuring a balanced
match between the percentage of votes and the percentage of seats
obtained by each party. Votes are counted for each parliament in each of
the 22 multi-member constituencies (18 corresponding to the 18 mainland
districts, one each for the Azores and Madeira, and two for expatriates,
divided into ‘Europe’ and ‘rest of the world’). There has been only one
major change to the Portuguese electoral system since it was established
in 1975 – the reduction in the number of deputies from 250 to 230 as
part of the 1989 constitutional review, which took effect from the 1991
parliamentary election and which had a slight impact on the average size
of constituencies (reduced from 11.4 to 10.5). Under the electoral law, the
number of members per constituency is proportional to the number of reg-
istered voters.
In terms of the ‘executive-parties’ dimension, the average figures shown
in Table 8 for the entire democratic period under consideration (1976–95)
show that Portugal occupied a middle-of-the-road position amongst the
24 political systems, rather closer to the ‘consensus model’ of democracy
than to the ‘majoritarian model’. In other words, Portugal’s institutional
arrangements significantly facilitate the representation of minorities. This
means that, although Portuguese society is relatively homogenous (except
in terms of religious integration, socioeconomic inequalities and political
divisions), the design of the political institutions with regard to the ‘executive-
parties’ dimension is substantially favourable to the expression and repre-
sentation of minority identities and interests.
However, we know that during the democratic period (1974 to the
present), the Portuguese political system has presented differing charac-
teristics in terms of the ‘executive-parties’ dimension, depending on the
period in question – before or after 1987 (Lopes and Freire 2002; Lobo
2001, 2003; Magalhães 2003; Freire 2005, 2006a).
The changes in the Portuguese party system can be divided into three
distinct phases (Freire 2005, 2006a). The first of these was the period
from 1976 to 1987, which is characterised by a fragmented multiparty
system with highly unstable cabinets. During this phase, the role of each
of the different major political institutions (president, government and
parliament) was more balanced. The second period, from 1987 to 2002,
was one in which a strong bipartisan trend within the party system was
evident. This trend impelled change towards single party and increasingly
stable governments with power being concentrated with the prime minis-
ter. Between 2002 and 2005 the system appeared to have entered a
third phase, one in which the concentration of the vote in the two major
parties persisted, although not sufficiently strong to obviate the need to
form coalitions. We now know that the period between 2002 and 2005
represented only a brief interregnum in the majoritarian trend in the
Portuguese party system. The PS won the 2005 legislative elections with a
quasi-majority of votes (around 45 per cent) and an absolute majority of
seats that created the conditions for the country to return to stable single
party government. However, as can be seen in Figure 1, and as has been
argued elsewhere (Freire 2006a), the majoritarian trend in the political
and party systems is not due to any major change in the institutional
format of the regime, namely the electoral system, but mainly to a con-
centration of the vote in the two major parties (see Freire 2005, 2006a).
Note: The AD coalition was considered as a single organisation in calculating both the ENEP and the
‘Vote percentage of largest party divided by 10’ for the years 1979 and 1980. In these years, the AD
is considered the largest party.
Sources: ENEP, and the ‘Vote percentage of largest party divided by 10’ calculated by the author
from official electoral data (www.cne.pt); Effective threshold (Lijphart) (Magalhães 2003: 189);
Disproportionality (Gallagher’s Least Squares Index) (Magalhães 2003: 189).
10 Although in 1998 a elected by proportional representation (for the next parliament, the
referendum was held number of deputies will be cut to 47, all elected for a single constituency,
to find out whether
the Portuguese instead of various constituencies as previously).
wanted to adopt a The Azores are located at around 2000 km from the Iberian Peninsula
regionalised system of
government for the and have a population of 241,763 (INE 2001). The region consists of nine
country as a whole. islands, each of which corresponds to a constituency (an extra compen-
The proposal from the
Socialist government satory constituency will be added at the next elections, as a result of the
was also supported by recent reform of the electoral system). The region’s parliament has a total
the Communist Party.
The right wing parties
of 52 deputies, elected by proportional representation.
(PSD and CDS-PP)
opposed the plans. Brief conclusions
The proposal was
rejected by the Portugal is a fundamentally homogenous country in terms of ethnicity
electorate, with and language, and also as regards religious faith. In other words, the
63.5 per cent against
regionalisation, and country has no significant minorities in these areas. However, there are
only 36.5 per cent large socioeconomic inequalities, which have remained largely unchanged
in favour (Freire and
Baum 2003). since at least the 1980s. What is more, these inequalities quite clearly fit a
geographical pattern. In addition to socioeconomic issues, and above all
those of inequality, the level of religious integration also has significant
potential for political polarisation. Curiously, however, these territorially
based social inequalities are not a great source of political controversy.10
This may be because the country’s institutional system (unitary and highly
centralised state), which includes no regionalisation or a parliamentary
second chamber to represent the regions, provides no channel for the
expression of any (potential) claims. Another reason may be the constitution
prohibition of regionalist political parties. In addition to these social sources
of political polarisation, there are also the political divisions as such, which
provide the framework for conflict within the party political system.
