Bridging the gap? The changing relationship between the socialists and radical left in Portugal before and after the Government deal

This chapter has two major goals: to explore the process that brought the Socialist Party (PS), the Left Bloc (BE) and the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) together with the Greens (PEV) close enough to cooperate with each other and to support the so called Geringonça (“Contraption”) established in Portugal in 2015; and to see what happened to the relationship among the same parties after the beginning of this unprecedented alliance. The first objective has to do with a series of questions. What brought the Socialists and the radical left parties to collaborate after many years spent so far from each other? Had they already started any sort of convergence in ideological or policy terms before 2015? Or was it simply the fear of another legislature led by the centre-right coalition that pushed them to find a common ground for discussion and collaboration after the 2015 election? This first objective is related to the phase that preceded the agreement among the PS and the radical left parties. The second one has to do with the government phase, that following the general approach of the volume can be defined as a phase of renewal, which shows at the same time political stability and economic sustainability after (or despite) the strong political, economic and social crisis occurred a few years earlier. It aims to understand how the relationship between the Socialists and the radical left has changed since 2015 and, in particular, whether the parties involved in the Geringonça got any closer on the ideological and policy space or simply decided to leave aside their differences, pursuing the common aim of keeping the centre right away from government. In the latter case, which is the one we expect to be true, did the radical left parties play the role of “opposition in government” in order to reassure their electorate that they have not “sold out” their political principles? Or did they rather seek to appear as responsible as their mainstream political ally? And whichever approach they adopted, how have they pursued it?