Talk:António de Oliveira Salazar/Archive 2

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The refugee section is illegible
I'll refrain from judging the actual veracity or objectivity of the article because I don't know the subject nearly well enough but some paragraphs are illegible. In particular many run-on sentences abusing comas to the point where you can no longer match the subject with the verb, for instance this beast of a sentence:

The Portuguese consul general in Bordeaux, Aristides de Sousa Mendes, helped several, in appeasement to Hitler, the Portuguese dictator, António de Oliveira Salazar, issued his "Circular 14", decreeing that no Jews or dissidents were to be granted passage to Portugal, after further defying his government, by assisting at the border, Sousa Mendes was ordered to return to Lisbon by a seething and upstaged Salazar who declared him mentally unfit, He was stripped of his diplomatic status, his pension and his right to practise law, his original profession.

I read it several times and I'm still not certain of what it means. It looks like something spewed by a bot. At least I learned that Hitler was a Portuguese dictator.

Given my lack of knowledge in the subject I don't feel capable of rewriting this entire section but frankly it's rather appalling.

--82.121.74.176 (talk) 17:22, 24 July 2017 (UTC)


 * ✅ The entire section doesn't need to be rewritten; the substandard material needed to be removed. It's a good idea to check the revision history when an added text is so unintelligible that it indicates the contributing editor probably does not use English as his first language, especially when the surrounding text is fine. Carlstak (talk) 20:06, 24 July 2017 (UTC)

Edit warrior IP blocked for 31 hours
Uncooperative IP user 177.98.180.44 is temporarily blocked. Carlstak (talk) 01:46, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

a fascist? reliable sources call him an authoritarian conservative who never became totalitarian
The RS agree that he was not a fascist....and the article itself is full of details. here are quotes from five reliable sources: 1) Carlos A. Cunha, ‎(2010) states "A comparison of Salazar's dictatorship with German or Italian fascism shows that Portugal was not a fascist state." 2) Bernard Cook, (2001) states "he was not a fascist but rather an authoritarian conservative. " 3) Portuguese Studies Review - Volume 2 - Page 109 (1993) "an authoritarian or clerico-corporatist state not a fascist one." 4) António Costa Pinto - 1991 states "He was not a fascist, but a reactionary" 5) Fascism in Europe, 1919-1945 (Routledge Companions) by Philip Morgan (2002) states: "Lacking the impulse and will for wars of expansion, and the need, then, to organize their populations for war, where reasons why the authoritarian regimes of Salazar and Franco never became totalitarian. p 177.  Rjensen (talk) 06:18, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I read a Salazar biography (can't remember which, possibly one you mentioned) a few years back and I seem to remember the author agreeing with the quotes above. We should try to stick to the scholarly definition of fascism and not just use it as a synonym for right-wing authoritarian. Ivar the Boneful (talk) 16:09, 26 March 2019 (UTC)


 * It all depends on the definition of Fascism. There is very interesting article by George Orwell, titled "What is Fascism?" where is says that: "It will be seen that, as used, the word ‘Fascism’ is almost entirely meaningless. In conversation, of course, it is used even more wildly than in print. I have heard it applied to farmers, shopkeepers, Social Credit, corporal punishment, fox-hunting, bull-fighting, the 1922 Committee, the 1941 Committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai-Shek, homosexuality, Priestley's broadcasts, Youth Hostels, astrology, women, dogs and I do not know what else." I suspect that the editors that have been trying to label Salazar as fascist are probably having in mind the bull fighting or maybe Fatima.J Pratas (talk) 16:30, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Salazar admired Mussolini and was inspired by him, he adopted corporatism, a one-party state, a youth organization similar to that of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, etc, the difference between his regime and that of Mussolini is that his regime was more religious while Mussolini's was more secular, he criticized fascism but it seems that for him fascism is something that applies solely to Italy, AFAIK Wikipedia does not adhere to the notion that only Italy was a Fascist country, also Fascist movements and regimes had differences between them, they weren't completely identical to Italy, the best example of this is Nazism and Nazi Germany. -- 177.207.14.18 (talk) 15:54, 6 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Yes, Salazar's corporatist state had some similarities to Benito Mussolini's Italian fascism, but considerable differences in its moral approach to governing. Although Salazar admired Mussolini and was influenced by his Labour Charter of 1927, he distanced himself from fascist dictatorship, which he considered a pagan Caesarist political system that recognised neither legal nor moral limits. Salazar also viewed German Nazism as espousing pagan elements that he considered repugnant. Just before World War II, Salazar made this declaration: "We are opposed to all forms of Internationalism, Communism, Socialism, Syndicalism and everything that may divide or minimise, or break up the family. We are against class warfare, irreligion and disloyalty to one's country; against serfdom, a materialistic conception of life, and might over right." All you have to do is read Salazar's book, "Como se Levanta um Estado", published in 1936, to verify that this statesman was by no means a fascist. The real Portuguese fascists were exiled. In 1934, Salazar exiled Francisco Rolão Preto as a part of a purge of the leadership of the Portuguese National Syndicalists, also known as the camisas azuis ("Blue Shirts"). Salazar denounced the National Syndicalists as "inspired by certain foreign models" (meaning German Nazism) and condemned their "exaltation of youth, the cult of force through direct action, the principle of the superiority of state political power in social life, [and] the propensity for organising masses behind a single leader" as fundamental differences between fascism and the Catholic corporatism of the Estado Novo. --J Pratas (talk) 17:01, 6 April 2019 (UTC)
 * There were differences between his regime and Mussolini's of course, but that doesn't mean that it wasn't Fascist, like I said, his regime was more religious while Mussolini's was more secular, he might have criticized Italian classical fascism but he was inspired by it and admired Mussolini and copied many of Mussolini's regimes features, basically making it a Clerical fascist regime, he claimed that fascism was a political system that didn't recognise neither legal nor moral limits, but yet his regime tortured and killed thousands of his political opponents, isn't this the very definition of not recognizing "neither legal nor moral limits"? I don't see how his views on Nazism is relevant for this subject, and just because he persecuted other Fascists doesn't mean that his regime wasn't Fascist, Stalin persecuted many other Communists but that doesn't mean that Stalin's regime wasn't Communist. -- 177.207.14.18 (talk) 21:58, 6 April 2019 (UTC)
 * This is your opinion and your entitled to have it, however this is the wikipedia, so if you want to make a point you need to support it with reliable sources. In this talk page alone there are seven solid sources, from historians, from different nationalities, all analyzing the topic and saying that the Estado Novo was not fascist. Bring in the same amount of sources, with the same caliber, and the article will be revised accordingly. Please don't bring in popular literature or biased sources.J Pratas (talk) 08:27, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Unlike Mussolini or Hitler, Salazar never had the intention to create a party-state. Salazar was against the whole-party concept and when in 1930 he created the National Union he created it as a non-party. The National Union was set up to control and restrain public opinion rather than to mobilize it, the goal was to strengthen and preserve traditional values rather than to induce a new social order. Ministers, diplomats and civil servants were never compelled to join the National Union.--J Pratas (talk) 09:29, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but Wikipedia articles are built on reliable sources. If no reliable sources (that is, papers/books published by people recognized in their field, in this case historians) claim that the Estado Novo was a facist regime, then the article only has to reflect that, no room for personal opinion allowed. We have in this very talk page an array of reliable sources that claim that Salazar's regime was not a fascist one; until reliable sources that claim otherwise are presented, inserting fascism into the article (or Caetano's article, for that matter) is indulging in original research. RetiredDuke (talk) 11:46, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Paul H. Lewis, a political scientist, did consider Salazar a Fascist in his book Latin Fascist Elites. The Mussolini, Franco and Salazar Regimes (2003), does this count? But anyway, I wonder which standards those historians used to not consider his regime Fascist, a regime doesn't have to be completely identical to that of Mussolini or Hitler in order to be Fascist. -- 177.42.155.177 (talk) 03:03, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Well no--Lewis does not call Salazar a fascist. He says (p 7) "All three regimes came out of Latin cultural backgrounds and were popularly identified with the phenomenon of fascism.' Lewis on p 133 names several scholars 2 (Martins & de Lucena)   say yes he was, 2 (Nolte and  Cassels) say no he was not.  Lewis does not pick one side or the other.  2) also see Culture and Customs of Portugal Page 16 https://books.google.com/books?isbn=0313049467  by Carlos A. Cunha, ‎& Rhonda Cunha - (2010) "A comparison of Salazar's dictatorship with German or Italian fascism shows that Portugal was not a fascist state."  Rjensen (talk) 03:57, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * That's true, but there are many other scholars who do consider him a Fascist too, such as Manuel Loff, he once even gave an interview about this:
 * https://www.dn.pt/dossiers/sociedade/extrema-direita/entrevistas/interior/manuel-loff-branqueamento-de-salazar-ate-ja-o-fez-antifascista-1006046.html


