Local administration and political culture in a rural municipality

Abstract

Almost five years after the 25^th April, one has tried to find out the extent of the politicization of Portuguese population and the democratization of political structures at national level. Up to which point have they penetrated the periphery, those changes that have become evident in the centre? Up to which point were there any changes in the position and the behaviour of the elected local officers? Has the formation process of the local politics become democratic? And, at last, would the attitudes and the political inclination of the local population have changed? This article tries to show that, in spite of the changes that local government underwent after the 25^th April, the administrative centralization and an inadequate local financial autonomy (both legated by the bureaucratic and technocratic tradition of the Estado Novo) constrain the elected officers in such way that, at local level, structures are hardly built and policies are hardly defined in democratic terms. The article argues also that the politicization of the Portuguese population, after the 25^th April, has been more apparent than real, and there was no significant evolution in the attitudes and behaviours typical of dictatorship towards others more suited to the participating democracy.