Left Bloc

Formation and early history

The Left Bloc (B.E.) was formed in March 1999 by the merger of the People's Democratic Union (União Democrática Popular, UDP, communist: Marxist), Revolutionary Socialist Party (Partido Socialista Revolucionário, PSR, ex-LCI, Trotskyist Mandelist), and Politics XXI (Política XXI, PXXI, democratic socialist). B.E. has had full party status since its founding, yet the constituent groups have maintained their existence as individual political associations, so restaining some levels of autonomy in a loose structure.

In the 1999 legislative election the B.E. polled at 2%. In 2002 this rose to 3%.

First parliamentary representation

At the 2005 election B.E. received 6.5% of the votes leading them to enter the Assembly of the Republic for the first time with 8 MPs. In the Portuguese 2006 presidential elections, the Left Bloc's candidate, Francisco Louçã, received 288,224 votes (5.31%).

In the 2009 European election they received 10.73% winning them 3 MEPs. They also surpassed the CDU for the first time in an election. At the subsequent 2009 national election, the party obtained 9.81% of votes and 16 members of parliament in the 230-seat Assembly of the Republic.

The Financial crisis led socialist prime minister Sócrates to agreeing into a bailout memorandum with the Eurogroup. In the subsequent 2011 snap election, the country saw a massive shift to the right, with the Left Bloc losing nearly half of its previous popular support, obtaining only 5.17% of the vote and 8 members of parliament. This defeat is generally attributed to the partial support certain sections of the party appeared to offer the unpopular Socialist government while the latter pursued an austerity programme in response to the financial crisis.

Renewal, split and recovery

The historical merger of ideologies which gave rise to the Portuguese Left Bloc was a process that lasted sixteen years. Its main actors aged and times changed, which led to an awareness of the need for modernization and realism. Francisco Louçã is one of the founders who most insisted in restricting theory to the basic humanistic and ethical principles common to partisans and supporters in order to conquer a wider range of constituencies. The game would necessarily be played in the framework of democracy, active participation and defence of human rights. After thirteen years of intensive labor as a leader, Louçã quit the position of party chair-man in 2012 arguing that “it is time for renewal” and delegating his functions to a man and a woman. Catarina Martins, 39 years old, and João Semedo, a veteran, would be elected co-chairmen of the party on November 11, 2012. However, the renewal process would last for over one year.

In early 2014, the Left Bloc suffered a split, when elected Left Bloc MEP Rui Tavares, who already in 2011 had become an independent, founded left-libertarian LIVRE party. Left intellectuals who had come together to the Manifesto 3D collective challenged the Left Bloc to converge with LIVRE towards a joined list in the upcoming 2014 European election. Two official meetings in late 2014 and early 2015 however failed with the Left Bloc referring to programmatic differences with Tavares. So while the severe austerity programs under prime minister Passos Coelho did backdrop on the Portuguese political right, the European election in May saw the Socialists and liberal Earth Party as relative winners, whereas the Left Bloc lost more than half of 2009's votes and two of its three mandates. LIVRE received 2.2% but failed to win any mandate.

By 2015, the controversial privatization of Portugal's flag carrier airline TAP dominated the political debate. In the 2015 legislative elections, the Left Bloc didn't only recover, but even topped its 2009 electoral performance, winning 10.2% or 19 mandates. While in 2011, more than half of the elected Left Bloc's deputies were female, this time however a majority of the party's deputies was male.

On 10 November 2015, the Left Bloc signed an agreement with the Socialist Party that is aimed at identifying convergence issues while recognizing the differences.

Praxis

The Left Bloc is often considered by foreign observers and conservative local commentators as a radical left wing party. It actually occupies a flexible and moderate position to the left of the Portuguese Socialist Party (PS).

The Bloc proposed a number of important laws on civil rights and guarantees, including the protection of citizens from racist, xenophobic, and homophobic discrimination, support for same-sex marriage, laws for the protection of workers and anti-bullfighting legislation. These included Portugal's first law on domestic violence, which was then passed in parliament with the support of the Portuguese Communist Party and the Socialist Party. At present, together with SP, Left Bloc aims at “building a stable, long-lasting and reliable majority at the Parliament, in order to support the formation and subsequent action of a government committed to the change demanded through the ballot-box”. This purpose foreshadows changes taking place not only in the Iberian Peninsula as in European territory.