 * Also, Salazar's National Union party attended the Fascist conference in Montreux in 1934. --

177.134.129.207 (talk) 20:59, 8 April 2019 (UTC)


 * It is a fact that that in Portugal some left wing politicians (Manuel Loff was a several times listed as a candidate to the elections as part of the Comunist Party) like to label Salazar as a fascist because they know the label is negative and they hope that Salazar is associated with Hitler and Mussolini. But that is not the mainstream opinion in the international academia.
 * Another reputes scholar, specialized in Portugal, Josep Sánchez Cervelló also made a very clear judgement: "It was an authoritarian regime, with some similarities to the generic fascism though it cannot be confused with this one." You can read it using this link: Características del régimen salazarista, for those who cant read Spanish the abstract is translated to English.
 * Basically all international scholars concur in the same view.23:40, 8 April 2019 (UTC)J Pratas (talk)


 * And you seem to be sympathetic to Salazar and the Estado Novo regime, which may explain why you want to disassociate them from Fascism, but anyway, one of the reasons Cervelló doesn't consider the Estado Novo a Fascist regime is because there were elections in it, but there were elections in Fascist Italy and in Nazi Germany too, he also says that the Portuguese Legion was at first created only to contain more radical factions, that may be true, but it eventually became an important organization in the regime, the only reason Salazar didn't created a paramilitary organization before was because he didn't think it was necessary to protect the regime.


 * And once again, the National Union party attended the 1934 Fascist conference in Montreux. --

177.134.129.207 (talk) 04:54, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * the Portugal delegate at the 1934 Fascist conference in Montreux was António Eça de Queiroz, a royalist who headed the youth group and attended many national conferences on different topics. He was indeed flirting with fascism in 1934, in a Portuguese faction called "National Syndicalism" --Franco rejected the group and dissolved it. see Payne's coverage. Rjensen (talk) 07:08, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I never said it was Salazar who attended, just his party, why would he allowed someone to represent his party in the conference? Why didn't Queiroz represent the National Syndicalists instead? And the fact that he banned the National Syndicalists doesn't mean that his regime wasn't Fascist, and curious, by "Franco", did you actually mean Salazar and instead wrote Franco by mistake? -- 177.134.129.207 (talk) 02:05, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Oops yes I did mean Salazar....But as Payne explains, Salazar was trying to split the "National Syndicalists", winning over some members including Eça de Queiroz then breaking up the remaining faction. Payne says Eça de Queiroz was at Montreaux officially representing the National Syndicalist faction, not Salazar's party. There were pro-fascists in Portugal--but Salazar silenced them.  Rjensen (talk) 12:24, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * The fact that Eça de Queiroz, attended a chaotic conference (the same way he also attended many other events) does not make the Estado Novo fascist, as Stanley Paine very well explained it. Now, again, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but Wikipedia articles are built on reliable sources. If no reliable sources (that is, papers/books published by people recognized in their field, in this case historians) claim that the Estado Novo was a facist regime, then the article only has to reflect that, no room for personal opinion allowed. We have in this very talk page an array of reliable sources that claim that Salazar's regime was not a fascist one; until reliable sources that claim otherwise are presented, inserting fascism into the article (or Caetano's article, or any article of fascism for that matter) is indulging in original research. Please restrain from providing your own interpretations and bring in reliable sources. Once you bring in the reliable sources the article will be adapted to reflect the opinions of those reliable sources.--J Pratas (talk) 11:03, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Manuel Loff: https://www.dn.pt/dossiers/sociedade/extrema-direita/entrevistas/interior/manuel-loff-branqueamento-de-salazar-ate-ja-o-fez-antifascista-1006046.html
 * Jorge Pais de Sousa: https://storicamente.org/estado-novo-como-fascismo-de-catedra
 * Manuel de Lucena, who even says that there was no regime closer to that of Mussolini than Salazar's: http://analisesocial.ics.ul.pt/documentos/1223474660Y5fFJ3ke2Ya79VE3.pdf --

179.182.129.206 (talk) 01:35, 14 April 2019 (UTC)


 * As said before this is the Wikipedia in English, a POV by some left wing Portuguese scholars is not enough to make a case against a ovehelming amout of credible international scholars. Maybe you can make a case to add this non neutral point of view, but NOT to delete the mainstream of views from international scholars. Anyway please reach consensus before edit warring--J Pratas (talk) 17:50, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
 * How is it POV? You asked for sources that considered Salazar a Fascist and I gave you some, and there are many more, at this point it is you who is edit warring, and you seem to support Salazar and the Estado Novo, so if anything, you're the one that might be violating NPOV. And BTW, Manuel de Lucena doesn't even consider Nazi Germany to be Fascist, despite the fact that Nazi Germany is almost unanimously considered a Fascist regime, if he was so biased as you claim, why would he not consider it Fascist? -- 179.183.150.60 (talk) 19:34, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic. You cannot pretend that the views from a few Portuguese left wing historians is the main stream and then delete the point of view from a overwhelming amount of reputed international scholars. Please seek consensus before editingJ Pratas (talk) 20:47, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
 * What a joke, it's a waste of time to continue this discussion then, you're always going to come up with excuses in order to enforce your own POV, and if it fails you're going to call a more powerful user in order to enforce your POV under the guise of neutrality, which is what users who want to enforce their POV typically do. -- 179.183.150.60 (talk) 22:05, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
 * The IP certainly has a point. No doubt J Pratas is an apologist for Salazar and seems to fervently admire him; opposing points of view about a still controversial religionist dictator and his regime should be present in what is purported to be a balanced article. The points of view expressed by left-wing scholars belong in the article, but in my opinion it is over-reaching and simplistic to categorize Salazar as fascist. Carlstak (talk) 22:54, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

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Was Salazar Fascist ? (Continues the interesting debate)
In the work “Neutrality by Agreement”, Professor Costa Leite, in order to explain the role of Salazar during WWII felt the need to explain that “It is a temptation to reduce complex phenomena to stereotypes…But if they [stereotypes] are convenient, they may also be extremely misleading. For example, the stereotype of dictatorship suggests that in the context of World War II, a dictator is on the side of the Axis pursuing an anti-Semitic policy. In practice, however, such a stereotype ignores national cultures, geopolitical alignments, and the origin and evolution of political regimes." A few left wing Portuguese scholars, many political activist connected with communist parties, have been labeling Salazar as fascist with the clear intent of trying to connect Salazar with Hitler and Mussolini. Unfortunately the strategy works and anyone trying to come with a balanced perspective on Salazar’s article is immediately accused of being a fascist, a Nazi, or fervent admirer of Salazar, becoming entangled in the stereotype. In this particular case there is an overwhelming amount of sources by reputed scholars that have studied the connection between Salazar and Fascism that coincide in the idea that the regime was not Fascist. A few examples are:

•	Costa Pinto, António – “The Blue Shirts Portuguese Fascists and the New Stat”. The book is available online in the authors website. [Costa Pinto is NOT an admirer of Salazar and in his book he explains how Salazar dismantled the fascist movement in Portugal

•	Payne, Stanley (1995). – “A History of Fascism, 1914–1945”

•	Gallagher, Tom (1990). "Chapter 9: Conservatism, dictatorship and fascism in Portugal, 1914–45". In Blinkhorn, Martin. Fascists and Conservatives. Routledge. pp. 157–173. ISBN 004940086X.

•	Kay, Hugh (1970). Salazar and Modern Portugal. New York: Hawthorn Books.

•	Wiarda, Howard J. (1977). Corporatism and Development: The Portuguese Experience (First ed.). Univ of Massachusetts Press. ISBN 978-0870232213.

•	Carlos A. Cunha, ‎(2010) states "A comparison of Salazar's dictatorship with German or Italian fascism shows that Portugal was not a fascist state.

•	Bernard Cook, (2001) states "he was not a fascist but rather an authoritarian conservative. "

•	Portuguese Studies Review - Volume 2 - Page 109 (1993) "an authoritarian or clerico-corporatist state not a fascist one."

•	Morgan, Philipp – “Fascism in Europe, 1919-1945” (Routledge Companions) by Philip Morgan (2002) states: "Lacking the impulse and will for wars of expansion, and the need, then, to organize their populations for war, where reasons why the authoritarian regimes of Salazar and Franco never became totalitarian. p 177.

•	Sánchez Cervelló, Josep - also made a very clear judgement: "It was an authoritarian regime, with some similarities to the generic fascism though it cannot be confused with this one." You can read it using this link: Características del régimen salazarista, for those who cant read Spanish the abstract is translated to English.

