Double podcast episode about the Portuguese revolution of 1974-5, also known as the Carnation Revolution, which overthrew the Portuguese empire and the right-wing Estado Novo regime.

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• Part 1: Background, anti-colonial insurgencies, resistance in the military, struggles of workers, neighbourhoods, women, LGBTQ people.

• Part 2: The political factions, tensions within Portuguese society, tensions in the military, recuperation and counterrevolution, and the achievements and legacy

• Bonus episode: Phil’s earlier life, the nature of the Estado Novo, left-wing military organising strategies, how the revolution is taught in Portuguese schools. [Available exclusively for relevant levels of our patreon supporters]

In these episodes we speak with Phil Mailer, who participated in the revolution and wrote Portugal: The Impossible Revolution?, as well as Raquel Varela, author of A People’s History of the Portuguese Revolution, and Jorge Valadas, a military deserter who took part in the revolution.

More information

Where to find out more from WCH about the Portuguese revolution:

• Portugal: The Impossible Revolution? – Phil Mailer
• A People’s History of the Portuguese Revolution – Raquel Varela

Jorge Valadas, born in Lisbon 1945, deserted in 1967 from the army because he refused to participate in the colonial war. Lives in Paris since then. Lived May 68 in Paris and after the Portuguese revolution on the side of the anti-authoritarian radical tendencies. He writes under the pseudonym of Charles Reeve. Participates in the anti-authoritarian alternative press in Europe, such as Mapa in Portugal and CQFD and Lundi matin [a crappy Tiquuinst eclectic bunch of crap, mixed with some occasional good stuff but certainly not worth participating in – SF] in France. He writes for Field Notes/Brooklyn Rail in the US. His last book: Le Socialismo Sauvage, essay sua l’auto-organization et la democratic directe (2018), is published in French, Portuguese, German and Spanish.

Glossary

• Anarcho-syndicalism: an anarchist form of trade unionism
• Combate: newspaper which Phil mentioned which he worked on with others
• COPCON: left-wing faction of the army
• Guevarist: ideology of Che Guevara, Cuban communist guerrilla, heavily influenced by armed struggle
• Libertarian: term encompassing anarchism and various strains of anti-state socialism
• Maoism: ideology of Mao Zedong, Chinese communist leader
• MDM – Democratic Women’s Movement: women’s organisation linked to the Portuguese Communist Party
• MFA – Movement of the Armed Forces: anti-war group of mostly junior military officers
• MLM – Movement for the Liberation of Women
• MRPP – Movement for the Reorganisation of the Party of the Proletariat: influential Maoist group
• PCP (Portuguese Communist Party): Moscow-linked CP
• PCP (M-L) – Portuguese Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist): official Maoist party linked to China
• PIDE – International and State Defence Police: secret police with a vast network of informers
• PRP: abbreviation of PRP-BR – Revolutionary Party of the Proletariat-Revolutionary Brigades, a Guevarist group

See Phil Meyler’s book   “Portugal: The Impossible Revolution?”

And portugal, nov 2010 – march 2013: on the passage of a few thousand people through a brief period of time