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The Junta de Colonização Interna and the shaping of the Estado Novo’s peasantry: newness and stagnation of the rural society

Publication . CARVALHO, Rita Almeida de

Considerations on the Portuguese architecture during the New State are usually set apart cultural, societal and economic developments. Appreciating, in particular, the modifications of the constructive techniques, Portuguese architectural historians place the Estado Novo architecture within the ‘Modern Movement’ or Modernism. However, Modernism, far beyond a mere aesthetic phenomenon, has been conceptualise - either by philosophers, sociologists, anthropologists or historians – as a radical response to the abrupt economic and societal challenges brought by the modernity, such as the working class proletarisation, laicisation of the society, transport revolution, and so forth. Having said that, this paper aims to scrutinise the societal model reproduced by the Junta de Colonização Interna, one of the Estado Novo institutions in charge of studying and shaping the Portuguese rural landscape therefore materialising the regime’s political views. The aim is to discuss its modernist character. Is it the case that the Estado Novo institution has ever aimed the creation of a new way of living plainly adjusted to modernity or did it reproduced the conservative, traditionalist and catholic values, with all its the rigid stratification they advocate? To enlighten this question, sketches, internal reports and other documents of the Junta de Colonização Interna will be explored through the lens of the allegedly dialogue between tradition and modernity that others identified in relation to architecture and urban planning discourses of the Estado Novo regime thus contributing to the debate on the regime’s nature.

2018-10-25Conference object

Open access