Discontinuance, pendulosity, conservatism: a sketch of a political discourse without refraction

Abstract

Portuguese political history shows that the country's evolution has been discontinuous and that movement is achieved by ruptures, without any historicisation of a reformist thought. At each historic moment, it is the conservative pulsion that triumphs, even when it is a question of preserving a sociologically unacceptable leap. The tragedy lies in the fact that our reality alternates like a pendulum between archaising pulsion and anhistoric illuminism, meaning that a lot of the energy that would be needed to create a political culture open to progress is lost.