•	Albright, Madeleine in a recent interview to a Portuguese news paper on the occasion of the publishing of her book "Fascism: A Warning", said "Salazar was not a Fascist"

In all this debate I have not accused any editor of sympathizing with anything or anyone. I have limited myself to the sources. I kindly ask other editors to follow the same path (in particular Carlstalk, an established editor that should know that this is not constructive) I am ok with the article saying that there are a few scholars in Portugal that still label Salazar and his regime as fascist (it is an undeniable fact) but the article should be clear about the fact that their opinion is NOT mainstream (another undeniable fact).--J Pratas (talk) 08:42, 15 April 2019 (UTC)


 * J Pratas, you are in no position to lecture me about what is constructive and what is not, given that I have personally experienced your outbursts concerning the former tagging of this article as well as your harshly expressed critiques of my editing of the History of Lisbon article. We agree that scholarly dissent by leftist historians against the consensus concerning Salazar has a place in the article, so there is no dispute about that between us. Will you present to your fellow editors just how you think "the fact that their opinion is NOT mainstream" should be communicated in this article, since opposing points of view should be described neutrally? Carlstak (talk) 12:03, 15 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Not lecturing anyone. Just resenting an unnecessary remark. I can't see in all this discussion anything I have written that justifies your remark Carlstalk. In any case you seem to be a reasonable editor, always honestly seeking a balanced neutral article, you also write better English much better than I do, So if you think it is important that the article says that, in Portugal, there are still a few Portuguese left wing historians that classify Salazar as a Fascist, please go ahead and insert it yourself in the article. I am supportive. And Carlstalk please accept my apologies for any past behavior that made you feel unconfortable.J Pratas (talk) 21:35, 15 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your kind and considered response, J Pratas. Please accept my apologies as well for my emotional reaction. I respect your dedication to this article and its continued improvement; I know you have put much time and a great deal of hard work into it. I would indeed like to add some information on the points of view of left-wing Portuguese scholars and their assessments of the Estado Novo and Salazar. Perhaps someone would care to nominate the article for featured article status. I am preoccupied at the moment with my business, but I should be able to find some time to compose the material with sources this weekend. Best wishes, Carlstak (talk) 12:16, 16 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Take your time. No need to rush. Here is another data point that you might find useful for your evaluation: Paxton, Robert O. 2004. The Anatomy of Fascism. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Paxton says that: "Where Franco subjected Spain’s fascist party to his personal control, Salazar abolished outright in July 1934 the nearest thing Portugal had to an authentic fascist movement, Rolão Preto’s blue-shirted National Syndicalists. The Portuguese fascists, Salazar complained, were “always feverish, excited and discontented . . . shouting, faced with the impossible: More! More!” Salazar preferred to control his population through such “organic” institutions traditionally powerful in Portugal as the Church....His regime was not only non-fascist, but “voluntarily non-totalitarian,” preferring to let those of its citizens who kept out of politics “live by habit. (page 150)...The Estado Novo of Portugal differed from fascism even more profoundly than Franco’s Spain (pag 270)   J Pratas (talk) 07:11, 17 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Hi, before you do the promised editing, you might like to know that a similar discussion is now taking place in Fascism in Europe's talk page. Maybe you can trigger a centralized discussion that will apply to all involved articles.--J Pratas (talk) 20:12, 24 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks, J Pratas. I'll consider how to approach that discussion. I intend to work on editing this article Friday, when I'll finally be free to give it my full attention. 20:20, 24 April 2019 (UTC)


 * it would be nice if whatever the editing or the consensus the articles on Salazar, Estado Novo, Fascism in Europe, Portuguese 1933 Constitution, etc. would be coherent. I don't know how to centralized discussion and it seems to be a feature reserved for administrators. Can you trigger a centralized discussion ?J Pratas (talk) 20:30, 24 April 2019 (UTC)


 * I'll see what I can do. I'm taking a break from my work at the moment, and I'll probably be too tired mentally this evening to do anything more than check my watchlist, cook supper, and drink a couple of glasses of wine.;-)


 * find bellow a few more elements for your evaluation
 * Meneses, Filipe Ribeiro, "Salazar a Political Biography" says that "The obstacles in twinning the New State with fascism are self evident. Among other one can pick out the lack of mass mobilization, the moderate nature of Portuguese Nationalism, the careful and apolitical selection of the narrow elite that ran the country, the lack of powerful working class and the rejection of violence as a mean of transforming society. To include Salazar, given his background, his trajectory, is faith and his general disposition in the broad fascist family is at first sight to stretch fascism to a point where it becomes meaningless."
 * If you can read Portuguese Manuel Braga da Cruz claims that the Estado Novo and the Portuguese 1933 Constitution is fundamentally different from Fascism []
 * Luis Campos e Cunha says the same []
 * And there is a video in Youtube titled "Mário Soares diz que Salazar não era fascista nem corrupto"where Mário Soares says that Salazar was not exactly a fascist. Soares says that Salazar was a dictator, used censorship, and used the political police but that was all. J Pratas (talk) 08:19, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

J Pratas, having looked at the discussion at Talk:Fascism in Europe, I have no appetite to wade into that discussion; I would be surprised if a consensus is reached. The two opposing sides are intransigent, and no one will be convinced by argument. Besides, it is not for Wikipedia, speaking in its own voice, to decide whether the Estado Novo regime or Salazar himself were fascist, nor should it be, and thus it is self-evident to me that neither should be placed in the "fascist" category. I can read Portuguese, but I have no intention of making any value judgements about the relative worth of the arguments made by scholars "for" and "against" calling them fascist. It is a complex matter, no simple "yes" or "no" can do it justice. We all agree that scholarly opinion varies, and that the opposing viewpoints should be described neutrally. I believe that this article needs better representation of the leftist points of view for balance; consequently I will limit my editing to description of what leftist and Marxist sources (who have written mostly in Portuguese) have to say. Carlstak (talk) 16:17, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

Personal life
Finding myself in Lisbon, this well-sourced article has been very informative. But I wonder if it needs a brief, Personal life, section? I had to look outside Wikipedia to see that Salazar was unmarried and had no children. Did he have no personal life/interests at all? Where, for example, did he live during his long period in power? KJP1 (talk) 08:03, 26 May 2019 (UTC) ¨
 * , Thanks for the observation. A very valid point. I will work on this new chapter.--J Pratas (talk) 10:02, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * - That would be great. As I say, it’s a really good article and helped inform my visit to beautiful Lisbon. The Museum of the Resistance was particularly moving. All the best. KJP1 (talk) 15:15, 6 August 2019 (UTC)

Were Salazar, and the Estado Novo under Salazar, Fascist ?
There is an endless dispute going on the article Fascism in Europe on whether Salazar and the Estado Novo should be labeled fascist or not. I know this has been extensively discussed on this talk page, and the Salazar's article is written according to what was discussed. But there are other articles like Fascism in Europe, National Union (Portugal), National Union etc. where that debate is still on and that debate is leading to inconsistencies among related articles.

So far what seems to be clear is that scholarly opinion varies on whether the Estado Novo and the National Union should be considered fascist or not. International scholars such as Stanley G. Payne, Thomas Gerard Gallagher, Juan José Linz, António Costa Pinto, Roger Griffin, Robert Paxton and Howard J. Wiarda, prefer to consider the Portuguese Estado Novo (Portugal) as conservative authoritarian rather than fascist. On the other hand a minority of Portuguese left wing scholars like Fernando Rosas, Manuel Villaverde Cabral, Manuel de Lucena and Manuel Loff think that the Estado Novo should be considered fascist. If this list of sources is fairly complete, it looks like the mainstream view of works published in English by independent international scholars says "NO". If you know of additional sources or should you wish to help in the debate please help on the Fascism in Europe talk page and also Estado Novo  and  National UnionJ Pratas (talk) 10:13, 6 August 2019 (UTC)

Electoral results
Hey everyone! I think it would be nice to add to this page an electoral results section, - like Cavaco Silva's. I do not have the time to do that in the next few weeks, but if someone wants to get started, the Portuguese Wikipedia has the information in pages that can be found in the following categories:
 * Legislative elections
 * Presidential elections 178.9.136.118 (talk) 10:59, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Education section
Hey so, I would suggest a few changes to the education section: All the best!, 178.9.56.196 (talk) 08:59, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
 * 1) The text would be more fact-based if the first sentence of the first paragraph of the section was completely deleted and the data were allowed to speak for themselves. Or, at the very least, if a citation was added to the First Republic militants (so one could know who they were, if they were in power during the 16 years of the First Republic, etc.) and the adjectives "more democratic" and "authoritarian" were removed, as a person who is reading the page certainly knows this already, and it seems to imply something about the performance of democratic regimes vs. authoritarian regimes, without actually spelling it out (is it that democracies function worse than authoritarian regimes? Or that it is counter-intuitive that an authoritarian regime increased literacy more than a democratic regime? - any of the two implications would require a citation at least).
 * 2) The whole section is mostly a copy-paste/summary of the Estado Novo (Portugal) page. Because this is the Salazar page, the content should be adapted to focus on what is related to Salazar, - not to Estado Novo more generally. For example, the data regarding literacy rates do fall within Salazar's reign (and it would be nice to have the section mention Salazar's goals for education, seeing as now it only talks about the First Republic's goals for education, - in a page about Salazar), but the sentence that starts with "In 1971" doesn't make much sense, as Salazar's political life ended in 1968, and his actual life ended in 1970, - so it should be removed or some citations added so one can see what Salazar would have to do with the recognition of Católica in 1971, (missing: the foundation of ISCTE in 1972), and the foundation of four universities in 1973.
 * 3) A citation is missing in the sentence: "which experienced one of the fastest growth rates of Portuguese education in history."


