The territorial failure

The 50-year-old constitutional commitment to create administrative regions has remained unfulfilled, leaving the country with an outdated district-based structure. Despite various attempts at reform, including the Guterres government's failed regionalization referendum and the 2004 constitutional revision, the lack of progress has rendered the democratic promise of territorial cohesion largely inconsequential. The author argues that isolating single components of this deficit, as seen with the 2012 abolition of Civil Governments by the Passos Coelho administration, will continue to result in stagnation.