The book “Temas de História Açoriana” is now on the market. It’s a collection. What can we find there?

I’ve selected articles that take a different approach and give us a fresh look at the near past. The first deals with resistance to Philippine rule, highlighting the popular movement that turned this resistance into the only popular revolution on Terceira Island. The others deal with how the image of our heroes (Brianda Pereira, Conde da Praia, and Teotónio Ornelas) was constructed, followed by aspects related to autonomy and political intervention against the dictatorship, mentioning some of its protagonists, but also a summary of the evolution of the Azorean economy in the 20th century.
Although they were written at very distant times, given that the first is from 1978, when he was still a student at the Faculty, they presented some thematic unity.

One theme that strikes us in his work is “The Azorean Lobby in Lisbon.” Did we have one? Do we have one? Do we need one? What use is it to us?

The Azorean lobby was born and has survived in a particular historical context. It emerged in the last quarter of the 19th century in Lisbon within a community with the intellectual capacity to make its voice heard. The newspaper Portugal, Madeira e Açores, founded in 1884, served as an agglutinating element for the interests of the two archipelagos. In this context, the creation of what would later become the Casa dos Açores (House of the Azores) began to take shape in 1927. It was around it that the lobby was organized. A group of personalities, well placed in the state apparatus, took proposals from companies or requests from the Chambers and General Councils to the ministerial offices. Salazar didn’t like this interference and did everything he could to make the lobby inoperable after World War II.
The issue was put back on the agenda with the Revolution of April 25, 1974, but when regional autonomy was established, Mota Amaral didn’t want any intermediaries either. He centralized all the struggles, with central power in his hands.
Directly or indirectly, the spirit of lobbying still exists, but not in an organized way. This is notorious when the state budget is being discussed, and each economic group individually tries to reap benefits by putting pressure on the parties.

In your book, you discuss “The construction of regional unity and identity.” Today, this subject is debated as perhaps one of the great failings of Autonomy—building political unity while satisfying the interests of each island. How do you position yourself in this debate?

Identity is built, and its ingredients vary according to political and social circumstances. In other words, identity does not hover above society like a “sacred cow” that we must worship. In this study, I’ve tried to show how the valorization of specific cultural factors is linked to political interests. The fact that the Autonomous Region is created on paper does not mean it is lived and felt in practice. The levels of economic development on each island are very different. In the model of society in which we live, where profit is the driving force, and the market is entirely open to the outside world, it is impossible to achieve this utopia. Investments will always be channeled to islands where profit is more accessible, increasing their disparity. This is one of the flaws of autonomy, but it has no solution in this market economy based on profit and not solidarity.

in Diário Insular-José Lourenço-director

Translated to English as a community outreach program from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI) and the Modern and Classical Languages and Cultures Department (MCLL) as part of Bruma Publication and ADMA (Azores-Diaspora Media Alliance) at California State University, Fresno, PBBI thanks Luso Financial for sponsoring FILAMENTOS.