Португалияның орталық-оң партиясы

Centre right political party in Portugal

The Social Democratic Party (Partido Social Democrata, pɐɾˈtiðu susiˈal dɨmuˈkɾatɐ; PSD) is a liberal conservative political party in Portugal that is currently the country's ruling party. Commonly known by its colloquial initials PSD, on ballot papers its initials appear as its official form PPD/PSD, with the first three letters coming from the party's original name, the Democratic People's Party (Partido Popular Democrático, PPD). A party of the centre right, the PSD is one of the two major parties in Portuguese politics, its rival being the Socialist Party (PS) on the centre left. The PSD was founded in 1974, two weeks after the Carnation Revolution and in 1976 adopted its current name. In 1979, the PSD allied with centre right parties to form the Democratic Alliance and won that year's election. After the 1983 general election, the party formed a grand coalition with the Socialist Party, known as the Central Bloc, before winning the 1985 general election under new leader Aníbal Cavaco Silva, who shifted the party to the right. Cavaco Silva served as Prime Minister for ten years, instituting major economic liberalisation and winning two landslide victories. After he stepped down, the PSD lost the 1995 election. The party was returned to power under José Manuel Durão Barroso in 2002, but was defeated in the 2005 election. The party was able to return to power after the 2011 elections and four years later was able to win a plurality in the 2015 legislative election, winning 107 seats in the Assembly of the Republic in alliance with the CDS – People's Party, but being unable to form a minority government and went back to the opposition. Nine years later, in 2024, the party was returned to power under a minority government. The current leader, Luís Montenegro was elected on 28 May 2022 and is the incumbent Prime Minister of Portugal. Originally a social democratic party, the PSD became the main centre right, conservative party in Portugal. The PSD is a member of the European People's Party and the Centrist Democrat International. Until 1996, the PSD belonged to the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party and Liberal International. with its membership attempt vetoed by the Socialist Party. Alberto João Jardim was the co founder of the Madeiran branch of the PSD, and governed the autonomous archipelago for decades, running as a member of the party.

The Democratic People's Party participated in a number of coalition governments in Portugal between 1974 and 1976, following the Carnation Revolution. This is seen as a transitional period in Portuguese politics, in which political institutions were built and took time to stabilize. In 1976, the party adopted its current name. In 1979, the PSD formed an electoral alliance, known as the Democratic Alliance (AD), with the Democratic and Social Centre (now called the People's Party, CDS PP) and a couple of smaller right wing parties. The AD won the parliamentary elections towards the end of 1979, and the PSD leader, Francisco Sá Carneiro, became Prime Minister. The PSD would be part of all governments until 1995. The AD increased its parliamentary majority in new elections called for 1980, but was devastated by the death of Sá Caneiro in an air crash on 4 December 1980. Francisco Pinto Balsemão took over the leadership of both the Social Democratic Party and the Democratic Alliance, as well as the Prime Ministership, but lacking Sá Carneiro's charisma, he was unable to rally popular support. The Democratic Alliance was dissolved in 1983, and in parliamentary elections that year, the PSD lost to the Socialist Party (PS). Falling short of a majority, however, the Socialists formed a grand coalition, known as the Central Bloc, with the PSD. Many right wingers in the PSD, including Aníbal Cavaco Silva, opposed participation in the PS led government, and so, when Cavaco Silva was elected leader of the party on 2 June 1985, the coalition was doomed.

The PSD won a plurality (but not a majority) in the general election of 1985, and Cavaco Silva became Prime Minister. Economic liberalization and tax cuts ushered in several years of economic growth. After a motion of no confidence was approved, early elections were called for July 1987, which resulted in a landslide victory for the PSD, who captured 50.2 percent of the popular vote and 148 of the 250 parliamentary seats – the first time that any political party in Portugal had mustered an absolute majority in a free election. While the PSD had been very popular going into the election, the size of its victory far exceeded the party's most optimistic projections. A strong economy, growing above 7% in 1988, ushered a big convergence between Portugal and other EU countries. The PSD won a historic third term in the 1991 election, with a slightly higher vote share than four years earlier. However, continuing high levels of unemployment and a lower economy, after 1993, eroded the popularity of the Cavaco Silva government.

