ISCTE - Lisbon University Institute

Graduate Student, Department of History

PhD Student

Thesis Title: US Portuguese Relations (1945-1955)

About

Currently, I am working on a PhD dissertation that has the main purpose of analyzing the transatlantic relations of Portugal in the 20th century. With this work I will show how Portugal managed to resist to the decolonization process in the 1950’s, bearing in mind the political and cultural relations between Portugal and the United States of America. I can already conclude that the Portuguese authoritarian regime of Oliveira Salazar used the geostrategic importance of its Atlantic islands, mainly the Azores, as a bargain. In an era when all European colonial powers were struggling to maintain their overseas possessions, Portugal was able to carry on its colonial policy in Africa and, especially, in Asia. Some recent research, including my own work, conclude that, during the 1950’s, Portugal faced strong agitation to hold the Asian territories of the Portuguese Empire, as the case of Goa and Macao illustrates. Facing the emergence of the Third World as a political bloc willing to put an end to European presence in Asia and Africa, Oliveira Salazar struggled to preserve intact the Portuguese colonial possessions. He considered them the natural extension of the Iberian world and Europe. According to the Portuguese Prime-Minister, the end of the Portuguese empire in Africa would lead to the reshape of the Iberian World since it would just be a matter of time for Portugal’s absorption by Francoist Spain.