Portugal

Abstract

This chapter briefly describes the main features of the elections to the European Parliament in Portugal, in June 2009. The chapter focus on the background of the election, describing the political scene in which the elections occurred (major parties and new actors), the (small but consistent) decrease in the Portuguese citizen’s euro-enthusiasm in the last few years, the issues conveyed by the most important political forces in their Euromanifestos for 2009, the features of the electoral campaign (duration, major characters, most relevant events, funds allocated by the parties for campaign-related activities), the evolution of the relative positions of the parties in the opinion polls, and the final results, with a discussion of how the election outcome was interpreted by the different actors in the national arena. The chapter is part of a volume in which the European Election of 2009 is described in the context of 24 different countries, using the same analytical frame.