 * I have added some facts and figures on literacy rates. The best source on this topic is the book Alfabetização e Escola em Portugal nos Séculos XIX e XX. Os Censos e as Estatísticas by António Candeias published by the Gulbenkian Foundation in 2004. It has all the numbers and statistics. The comparison with the 1st Republic is very relevant. So it should stay. --J Pratas (talk) 16:15, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Salazar was a fascist
There seem to be people in this chat who want to change history. My edit was undone by Cristiano Tomás where i stated that "Further criticisms suggest that his party, the National Union, held extreme far-right and fascist views.". Then I cited with a direct source where salazar himself states his ideology is "fascism". People want to claim he is not which could not be more farther rom the truth. Can I get consensus to revert back my quote? 75.63.30.84 (talk) 18:39, 20 October 2019 (UTC)


 * The IP has misrepresented the source he cites. He says, "[S]alazar himself states his ideology is "fascism" ", but the journal article On Salazar and Salazarism by Michael Sanfey says no such thing. Rather, it says:
 * "Salazar did not allow all to compete (liberalism) but neither did he have a totalitarian ideology like fascism; he espoused Catholic "corporatism": state imposed collaboration of the social classes.


 * "In their essential design and purpose, while the regimes very much resembled each other, the Portuguese regime never relied, either in its foundation or development, on anything remotely like the Italian Fascist movement, which later became a party."


 * "Salazar did take strong action against real Fascists."


 * Carlstak (talk) 19:55, 20 October 2019 (UTC)


 * Agree with Carlstak. Most scholars do not classify Salazar as fascist.
 * Stanley G. Payne thinks that Salazar' system might best be described as one of Authoritarian Corporatism or even authoritarian corporative liberalism. -
 * Historian Juan José Linz says that fascism never took roots in Salazar' Portugal - ( -
 * Robert Paxton says that "The Estado Novo of Portugal differed from fascism even more profoundly than Franco’s Spain. Salazar was, in effect, the dictator of Portugal, but he preferred a passive public and a limited state where social power remained in the hands of the Church, the army, and the big landowners." see J Pratas (talk) 20:09, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Madeleine Albright has recently publishd a book titled Fascism: A Warning" and in an intreview with a Portuguese journalist she said "Salazar was not a" Fascist" []J Pratas (talk) 20:09, 20 October 2019 (UTC)


 * Gonna cite some of the same sources which I cited on the other discussion:


 * 1) Jorge Pais de Sousa - O Estado Novo de Salazar como um Fascismo de Cátedra
 * 2) Manuel de Lucena - Interpretações do Salazarismo
 * 3) Manuel Loff - O Nosso Século é Fascista. O Mundo visto por Salazar e Franco
 * 4) Manuel de Lucena - A Evolução do Sistema Corporativo Português: O Salazarismo
 * 5) Hermínio Martins, S. Woolf - European Fascism, pp. 302-336 -- 177.19.122.50 (talk) 05:53, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

This has been discussed one year ago. A long list of English speaking scholars saying that Salazar was not a Fascist has already been provided. So if there is no consensus you can not present it as a fact. On top of that another editor, (, already told you that "the points of view expressed by (Portuguese) left-wing scholars belong in the article, but in my opinion it is over-reaching and simplistic to categorize Salazar as fascist.". Another editor, who happens to be an historian, (, said the following: "There is a large polemic literature in Portuguese that is unfortunately spilling over here. It belongs in the Portuguese Wikipedia. Those polemics have not been generally accepted in the wider English language community of specialists on Portugal."J Pratas (talk) 09:56, 7 September 2020 (UTC)


 * The problem is that the status quo on Wikipedia is that Salazar and the Estado Novo were considered Fascists, and since no consensus was reached, thus it was agreed to maintain the status quo, dismissing Portuguese sources as "polemic" seems to be very biased Those polemics have not been generally accepted in the wider English language community of specialists on Portugal besides why do English speaking scholars have more value than Portuguese ones who have access to better information? This makes no sense. -- 179.180.141.189 (talk) 21:55, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

1st) Yes there is a consensus. And the consensus is that there are different POVs so you cannot pretende to have a POV presented as a fact. 2nd)Citations to non-English reliable sources are allowed on the English Wikipedia. However, because this project is in English, English-language sources are preferred over non-English ones when available and of equal quality and relevance. , 3rd) To label Salazar as fascist has not been generally accepted in the wider English language community of specialists on comparative studies on Fascism. Below a non exhaustive list of sources that say that Salazar's regime was not fascist.
 * 1) Paxton, Robert O. 2004. The Anatomy of Fascism. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Paxton says that: "Where Franco subjected Spain’s fascist party to his personal control, Salazar abolished outright in July 1934 the nearest thing Portugal had to an authentic fascist movement, Rolão Preto’s blue-shirted National Syndicalists. The Portuguese fascists, Salazar complained, were “always feverish, excited and discontented . . . shouting, faced with the impossible: More! More!”9 Salazar preferred to control his population through such “organic” institutions traditionally powerful in Portugal as the Church....His regime was not only non-fascist, but “voluntarily non-totalitarian,” preferring to let those of its citizens who kept out of politics “live by habit. (page 150)...The Estado Novo of Portugal differed from fascism even more profoundly than Franco’s Spain (pag 270)
 * 2) Manuel Braga da Cruz explains how the Estado Novo and the Portuguese 1933 Constitution is fundamentally different from Fascism []
 * 3) Roger Griffin, The Nature of Fascism (London: Routledge, 1993); page 266 - The National Union is classified "Conservative Right"
 * 4) Costa Pinto, "Salazar’s Dictatorship and European Fascism: Problems of Interpretation" (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996) Costa Pinto explains that The National Union is more a bureaucratic apparatus than a political party.
 * 5) Costa Pinto, António – “The Blue Shirts Portuguese Fascists and the New Stat”. The book is available online in the authors website. [Costa Pinto is NOT an admirer of Salazar and in his book he explains how Salazar dismantled the fascist movement in Portugal
 * 6) A. James Gregor, Phoenix: Fascism in Our Time (New Brunswick, Transaction Publishers, 1999); - Author says that Portuguese Estado Novo was not Fascist because fascist has always been revolutionary, anticonservative, anti-bourgeois, etc.. somethin that the Estado Novo never was.
 * 7) Juan J. Linz, Authoritarian and Totalitarian Regimes (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2000); Michael Mann, Fascists (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, - On page 226 Author says that Fascism has never taken roots in the Portugal of Salazar.
 * 8) Roger Eatwell, ‘Introduction: New Styles of Dictatorship and Leadership in Interwar Europe,’ Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions 7, no. 2 (2006): 127–137;
 * 9) Payne, Stanley (1995). – “A History of Fascism, 1914–1945”
 * 10) Gallagher, Tom (1990). "Chapter 9: Conservatism, dictatorship and fascism in Portugal, 1914–45". In Blinkhorn, Martin. Fascists and Conservatives. Routledge. pp. 157–173. ISBN 004940086X.
 * 11) Kay, Hugh (1970). Salazar and Modern Portugal. New York: Hawthorn Books.
 * 12) Wiarda, Howard J. (1977). Corporatism and Development: The Portuguese Experience (First ed.). Univ of Massachusetts Press. ISBN 978-0870232213.
 * 13) Carlos A. Cunha, ‎(2010) states "A comparison of Salazar's dictatorship with German or Italian fascism shows that Portugal was not a fascist state.
 * 14) Bernard Cook, (2001) states "he was not a fascist but rather an authoritarian conservative. "
 * 15) Portuguese Studies Review - Volume 2 - Page 109 (1993) "an authoritarian or clerico-corporatist state not a fascist one."
 * 16) Morgan, Philipp – “Fascism in Europe, 1919-1945” (Routledge Companions) by Philip Morgan (2002) states: "Lacking the impulse and will for wars of expansion, and the need, then, to organize their populations for war, where reasons why the authoritarian regimes of Salazar and Franco never became totalitarian. p 177.
 * 17) Sánchez Cervelló, Josep - also made a very clear judgement: "It was an authoritarian regime, with some similarities to the generic fascism though it cannot be confused with this one." You can read it using this link: Características del régimen salazarista, for those who cant read Spanish the abstract is translated to English.
 * 18) Albright, Madeleine in a recent interview to a Portuguese newspaper on the occasion of the publishing of her book "Fascism: A Warning", said "Salazar was not a Fascist"J Pratas (talk) 07:43, 12 September 2020 (UTC)