In terms of the executive-parties dimension, Portuguese democracy is
basically close to the consensus model. In other words, it provides fairly
favourable conditions for the expression of minority identities and interests.
However, from 1987 onwards there has been a shift towards majoritarian
democracy, but this was due more to changing voter behaviour than to
any real alteration in the design of political institutions, namely in the
electoral system.
Despite the existence of devolved government for the Azores and Madeira
regions, Portugal has always (since the transition to democracy) had a
political system closer to the majoritarian model with regard to the federal-
unitary dimension. Indeed, from a comparative standpoint, the political
system is extremely centralised and unitary, not least because the
Autonomous Regions of the Azores and Madeira account for no more than
around five per cent of the country’s population. In other words, if we
exclude these regions, from the point of view of expression of the interests
and identities of the population’s resident in outlying regions with limited
control over economic resources, the Portuguese political system does not
facilitate representation of territorially based minorities.
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Contributor details
André Freire is an assistant professor at ISCTE in Lisbon and is also a senior
researcher at CIES-ISCTE. Contact: André Freire, ISCTE, Avenida das Forças
Armadas, 1649-026 Lisboa, Portugal.
E-mail: andre.freire@iscte.pt
Review
Portuguese Journal of Social Science Volume 6 Number 3. © Intellect Ltd 2007.
Review. English language. doi: 10.1386/pjss.6.3.213/5
1 Given that the some are more successful than others – depending on the availability of
periodisation information, particularly concerning the more distant periods. Nevertheless,
established by the
authors is different each chapter of this book is a small jewel of political science, an ambitious
for each country, we and useful sketch of the leadership minorities that, in four southern
adopt the criteria of
the type of regime for European countries, were the protagonists during 150 years of regime
comparing the change, industrialisation and social and cultural transformation.
ministerial elite.
The book consists of five chapters, four of which are dedicated to
Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece respectively, with the fifth being a com-
parative analysis in the form of a conclusion by Nancy Bermeo, who also
co-wrote the preface with Pedro Tavares de Almeida and António Costa
Pinto (this latter two also wrote the chapter on Portuguese ministers).
The editors begin by explaining the importance of ministers in the con-
temporary political arena and describing the purpose of this compilation,
viz, to examine the composition of the southern European ministerial
elites and the rules for their recruitment during the past 150 years, in
order to evaluate the impact of the different regime types and modes of
transition, to scrutinise the similarities and differences between the various
countries and to identify the dominant tendencies and variations over
time. In these first pages the editors also describe the orientation transmit-
ted to the authors through analysis of the ministers’ social profile and
their political cursus honorum, in order to determine the attributes, quali-
ties and types of experience that during the different periods placed the
individuals in the advantageous position from which they could become
members of the ministerial elite.
In the application of the first methodological demand, that is, in the
periodisation of the main regime changes, it is possible to clearly observe
the first similarity between the countries being studied. The seven regime
changes that took place in Greece and Spain, and the five that were identi-
fied in Portugal and Italy, suggest similar national historical trajectories in
terms of political stability – or instability. However, the exercise of the com-
parison becomes even more pertinent when it is established that, through-
out the period being studied, the four states experienced monarchism,
republicanism, authoritarian fascism and democracy almost contempora-
neously. Having arrived at this point, the first question arises: does a model
of political organisation produce a specific type of ministerial elite, inde-
pendent of location? In other words, does the political nature of a regime
determine the recruitment standard and the profile of its ministers?
Answering this question calls for a transversal comparison that demands
a flexible analysis of the nature of the different type of regime.1 That is to
say, that in referring to the monarchical ministerial elite it considers every
Spanish government between 1874 and 1931, even though the Franco
regime was – at least nominally – a monarchy, and not forgetting that the
present head of the Spanish state is a monarch, while in the case of
Greece, it is only concerned with the executives nominated prior to the
installation of Metaxas’s dictatorship (1936–41). The authors also assume
that Italian monarchy ended in 1924, the year in which the last competitive
elections took place. Portugal is the only country in which the regimes fol- 2 In chapter two Linz,
lowed each other in an almost linear sequence from monarchy to republic Jerez and Corzo divide
the first Bourbon
(1910) to dictatorship (1926) to parliamentary democracy (1974). Restoration into three
The average age of the ministers at the date of first appointment ranged periods: 1874–1902,
1902–23 and
between 47 in Portugal and 55.3 in Spain (between 1902 and 1923) during 1925–31 (civil
the monarchical periods.2 While it was common for the capital cities to be directorate/
dictablanda).
over-represented within government in the four countries during that
era – a situation that persists to the present – it is also worth noting the
disproportionate number of ministers who came from other regions –
Piedmont in the case of Italy and the Peleponnese and Sterea Hellas in
Greece. The hegemony of these territories in the set of ministers can be
explained by the role their elites played at key moments in the process of
nation building. Nevertheless, over time the proportion of ministers from the
Italian north-west gradually declined (from 47.1 per cent in 1861–76, to
33 per cent in 1913–22), thereby obtaining greater correlation with the
area’s demography (as a proportion of the total population) and the percent-
age of ministers who were integrated into the government. The same trend is
not be seen with the ancient Greek territories, from where at least half of the
members of government were always recruited (with the exception of the
period 1910–36, when they represented 39 per cent of the total).
