ABSTRACT
Before examining in detail the major features of Portugal’s contemporary economy, it is necessary to set the recent transformations in their historical context. In this opening chapter the intention is to survey Portugal’s economic evolution from the 1920s to the 1960s. Such a task is much easier today than it would have been a decade or more ago. Archives are now open that were previously closed and a new generation of young researchers has begun to probe the workings of the political economy under the dictatorship. I have relied heavily for this chapter on the literature published by Portugal’s leading economic historians (Nunes and Brito 1992, Reis 1993, Rosas 1994, Lopes 1996, Neves 1996b).