 * There was no consensus at all, you can clearly see on the result of the discussion which I linked, because of this it was decided that the status quo would be maintained, and the status quo was that the Estado Novo was Fascist, you're just distorting things to promote your agenda, Portuguese sources have better access to information than non-Portuguese ones, so they tend to have better quality in this case, while you mention some great sources, some of them, like Madeleine Albright, are not of equal or better quality, Madeleine Albright for instance, is not even an authority on Fascism or the Estado Novo or Portugal, she probably doesn't even know much about those subjects. -- 179.179.173.15 (talk) 21:45, 12 September 2020 (UTC)


 * The consensus is that there is no consensus. When there is no consensus we need to follow Wikpedia's Neutral Point of view policy and if different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, and we need to treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements. It seems that on Feb 2nd 2017 an IP from Venezuela categorized Salazar as a Fascist Ruler without using the talk page, without providing any explanation and against all that had been debated it the article's talk page. It does not make any sense to try to hold on to this sneaky addition from the Venezuelan IP, that has gone unnoticed, calling it "status quo ante". The categorization of Salazar as a fascist is a minority view. J Pratas (talk) 08:55, 13 September 2020 (UTC)


 * The Estado Novo and Salazar were considered Fascist in Wikipedia way before 2017:


 * * Jun 2008
 * * Oct 2008,
 * * Nov 2009,
 * * Nov 2010,
 * * Aug 2011,
 * * Nov 2012,
 * * Aug 2013,
 * * Feb 2014,
 * * Nov 2015,
 * * Oct 2016,
 * * Dec 2017,
 * * Feb 2018,
 * * Feb 2019, -- 179.183.231.92 (talk) 06:07, 15 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Dear IP. Please familiarize yourself with Wikipedia's policies. When there is no consensus we need to follow Wikpedia's Neutral Point of view policy and if different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, and we need to treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements.J Pratas (talk) 07:53, 15 September 2020 (UTC)


 * You were stating that an IP from Venezuela categorized Salazar as Fascist ruler and that this was just an sneaky addition by that IP, then I showed you that Salazar was considered a Fascist here way before that, and now you come up with this? Again, since no consensus was reached, the status quo was maintained, and as you can see the status quo is that Salazar and the Estado Novo were Fascist. -- 186.213.22.136 (talk) 16:19, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

There is no consensus on categorizing Salazar as a fascist. Outside of Portugal the consensus is that Salazar was NOT a fascist, yet some Portuguese scholars, not all of them, think that Salazar was a Fascist. There is also no consensus among Wikipedia editors. In that case it does not matter the status quo ante, what prevails is the fundamental principle of Neutral Point of View. When there is no consensus we need to follow Wikpedia's Neutral Point of view policy and if different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, we need to treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements. Fundamental principles are non negotiable and are not subject to any status quo ante that violates de fundamental principle. J Pratas (talk) 16:57, 15 September 2020 (UTC)


 * You have no proof that Salazar not being Fascist is the majority view among scholars, and your attempt to discard Portuguese scholars is completely ridiculous, and besides, how does classifying Salazar as a Fascist violate NPOV? If anything, your edits are far more POV, in fact, all your disruptive edits since April last year have been about imposing POV. -- 186.213.22.136 (talk) 22:10, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Portuguese history is not my specialism and I’m not competent to judge whether the weight of reliable sources does so describe him or not. That said, looking both at the article and the Talkpage, it is pretty clear, to me at least, that JPratas is determined that Salazar should not be described as a fascist, irrespective of the sources. As to their NPoV argument, I see on their own user page; “António de Oliveira Salazar - A man who was being unfairly accused of being anti-Semit(sic) and Pro-Hitler“. That looks rather like a POV to me. KJP1 (talk) 22:27, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

Ad hominem is a term that refers to several types of arguments, most of which are fallacious. Typically this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself. This avoids genuine debate by creating a diversion to some irrelevant but often highly charged issue. The point is not what I think or what is my view. The point is what do reliable sources say? A long list of English speaking scholars saying that Salazar was not a Fascist has already been provided. As editor already explained, "There is a large polemic literature in Portuguese that is unfortunately spilling over here. It belongs in the Portuguese Wikipedia. Those polemics have not been generally accepted in the wider English language community of specialists on Portugal."

Nevertheless I am perfectly OK with including in the article the POV from some Portuguese scholars. And one must have in mind that even among the Portuguese scholar community there is no consensus. There are many Portuguese with published works on the topic that argue that in their view Salazar was NOT a fascist. (examples: António Costa Pinto, Rui Ramos, Braga da Cruz, etc.) Even the former Portuguese Presidente Mário Soares said that in his view Salazar was not a Fascist.

I am not pushing for any POV to prevail over the other. I am perfectly OK with having both POVs represented. I have already done that in the article on the National Union (Portugal) where I wrote:

Scholarly opinion varies on whether the Estado Novo and the National Union should be considered fascist or not. Salazar himself criticized the "exaltation of youth, the cult of force through direct action, the principle of the superiority of state political power in social life, [and] the propensity for organising masses behind a single leader" as fundamental differences between fascism and the Catholic corporatism of the Estado Novo. Scholars such as Stanley G. Payne, Thomas Gerard Gallagher, Juan José Linz, António Costa Pinto, Roger Griffin, Robert Paxton and Howard J. Wiarda, prefer to consider the Portuguese Estado Novo (Portugal) as conservative authoritarian rather than fascist. On the other hand Portuguese scholars like Fernando Rosas, Manuel Villaverde Cabral, Manuel de Lucena and Manuel Loff think that the Estado Novo should be considered fascist

What does not make sense is to try to impose a POV as a fact, when it clearly is not. J Pratas (talk) 07:40, 16 September 2020 (UTC)


 * There's no ad hominem here, I'm just calling a spade a spade, your edits since April last year have clearly been disruptive and the purpose of them is to impose a POV, no reason to pretend otherwise, your attacks on Portuguese scholars are actual ad hominems, and how are you not pushing a POV over the other? You attack Portuguese scholars as biased and also you attempt to discard them for some reason, there's no reason to treat non-Portuguese scholars as superior especially when this is a subject about Portugal. -- 177.19.68.90 (talk) 23:44, 16 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Dear IP the ad hominem side comment was not for you, but for the other user who decided to step in not to discuss substance but to try to jump into conclusion based on my attributes as an editor. As to your point, the only person that is pushing for a POV is you. You are the only person here wanting to categorize Salazar as a fascist and wanting to present it as a fact. What I have said over and over again is that there is no consensus on weather Salazar was Fascist or not. In this case, if we want to respect the NPOV policy then we are supposed to '"Avoid stating opinions as facts. Usually, articles will contain information about the significant opinions that have been expressed about their subjects. However, these opinions should not be stated in Wikipedia's voice. Rather, they should be attributed in the text to particular sources"

'. J Pratas (talk) 09:38, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
 * While there is controversy over whether Salazar was Fascist or not, the same thing is true for pretty much every leader considered Fascist except for Mussolini, even Hitler sometimes is not considered Fascist, so many people would have to be removed, now, you are the only one who is pushing a POV, many of your edits on articles related to the Estado Novo or Salazar show that, and they are not just about whether the regime was Fascist either, and again, since no consensus was found, the status quo was to be maintained, and the status quo is that Salazar was Fascist, but you ignored this to push your POV. -- 177.206.210.197 (talk) 21:53, 21 September 2020 (UTC)

I am glad that you are recognizing that there is controversy. Now you just need to accept the policy. '''"Avoid stating opinions as facts. Usually, articles will contain information about the significant opinions that have been expressed about their subjects. However, these opinions should not be stated in Wikipedia's voice. Rather, they should be attributed in the text to particular sources" '''J Pratas (talk) 07:39, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Oh but I never denied that there was controversy, but again, the same is true for pretty much every leader considered to be Fascist except Mussolini, and of course, no consensus was found, so it was agreed that the status quo would be maintained, you ignored this of course, typical of you. Frankly I'm not going to continue this "discussion", it's a waste of time, you don't have any interest in discussing anything, I'm not going to do this ever again, I hope though that one day you will be held accountable for your disruptive behavior. -- 179.176.25.78 (talk) 18:25, 28 September 2020 (UTC)