The level of academic attainment of ministers during this period was
very high. Only rarely did the percentage of those without either a univer-
sity education or military instruction surpass 10 per cent. In the same
fashion, civilians outnumbered members of the armed forces, even though
these latter had a significant presence in governments (apart from Italy
between 1913 and 1922, at least one-fifth of all southern European min-
isters were members of the armed forces). Examining the professions of the
civil ministers we note the preponderance of jurists, who shared their pro-
tagonism with civil servants, university professors and, to a lesser extent,
with writers and journalists in Italy, Portugal and Spain, respectively. In
the Greek case, lawyers represented a much lower proportion (between
6.1 and 13.5 per cent) due to the introduction of the ‘full-time politician’
category that Soritopoulos and Bourikos defined as ‘those who enter poli-
tics immediately after finishing their studies . . . without having exercised
any other occupation’, supporting themselves with family or party
resources. In any case, the percentage of Greek ministers with juridical
qualifications (38.7 per cent during the period 1843–78 and 52 per cent
between 1878 and 1910) is the lowest of the four countries being studied.
The structure of opportunities offered to career politicians in the monar-
chical regimes of southern Europe was marked by clientelism and by the
excessive governmentalisation of the political game. In Spain and Portugal,
for example, caciques and local notables collaborated in the manipulation of
elections in order to form a parliament that was favourable to the govern-
ment in power. Ministers were then selected from amongst these parlia-
mentarians, taking into account such criteria as personal loyalty (to the
head of government) and party loyal (by belonging to the group that
3 Tavares de Almeida sustained the executive). Tavares de Almeida and Costa Pinto call particu-
and Pinto establish lar attention to the fact that the subversion of liberal democratic proce-
two differentiated eras
within the Portuguese dures did not affect the status of parliament as the main source of
authoritarian period: ministerial elite recruitment. And in truth, in these two countries – Spain
the Military
Dictatorship and Portugal – at least 75 per cent of ministers were parliamentary
(1926–33) and the deputies before they entered government.
New State (1933–74).
In the comparative The period between the two world wars is normally associated with
analysis of the two regime types: liberal republicanism and fascist inspired dictatorships.
authoritarian regimes
we only can account,
If in Portugal, Spain and Greece one preceded the other, in Italy there was
in the Portuguese an observable continuity between parliamentary monarchism and ultra-
case, the data right authoritarianism. Given there is only information available for the
referring to the New
State. With respect to Portuguese and Spanish republics (since data on Greek ministers during
Greece, since we do the republican period are included in the period from 1910–36), it is possi-
not have the complete
information for the ble to highlight some singularities shared by the two Iberian states during
Metaxas dictatorship, the republican period. Firstly, in both countries the advent of the republic
our analysis will only
consider the Colonels’ resulted in a visible renewal of the leading elite. For example, in the case of
Regime (1967–74). Spain, 96.6 per cent of ministers and approximately 85 per cent of deputies
were new to their positions. The changes in the composition of the politi-
cal class were simultaneously accompanied by changes in the profile of its
members. In a clear break with the historical predominance of the
national capitals as the centre of governing elite recruitment, over half
(52.1 per cent) of Portuguese ministers and 44.9 per cent of Spanish min-
isters now came from towns and small cities (Estèbe 1982). In this sense,
and as a reflection of the access to power that the rural middle classes
had during these years, there was a significant increase in the number
of medical doctors, school teachers, lawyers and registrars amongst the
ministers in both countries. It is worth noting some of the more significant
differences, such as the number of military officers in the Portuguese gov-
ernment (the military represented 44.8 per cent of all ministers – ten
times more than was the case in Spain) and the hegemony of the
Democratic Party in the majority of Portuguese cabinets, in clear contrast
to the diverse coalitions that existed throughout the life of the Spanish
Second Republic.
As noted above, the years between the two world wars also witnessed
the ascension to power in the majority of European states of heterogeneous
conservative coalitions that led to the establishment of authoritarian and
proto-fascist regimes. The most durable of these, with 48 and 38 years of
existence, were in Portugal and Spain respectively. At the other extreme
was the experience of the Greek dictatorships of 1936–41 and 1967–74,
two periods of authoritarianism separated by two decades of limited
democracy.3 In these regimes ministers were mainly nominated for the
position for the first time after they had reached 50 years of age. Among
them, the academic level was always very high and the proportion of mil-
itary officers was very significant (between 25.6 per cent in the Colonels’
Regime and 33.3 per cent in Franco’s Spain). In the cabinets of Portugal’s
New State, university professors came to represent over 30 per cent of all
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