Interpretations on salazarism: notes of critical reading - I

Abstract

The author selects and presents here the main positions spread by Portuguese and foreign scholars concerning the nature of the salazarist regime. Supported by the reading and re-reading ofthe amount of work published after the end of the sixties, the author expresses his views and reflects upon them, approaches and opposes some authors, outlines critiques and glimpses new tracks of interpretation. After evoking what is considered to be the theoretical poorness that enveloped the overthrown regime for so many years, he establishes 1969 as the beginning of the intellectual activity that would produce the analyses and positions reviewed in this article namely those of Hermínio Martins, Philippe Schmiter, Stanley Payne and Manuel de Lucena. Leaving aside, even if they worth mention, some previous essays, the choice of 1969 is justified on account ofeverything highly upsetting and atimulating happened in 1968, from the French May up to the Marcelist advent, passing by the invasion of Czechoslovakia and Salazar's political death.