 * The status quo ante is what the article says, and the article says that:
 * The corporatist state had some similarities to Benito Mussolini's Italian fascism, but considerable differences in its moral approach to governing. Although Salazar admired Mussolini and was influenced by his Labour Charter of 1927, he distanced himself from fascist dictatorship, which he considered a pagan Caesarist political system that recognised neither legal nor moral limits.
 * Unlike Mussolini or Hitler, Salazar never had the intention to create a party-state. Salazar was against the whole-party concept and in 1930 he created the National Union a single-party, which he marketed as a "non-party". announcing that the National Union would be the antithesis of a political party
 * The National Union was set up to control and restrain public opinion rather than to mobilize it, the goal was to strengthen and preserve traditional values rather than to induce a new social order. At no stage did it appear that Salazar wished it to fulfill the central role the Fascist Party had acquired in Mussolini´s Italy, in fact it was meant to be a platform of conservatism, not a revolutionary vanguard.(Gallagher 2020 - Salazar the dictator who refused to die)
 * In 1934, Salazar exiled Francisco Rolão Preto as a part of a purge of the leadership of the Portuguese National Syndicalists, also known as the camisas azuis ("Blue Shirts"). Salazar denounced the National Syndicalists as "inspired by certain foreign models" (meaning German Nazism) and condemned their "exaltation of youth, the cult of force through direct action, the principle of the superiority of state political power in social life, [and] the propensity for organising masses behind a single leader" as fundamental differences between fascism and the Catholic corporatism of the Estado Novo.J Pratas (talk) 11:32, 30 September 2020 (UTC)
 * So the status quo ante is a bunch of POV edits you copy and pasted on several articles? LOL give me a break.
 * Oh, so he was inspired by Fascism in a lot of things but he had some differences from Italian Fascism, that doesn't mean he wasn't one, Fascist leaders, movements and regimes had many differences between each other.
 * The National Union was the official party of the regime, and was the only party allowed under the regime, it doesn't matter if Salazar wanted to created it as a "non-party", didn't want to call it a party, or whatever, it was a party in practice and was the official party of the regime, no different than the NSDAP in Germany, or the PNF in Italy, or the FET y de las JONS in Spain, etc.
 * Public mobilization is something superficial, now the regime was more conservative compared to Mussolini's one, that is true, but then again, the Estado Novo was born out of the 1926 Revolution, this is definitely revolutionary, and strenghtening and preserving traditional values is also something Fascists support, in fact this is a core tenet of Fascist ideology.
 * So what? Is Hitler not a Fascist too because he purged the SA in the Night of the Long Knives?
 * But like I said, this "discussion" is a waste of time, you only want to impose your POV, that's all, again, I hope you will be held accountable for your disruptive behavior. -- 191.33.113.107 (talk) 07:48, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

Those interested in the topic might like to read this article from David Gelber [] as an apetizer for the book: "Salazar the Dictator Who Refused to Die" by Tom Gallagher. According to Gelber Gallagher shows that what really set Salazar apart from the fascist rulers was his attitude to modernity. Hitler and Mussolini embraced new technology and the latest racial and social theories.J Pratas (talk) 18:37, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
 * The first arguments used by Gallagher seems to focus on superficial characteristics, though Gallagher forgets about the Portuguese Legion, which was very similar to the paramilitary groups of other Fascist movements, or the Portuguese Youth, which was very similar to the youth groups of other Fascist movements, if he wants to talk about aesthetics he should at least have mentioned this, next he talks about expansionism, which is also a superficial characteristic, Nazi Germany mostly annexed areas which previously belonged to Germany or was majority ethnic German, and before the war, the only expansionist war Fascist Italy engaged in was Ethiopia, but Italy already attempted to control Ethiopia way before Fascism, and attitudes to modernity and technology also varied between different Fascists, some of them embraced it more while others not so much, and Mussolini only embraced racial theories and laws after being pressured by Hitler in 1938. Those who do not consider Salazar a Fascist usually base their arguments on superficial characteristics and sometimes, funnily, even on left-wing propaganda about Fascism, those who do consider him Fascist seem to have much better arguments, at least so far this is what I've seen. -- 177.207.11.63 (talk) 22:20, 8 October 2020 (UTC)


 * You are free to think that Robert Paxton, Tom Gallagher, António Costa Pinto, Stanley G. Payne, Madeleine Albright, Juan José Linz, Howard J. Wiarda, Raymond Aron, Philip D. Morgan, Roger Eatwell etc... are all ridiculous and wrong, but this is the Wikipedia not a personal blog. So we have to stick to the sources.

New definition of Fascism
In a recent article, an author uses a definition of fascism developed by the writer and retired businessman, Laurence Britt. To develop his theory, Britt compared the regimes of Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Salazar, George Papadopoulos and Suharto, all of which he deemed fascist. Can we now accept this new definition and change this article to reflect its findings? Please discuss at WP:RSN. Note that while the source is used to label the Proud Boys as fascist, it could also be used as a source for other articles if it is deemed reliable. TFD (talk) 23:27, 24 November 2020 (UTC)


 * ""Portuguese Estado Novo was not Fascist because fascist has always been revolutionary, anticonservative, anti-bourgeois, etc.. somethin that the Estado Novo never was.""

- A. James Gregor - Phoenix: Fascism in Our Time (New Brunswick, Transaction Publishers, 1999)


 * ""The regime of Salazar where fascism as we characterize it has never taken roots""

- [| Totalitarian and Authoritarian Regimes - Originally a chapter in the "Handbook of Political Science,"]


 * "Where Franco subjected Spain’s fascist party to his personal control, Salazar abolished outright in July 1934 the nearest thing Portugal had to an authentic fascist movement, Rolão Preto’s blue-shirted National Syndicalists. The Portuguese fascists, Salazar complained, were “always feverish, excited and discontented . . . shouting, faced with the impossible: More! More!” Salazar preferred to control his population through such “organic” institutions traditionally powerful in Portugal as the Church....His regime was not only non-fascist, but “voluntarily non-totalitarian,” preferring to let those of its citizens who kept out of politics “live by habit. (page 150)...The Estado Novo of Portugal differed from fascism even more profoundly than Franco’s Spain (pag 270)."

- [|THE ANATOMY OF FASCISM. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.]


 * ""Salazar made clear his rejection of fascist pagan cesarism""

- [|Stanley Payne - A History of Fascism, 1914–1945]


 * ""It is also important to highlight that in the popular discourse Estado Novo is often referred to as fascism. This label does not always receive support in academic circles because although it is considered to have been an authoritarian regime, Estado Novo did not portray all the characteristics of an ideal type of fascism""

- [|da Silva R, Ferreira AS. The Post-Dictatorship Memory Politics in Portugal Which Erased Political Violence from the Collective Memory. Integr Psychol Behav Sci. 2019;53(1):24-43. doi:10.1007/s12124-018-9452-8]


 * ""He was not a fascist, rather an authoritarian conservative.His policies emphasized depoliticization""

- [|Cook, Bernard - Europe Since 1945: An Encyclopedia, Volume 2 pag 1027]


 * ""Unlike Mussolini or Hitler, throughout his life Salazar shrank from releasing popular energies and he never had the intention to create a party-state. Salazar was against the whole-party concept and in 1930 he created the National Union, a single-party which he marketed as a "non-party", announcing that the National Union would be the antithesis of a political party...While Hitler and Mussolini militarized and fanaticized the masses, Salazar demilitarized the country and depoliticized men""

Lord Mammon?
There are two references in this article about "Lord Mammon" in reference to Portugal's finances. Is there a reason for that? 2.203.238.209 (talk) 15:38, 26 January 2021 (UTC)Thorin
 * I think it was some kind of joke. I've deleted it.J Pratas (talk) 17:12, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

Neutrality concern
I'm a bit concerned for sources being misquoted, such as Hugh Kay's "Salazar and Modern Portugal" (1970). The book clearly states anti-internationalism, communism and socialism — nowhere does it mention anti-fascism. Later on, the article also paints him as anti-nazi, based on a quote criticizing the way Hitler was handling power. So why, then, this blatant effort to paint Salazar as an anti-facist, anti-nazism figure? I ask you to be mindful of biased edits and stay true to the sources. I've sinced then corrected this. 95.94.244.243 (talk) 12:24, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

On Salazar being labeled or not fascist.
Salazar's recent biographers (i.e Tom Gallagher 20202, and Filipe Ribeiro de Meneses 2010) were blunt about Salazar not being a fascist. The majority of Portuguese and foreign historians, sociologists and politologists do not consider Salazar and his regime as fascist. (Torgal 2008). Even former Portuguese president, Mario Soares, who for years presented himself as an anti-fascist fighter, ended up recognizing that Salazar was not a fascist []. You can find below a long and heterogeneous list of reliable sources that think that Salazar was not fascist.