Cavaco Silva stepped down as leader in January 1995. In the following month, in the PSD congress, the party elected Fernando Nogueira as leader. The PSD lost the 1995 election to the PS. In 1996, Cavaco Silva ran for the presidency of the republic, but he failed to defeat former Lisbon Mayor Jorge Sampaio. Sampaio won 53.9% to Cavaco's 46.1%. The party, for the first time in 16 years, was out of government. The party was again defeated in the 1999 elections. The party, however, made a big comeback in the 2001 local elections by winning several cities, like Lisbon, Porto and Sintra, from the PS and, some, against all odds and predictions. This PSD result led the then Prime Minister António Guterres (PS) to resign and the country was led to snap general elections on March 2002. At the time, the party reviewed its membership database, resulting in a correction from 183,000 in 1996 to 77,000 in 1999.

The PSD made a comeback in 2002 by defeating the PS by 40% to 38% margin, however, despite falling short of a majority, the PSD won enough seats to form a coalition with the CDS PP, and the PSD leader, José Manuel Durão Barroso, became Prime Minister. Durão Barroso later resigned his post to become President of the European Commission, leaving the way for Pedro Santana Lopes, a man with whom he was frequently at odds, to become leader of the party and Prime Minister.

In the parliamentary election held on 20 February 2005, Santana Lopes led the PSD to its worst defeat since 1983. With a negative swing of more than 12% percent, the party won only 75 seats, a loss of 30. The rival Socialist Party had won an absolute majority, and remained in government after the 2009 parliamentary election, albeit without an absolute majority, leaving the PSD in opposition. The PSD supported candidate Aníbal Cavaco Silva won the Portuguese presidential elections in 2006 and again in 2011. After the 2005 elections, Luís Marques Mendes was elected leader of the party. Internal infighting weakened Marques Mendes and, in September 2007, Marques Mendes was defeated by Luís Filipe Menezes by a 54% to 42% margin. Menezes was also incapable of dealing with his internal opposition and, after just six months in the job, Menezes resigned. On 31 May 2008, Manuela Ferreira Leite became the first female leader of a Portuguese major party. She won 38% of the votes, against the 31% of Pedro Passos Coelho and the 30% of Pedro Santana Lopes. In the European Parliament election held on 7 June 2009, the PSD defeated the governing socialists, capturing 31.7% of the popular vote and electing eight MEPs, while the Socialist Party only won 26.5% of the popular vote and elected seven MEPs. Although this was expected to be a "redrawing of the electoral map", the PSD has still defeated later that year, though the PS lost its majority. Pedro Passos Coelho was elected leader in March 2010, with 61% of the votes.

Growing popular disenchantment with the government's handling of the economic crisis coupled with the government's inability to secure the support of other parties to implement the necessary reforms to address the crisis, forced the Socialist Party Prime Minister José Sócrates to resign, leading to a fresh election on 5 June 2011. This resulted in a non absolute majority for the PSD, leading to a coalition government with the CDS PP, which served a full term until the 2015 general election. During this term, many austerity policies were put into practice to reduce the budget deficit but, ultimately, created unemployment and a recession that lasted until mid 2013. Since that date, the economy recovered starting to grow between 1 and 2% per trimester. In the 2015 general election, the PSD and CDS PP ran in a joint coalition, called Portugal Ahead, led by Pedro Passos Coelho and Paulo Portas. The coalition won the elections by a wide margin over the Socialists, capturing 38.6% of the votes while the Socialists captured only 32%, although the coalition lost 25 MPs and a more than 11% of the votes, thus falling well short of an absolute majority. The PSD/CDS PP coalition was asked by the then President of the Republic, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, to form a government with Passos Coelho as Prime Minister.

