The Secretariat for Administrative Reform; The First Years of a Reform Project within the Intricacies of the Marcelist Spring (1967–1970)

Abstract

This article analyzes the action of the Secretariat for Administrative Reform, the first administrative reform coordination organization created by the Portuguese “Estado Novo”. In addition to present the action of a body still quite unknown in the historiography, due to the disappearance of its archive, this article aims to investigate the relation between the political decision to initiate administrative reform and the regime’s idiosyncrasies and priorities in the late 1960s. To achieve these goals and to overcome the lack of documents, the analysis of parliamentary debates, legislation and contemporary publications, as well as documentation from various ministries was called upon. It is argued that the creation of the Secretariat was due to the impact of the economic planning rationales that marked the second half of the 1960s and that the objectives of the organization were an answer to the political priorities of the first phase of Marcello Caetano’s government. In the end, it is concluded that there is a profound connection between the groundwork and the execution of the Third Development Plan and the creation of the Secretariat, as well as that the characteristics of the regime that led to its creation would also be responsible for its end.