The Making of Portuguese Democracy

by Kenneth Maxwell

This vividly-written book is the first comprehensive assessment of the origins of the present-day democratic regime in Portugal to be placed in a broad international historical context. After a vibrant account of the collapse of the old regime in 1974, it studies the complex revolutionary period that followed, and the struggle in Europe and Africa to define the future role of Europe's then poorest country. International repercussions are examined and comparisons are drawn with the more general collapse of communism in the late 1980s.

Genres: Portugal

268 pages, Paperback

First published September 7, 1995

About the author

Kenneth Maxwell was the founding Director of the Brazil Studies Program at Harvard University's David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS) (2006-2008) and a Professor in Harvard's Department of History (2004-2008).

From 1989 to 2004 he was Director of the Latin America Program at the Council on Foreign Relations, and in 1995 became the first holder of the Nelson and David Rockefeller Chair in Inter-American Studies. He served as Vice President and Director of Studies of the Council in 1996. Maxwell previously taught at Yale, Princeton, Columbia, and the University of Kansas.


Kenneth Maxwell founded and was Director of the Camões Center for the Portuguese-speaking World at Columbia and was the Program Director of the Tinker Foundation, Inc. From 1993 to 2004, he was the Western Hemisphere book reviewer for Foreign Affairs. He is a regular contributor to the New York Review of Books and was a weekly columnist between 2007 and 2015 for Folha de São Paulo and monthly columnist for O Globo from 2015.

Maxwell was the Herodotus Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, and a Guggenheim Fellow. He served on the Board of Directors of The Tinker Foundation, Inc., and the Consultative Council of the Luso-American Foundation. He is also a member of the Advisory Boards of the Brazil Foundation and Human Rights Watch/Americas. Maxwell received his B.A. and M.A. from St. John's College, Cambridge University, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Princeton University.

Reviews

[Colin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Uff... Levei muito tempo nesta leitura mas valeu a pena. O escritor fez uma obra muito complete. O foco da história é a transição da ditadura para democracia, mas há um capítulo sobre a história mais longínqua do país. Dado este pano de fundo, ele explica os argumentos do General Spinola e os oponentes do regime Salazarista. É daí fora, mergulhamos dentro das águas turbulentos dos anos setenta: a guerra colonial, a revolução, a contra-revolução, independência de Angola, despolitização das forças armadas, implantação de uma democracia viva, e o novo cargo do país dentro da CE e da NATO. A história mundial é sempre lá, lado a lado com os acontecimentos domésticos porque nada acontece num vácuo.
O que mais me chamou a atenção é a carácter esquerdista de tantas protagonistas nesta história. Claro está que a reacção contra a extrema direita haveria de absorver uma influência da ala oposta, mas nunca apreciei antes disto, que o país aproximou-se tanto ao modelo soviético. Ao fim das contas, (nas palavras de autor, a lembrar-nos de uma profecia falhada de Kissinger) "Foi Karensky quem sobreviveu não Lenine. Foi o socialista moderado Mário Soares quem, no final, tornou presidente da República e o militar radical populista Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho quem foi, primeiro para a prisão e, depois, para a obscuridade"
Ups! Spoilers!