The 2nd PSD/CDS government was duly formed and took the oath of office on 30 October 2015, but fell after a no confidence motion was approved two weeks later. Its 11 days of rule make it the shortest lived government since Portugal has been a democracy holding free elections. After that, the PSD returned to the opposition benches, and the Socialist Party was able to form an agreement with BE and CDU to support a PS minority government led by António Costa. Pedro Passos Coelho continued as party leader, but a weak opposition strategy led to bad polling numbers for the PSD. All of this culminated with the results of the 2017 local elections. In these elections, the PSD achieved their worst results ever, winning just 98 mayors and 30% of the votes. Passos Coelho announced he would not run for another term as PSD leader. On 13 January 2018, Rui Rio defeated Pedro Santana Lopes by a 54% to 46% margin and became the new party leader. In order to avoid bankruptcy due to mounting debt, in 2017, the party, alongside the Portuguese Socialist Party, the Portuguese Communist Party, BE and the ecologist party PEV, voted in favour of abolishing party fundraising limits, thereby opening all Portuguese parties to private political donorship, that they are not obligated to disclose. The new proposal was reluctantly approved by the Portuguese president Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa. During his first year in the leadership, Rio faced big internal opposition and, in January 2019, Rio won a motion of confidence presented by Luís Montenegro. In the EP 2019 elections, the PSD achieved their worst result ever in a national election, winning just 22% of the votes. However, the party recovered a lot of ground in the October 2019 general elections, achieving 28% of the votes, against the 36% of the PS. Nonetheless, Rio's leadership was, once again, challenged and he faced, in a two round leadership contest in January 2020, Luís Montenegro and Miguel Pinto Luz. Rio won the 1st round with 49% of the votes and defeated Luís Montenegro in the 2nd round by 53% to 47% margin, thus being re elected as party leader. In the Azores 2020 regional elections, the PSD was able to return to power, after 24 years in opposition, by forging a controversial deal with CHEGA, plus CDS, PPM and IL. The PSD won almost 34% of the votes, while the PS fell more than 7 pp, compared with 2016, to 39%, an unexpected result, and overall the right wing parties had a 1 seat majority over all the left. After 2020, the PSD controls the governments of Portugal's only two autonomous regions. The 2021 local elections were quite positive for the PSD, despite not winning the most mayors in the country as a whole. The party, and its led coalitions, won a combined 32% of the votes and were able to win, from the PS, several cities like Coimbra, Funchal and Barcelos. The main gain of the PSD was the victory in Lisbon, where Carlos Moedas defeated, against all odds and predictions, the PS incumbent mayor Fernando Medina. In October 2021, disagreements between the PS and BE CDU led to the rejection of the 2022 budget and the calling of a snap general election for 30 January 2022. Despite a close race predicted by polls, the PSD suffered a big setback by winning just 29% of the votes and seeing the PS gaining a surprise absolute majority, with 41% of the votes. After the election, PSD leader Rui Rio opened the process to elect a new party leader. On 28 May 2022, Luís Montenegro was elected party leader by a landslide, gathering more than 72% of the votes.

Following António Costa's resignation due to an investigation around alleged corruption involving the award of contracts for lithium and hydrogen businesses, a snap election was called for 10 March 2024. For this election, PSD, CDS–PP and PPM decided to contest the election in a joint alliance called Democratic Alliance (AD). On election day, the AD won by a narrow 29% to 28% margin over the Socialist Party, and formed a minority government.

The party was founded based on classical social democracy to centre left party, but later it evolved into catch all centre right party. The party has been described as liberal conservative, or conservative liberal, with Christian democratic, liberal and economically liberal elements.

The orange color is dominant in the PSD symbols since 1974 and the logo is characterized by three arrows, inspired in the Three Arrows political symbol from the German Social Democratic Party during the 1930s against Nazism. In the PSD logo, the three arrows represent freedom, equality and solidarity a traditional social democratic motto, with its roots in the French Revolution.