PORTUGAL
— Officially: República Portuguesa.
— Seat of government: Lisboa.
— Status: Democratic.
— Structure: The parliament (Assembleia da República) is elected in the distritos (with number of members determined by population), modified by party-list proportional representation, and chooses the prime minister. The president is elected directly.
— Governing party: Partido Socialista.
— Heads of government: António Costa, PS, prime minister (since 2015); Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, PSD, president (since 2016).
— Other parliamentary parties: Partido Social Democrata, led by Rui Rio; Bloco de Esquerda, led by Catarina Martins; Partido Comunista Português, led by Jerónimo de Sousa; Partido Popular, led by Francisco Rodrigues dos Santos; Pessoas-Animais-Natureza; Partido Ecologista “Os Verdes”, led by Heloísa Apolónia; Chega; Iniciativa Liberal.
— Recent history: The president in 2004, Jorge Sampaio (1996-2006), a member of the PS, exceeded the traditional figurehead role by dissolving a parliament controlled by the PSD and the PP after PSD leader José Manuel Durão Barroso (2002-4) left to become president of the European Commission, leading to a PS victory and a government headed by José Sócrates (2005-11). An election to replace Sampaio in 2006 went to Aníbal Cavaco Silva (2006-2016) of PSD; he was reelected in 2011. General elections in 2009 were again won by the PS. But an early election in 2011 was won by the PSD, with Pedro Passos Coelho becoming prime minister (2011-5). In 2015 elections, the PSD-PP coalition retained a plurality, but with a large swing to leftist parties. A coalition was originally agreed among PS, BE, and CDU, but it collapsed in a parliamentary vote, leading to a minority PS government. Rebelo de Sousa replaced Cavaco Silva in 2016. An election in 2019 saw a shift towards the Socialists at the expense of the other large parties.
— FH: 1-1, free. Econ: 8.05 (25), full democracy.
— Updated: 2021 June 19.
O.T. FORD