 * ""Portuguese Estado Novo was not Fascist because fascist has always been revolutionary, anticonservative, anti-bourgeois, etc.. something that the Estado Novo never was.""

- A. James Gregor - Phoenix: Fascism in Our Time (New Brunswick, Transaction Publishers, 1999)


 * ""The regime of Salazar where fascism as we characterize it has never taken roots""

- [| Totalitarian and Authoritarian Regimes - Originally a chapter in the "Handbook of Political Science,"]


 * "Where Franco subjected Spain’s fascist party to his personal control, Salazar abolished outright in July 1934 the nearest thing Portugal had to an authentic fascist movement, Rolão Preto’s blue-shirted National Syndicalists. The Portuguese fascists, Salazar complained, were “always feverish, excited and discontented . . . shouting, faced with the impossible: More! More!” Salazar preferred to control his population through such “organic” institutions traditionally powerful in Portugal as the Church....His regime was not only non-fascist, but “voluntarily non-totalitarian,” preferring to let those of its citizens who kept out of politics “live by habit. (page 150)...The Estado Novo of Portugal differed from fascism even more profoundly than Franco’s Spain (pag 270)."

- [|Rober Paxton - THE ANATOMY OF FASCISM. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.]


 * ""Salazar made clear his rejection of fascist pagan cesarism""

- [|Stanley Payne - A History of Fascism, 1914–1945]


 * ""It is also important to highlight that in the popular discourse Estado Novo is often referred to as fascism. This label does not always receive support in academic circles because although it is considered to have been an authoritarian regime, Estado Novo did not portray all the characteristics of an ideal type of fascism""

- [|da Silva R, Ferreira AS. The Post-Dictatorship Memory Politics in Portugal Which Erased Political Violence from the Collective Memory. Integr Psychol Behav Sci. 2019;53(1):24-43. doi:10.1007/s12124-018-9452-8]


 * ""He was not a fascist, rather an authoritarian conservative.His policies emphasized depoliticization""

- [|Cook, Bernard - Europe Since 1945: An Encyclopedia, Volume 2 pag 1027]


 * ""Unlike Mussolini or Hitler, throughout his life Salazar shrank from releasing popular energies and he never had the intention to create a party-state. Salazar was against the whole-party concept and in 1930 he created the National Union, a single-party which he marketed as a "non-party", announcing that the National Union would be the antithesis of a political party...While Hitler and Mussolini militarized and fanaticized the masses, Salazar demilitarized the country and depoliticized men""


 * "Although some Portuguese historians recognize the existence of a Portuguese fascist regime, researchers in comparative fascist studies usually label the Portuguese New State as a conservative authoritarian,pseudo-fascist, fascistized or para-fascist regime"

- Rita Alemeida Carvalho [| Ideology and Architecture in the Portuguese ‘Estado Novo’: Cultural Innovation within a Para-Fascist State (1932–1945)]


 * ""contrary to what the contemporary popular history teaches, Salazar did not share fascist tastes, neither aesthetic nor ethical... Salazar hated turbulence and living with the crowds. He did not appreciate mass choreography, nor did he die of love for the modernist exaltation of mechanical progress.""

- José Luis Andrade [| O antifascismo de Salazar]


 * ""On the other hand, not having an original party to occupy the State, Salazarism was concerned, essentially with conquering the public administration as it found it, and not with eliminating it or replacing it with the party bureaucracy... Contrary to what was seen in fascism and Nazism, it was not so much the party that invaded and penetrated the State, but the State that created and penetrated the party ... he repudiated the militarization of the regime.""

- [| CRUZ, Manuel Braga da. Notas para uma caracterização política do salazarismo. Análise Social: Revista do Instituto de Ciências Sociais da Universidade de Lisboa, Lisboa, v. 18, n. 72-74, p. 773-794, 1982-83.]


 * ""Salazar was not fascist""

- Albright, Madeleine [|"Salazar não era fascista"]


 * ""Was Salazar a fascist? The answer is, historically, no.""

- Luís Campos e Cunha [| Fascismo e salazarismo]


 * "[regimes like that of Salazar] "should not be listed as fascist, but considered classic conservative and authoritarian regimes.""

- Renzo De Felice, "Il Fenomeno Fascista", Storia contemporanea, anno X, n° 4/5, Ottobre 1979, p. 624.


 * ""fundamentally not fascist, although not immune to occasional fascist influences. These were much more traditional regimes and they lacked mass support and mobilization. They included Poland under Pisuldski, Portugal under Salazar...""

- Stephen J. Lee, The European Dictatorships. 1918-1945, (London: 1988), pp. 18.


 * ""João Medina, after criticizing the "journalistic facility adopted by some hurried pseudo-historians" who define Salazar's dictatorship as a fascist, defends the thesis that Salazar´s regime should not be considered fascist. " "

- [De Lucena, Manuel. “Entre Lucidez e Paixão.” Análise Social, vol. 36, no. 160, 2001, pp. 925–938.]


 * ""almost nothing of what has been written about fascism applies to the Portuguese case (...) the differences between Salazarism and that Italian fascism are more profound than the similarities ""

- Maria Filomena Monica, Educaçâo e Sociedade no Portugal de Salazar (A escola primària salazarista 1926-1939), (Lisboa: 1978), p. 98.


 * ""Furthest from the Italian Fascist model was the institutionalization of the single-party, which was much closer to the situation in Primo de Rivera’s regime in Spain in 1923. Created from above, with limited access to society and governmental decision-making, the UN had an elitist character ""

- Adinolfi, Goffredo & Pinto, António. (2014). Salazar’s ‘New State’: The Paradoxes of Hybridization in the Fascist Era. 10.1057/9781137384416_7.


 * ""The obstacles in twinning the New State with fascism are self evident. Among other one can pick out the lack of mass mobilization, the moderate nature of Portuguese Nationalism, the careful and apolitical selection of the narrow elite that ran the country, the lack of powerful working class and the rejection of violence as a mean of transforming society. To include Salazar, given his background, his trajectory, is faith and his general disposition in the broad fascist family is at first sight to stretch fascism to a point where it becomes meaningless. ""

- Meneses - Salazar: A Political Biography []


 * ""Salazar did not allow all to compete (liberalism) but neither did he have a totalitarian ideology like fascism; he espoused Catholic "corporatism": state imposed collaboration of the social classes.(...)In their essential design and purpose, while the regimes very much resembled each other, the Portuguese regime never relied, either in its foundation or development, on anything remotely like the Italian Fascist movement, which later became a party.(...) Salazar did take strong action against real Fascist.""

- [|Michael Sanfey “On Salazar and Salazarism.” Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review, vol. 92, no. 368, 2003, pp. 405–411. JSTOR]


 * ""Although Salazar introduced radical social reforms in some areas (the Estado Novo/New State) and emulated ‘fascist’ organizational elements (militia, secret police, etc.), the raison d’être of the regime was the preservation of conservative and Catholic values, as well as the defense of the existing system against radical alternative conceptions of domestic organizations.(...) Although in subsequent years Salazar accentuated his commitment to a mimetic ‘fascist’ model of domestic organization, this remained confined to the articulation of form and style rather than extending into the sphere of political substance. His regime remained an essentially pro-system pattern of conservative-authoritarian government whose ‘fascist’ elements of style were duly shed in the 1940s.""

- Kallis AA. The ‘Regime-Model’ of Fascism: A Typology. European History Quarterly. 2000;30(1):77-104. doi:10.1177/026569140003000104


 * ""It was an authoritarian regime, with some similarities to generic fascism although it cannot be confused with it""

- Sánchez Cervelló, Josep


 * "Rui Ramos is part of a 'large number of historians'  who refute the fascist character of the regime. I myself reject this classification, I only consider this perspective of analysis between 1933 and 1945"

- [| Manuel Loff in Público Newspaper "A História de Rui Ramos desculpabiliza o Estado Novo?"]


 * ""In the Iberian Latin context the "fascist" label has served often to obscure rather than assist our understanding of these systems, especially as the term implies a blanket condemnation." (p.5) "Iberian Latin model, here termed corporatist, conforms to neither the liberal-pluralist nor the "fascist"or totalitarian model....Fitting neither the liberal framework nor the fascist-totalitarian one, far more dynamic and change-oriented than often thought, the Iberic Latin model is a distinct type with its own philosophic traditions, characteristics...""

- Howard Wiarda "Corporatism and Development: The Portuguese Experience


 * ""In Portugal, Goffredo Adinolfi argues, Italian fascism was one of the principal sources of inspiration for the Estado Novo, particularly in the conception of the “ethical state” and among other features, its corporatist organization. However, the limits of this inspiration were evident both in the ideological and the constitutional field. Wholly antidemocratic, the regime's “constitution” located its ideological roots in the most right-wing form of liberalism, Lusitanian Integralismo and Catholicism. Equally, Salazar himself was far from committed to a totalitarian state. Nor would fascism become a hegemonic force in Spain, although the process of fascistization there went considerably further than in Portugal...""

- Saz I., Box Z., Morant T., Sanz J. (2019) Introduction. In: Saz I., Box Z., Morant T., Sanz J. (eds) Reactionary Nationalists, Fascists and Dictatorships in the Twentieth Century. Palgrave Studies in Political History. p 19, Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22411-0_1

However, on the other hand there are some Portuguese scholars that think the opposite, they think that Salazar should be labeled as fascist. Examples:


 * 1) Jorge Pais de Sousa - O Estado Novo de Salazar como um Fascismo de Cátedra
 * 2) Manuel de Lucena - Interpretações do Salazarismo
 * 3) Manuel Loff - O Nosso Século é Fascista. O Mundo visto por Salazar e Franco
 * 4) Manuel de Lucena - A Evolução do Sistema Corporativo Português: O Salazarismo
 * 5) Hermínio Martins, S. Woolf - European Fascism, pp. 302-336
 * 6) Luis Reis Torgal - España-Portugal: Estudios de historia contemporánea, pp. 87
 * 7) Fernando Rosas - O salazarismo e o homem novo: ensaio sobre o Estado Novo e a questão do totalitarismo
 * 8) Manuel Villaverde Cabral - Sobre o Fascismo, pp. 914
 * 9) Eduardo Lourenço - O fascismo nunca existiu, pp. 229
 * 10) João Paulo Avelãs Nunes - Tipologias de regimes políticos. Para uma leitura neomoderna do Estado Novo e do Nuevo Estado
 * 11) D.L. Raby - Fascism and Resistance in Portugal: Communists, liberals, and military dissidents in the opposition to Salazar, 1941-74 -

But even Luis Reis Torgal recognizes that he defends a minority point of view. This is what Torgal said


 * "we can observe that the majority of Portuguese and foreign historians, sociologists and politologists (René Rémond, Pierre Milza, Stanley Payne ...) either go beyond the question of the characterization of the Estado Novo or recognize its own originality or singularity, not to be confused with the system named, in a generic sense, “fascism”"

- In the original, in Portuguese : verificarmos que a maioria dos historiadores, sociólogos e politólogos portugueses e estrangeiros (René Rémond, Pierre Milza, Stanley Payne…) ou ultrapassa a questão da caracterização do Estado Novo ou reconhece-lhe uma “originalidade” ou “singularidade” própria, não confundível com o sistema nomeado, em sentido genérico, de “fascismo”

J Pratas (talk) 10:03, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

Fascism
A few years ago there was a discussion about whether Salazar's regime should be considered fascist or not, eventually it was decided to maintain the status quo since no consensus was reached, and the status quo was that he was a fascist:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Fascism_in_Europe#Should_the_Estado_Novo_regime_in_Portugal_be_considered_a_Fascist_regime?

So I'm just restoring the status quo, just wanted to clarify this in order to avoid edit warring. -- 2804:248:fb44:4300:d86a:797d:b827:58f6 (talk) 03:58, 9 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Well no -- one one anonymous editor (who was on Wikipedia only two days) favoured the "fascist" label. Most editors and most sources rejected the label for the regime and for Salazar (who abolished the fascist movement). Rjensen (talk) 19:49, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Neutrality
I think this is an excellent article, but I'm a little but concerned about its neutrality. For example, the evaluation section seems to me to consist almost entirely of positive comments. Perhaps these could be balanced by some more negative assessments. Cleisthenes2 (talk) 05:28, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Very much agree - reading this leaves one thinking that nary a soul in the world ever questioned the nobility of staying neutral in WWII. 2001:8A0:E974:F400:692A:3B06:D91D:4E81 (talk) 10:36, 13 October 2019 (UTC)

I agree. I don't know enough about Salazar to evaluate, but the opening paragraphs of the articel seem alarmingly enthusiastic, and I am afraid it is biased. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:36D:119:4267:1874:4633:7C86:B940 (talk) 17:40, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

If anything that is an understatement. No way does this even come close to being neutral. It's a hagiography. This is about a man widely regarded as a dictator, openly opposed to democracy, who was installed in power by a military coup, ruled through a murderous secret police and remained neutral in the face of the Nazis, and it barely mentions that not everybody thinks of him as an "accomplished wizard". 86.13.184.107 (talk) 18:30, 10 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Silliest comment I ever read lol "murderous secret police", you realize that Salazar during his entire rule "murdered" less of his citizens than basically all the democracies? Just in Italy for a few years in the 50s the state caused the deaths over 150 of it's citizens, in my own country Sweden in the 30s the military shot workers. Salazar looks peaceful compared to some of the democracies. He was also not installed by coup as you state.Chronicler87 (talk) 12:25, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

This article is obviously biased. There is no need to begin with the debate about whether or not he was a Fascist, certainly Salazar was no Hitler or Mussolini, etc., but there is also no need to pretend that he was some benevolent ruler... The Estado Novo was an authoritarian dictatorship that pursued policies of overt political repression. Censorship of the press, which had already been introduced after the military coup d’état in 1926 and subsequent military dictatorship, prevented freedom of expression, with a ban on strikes and restricted freedom of assembly (which this article describes as "depoliticization of society"). All remaining political parties were banned in 1932. Dissidents were driven into exile, imprisoned, murdered or silenced by the PiDE Secret Police (Polcia Internacional e de Defesa do Estado). I imagine it will be difficult to make the requisite changes in this article--it appears that many of the editors have "axes to grind" and a relatively neutral appraisal of this highly conflicted period in Portugal's history will not be possible. --Quigley david (talk) 12:13, 11 April 2021 (UTC)

I agree, this article is completely biased in favor of Salazar and it requires editing. R. J. Dockery (talk) 04:06, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Very much agreed, the first paragraph, specifically, is very enthusiastic even though it is stated all along in the article that he was in fact a dictator. As stated by Quigley david even if Salazar wasn't as bad as other dictators he was a dictator nonetheless. This fact is not even a debatable one in my opinion because again it is stated and proved with sources furthermore into the article so it's a bit concerning that is omitted in the first paragraph and infobox. Shexantidote (talk) 23:39, 29 November 2021 (UTC)
 * This article also doesn't talk about Salazar's personal life, unlike the Portuguese Wikipedia article. He had clandestine adulterous affairs with various married women throughout his rule, which would have disgusted ordinary Portuguese people if they'd found out. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2402:3A80:CAD:BE92:982:2345:E291:953F (talk) 08:30, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Wolfram
It is misleading to claim Salazar's regime only helped the Allies during World War II. He also supplied the Axis with wolfram, without which Germany's war effort would have collapsed in 1940: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/94297/1/2000-08.pdf (86.151.111.198 (talk) 18:53, 14 June 2021 (UTC))


 * Not that simple. Selling wolfram does not mean help. Tom Gallagher says that "Until late into the war, Salazar insisted that denying sales of the mineral to Germany jeopardised Portuguese neutrality and invited possibly terrible retribution from the skies." (Gallagher, 2020, p ) In addition "while the British paid for wolfram with a credit, Salazar expected the Germans to pay with gold, which they did in very large quantities." (Gallagher, 2020, p ). Furthermore, anyone reading Douglas Wheeler work, "The Price of Neutrality: Portugal, the Wolfram Question, and World War II" Luso-Brazilian Review Vol. 23, No. 1 (Summer, 1986), pp. 107-127 will recognize, as Wheeler did that "maintaining neutrality was like a delicate balance". Another source saying the same thing is Costa Leite who asserts that "in May 1941, the British acknowledged their incapacity to help defend the Portuguese Mainland in case of attack." It is important to consider this vulnerability and initial incapacity of the Allies to supply fuel and raw materials to Portugal when analysing Portuguese trade with Germany. The Allies monitored that trade, and although they were often contentious about its exact terms, they knew and accepted its rationale." (Neutrality by Agreement: Portugal and the British Alliance in World War II, Joaquim da Costa Leite, these are central works on the topic, from a British, an American and a Portuguese historian, that go against the idea of Salazar "helping" the Nazis. You will need consensus to make such a hard claim in the lede section without any context to support it. J Pratas (talk) 10:46, 15 June 2021 (UTC)


 * By the way. All this is very much in line with the source that you provide. Your source also says that "The Portuguese actions were intended to protect Portugal's neutrality and to end a wolfram boom that Salazar believed would destabilize the Portuguese economy."J Pratas (talk) 10:58, 15 June 2021 (UTC)