Political Background
The national and regional governments are dominated by two political parties, the PS, a Social Democratic party, that resembles the British Labour or the German SPD, and the PSD, a conservative party, member of the European People's Party, that have similar base politics in some themes: both are Pro-Europe and support the market economy. Other parties with seats in the parliament are the Portuguese Communist Party, the People's Party, the Left Bloc and the Green Party. The Communists and the Greens are in coalition as the Unitarian Democratic Coalition.
As of 2011, Pedro Passos Coelho is the prime minister for the liberal conservatives Social Democratic Party in coalition with the right-wing conservative People's Party. The coalition is supported by a majority in the Parliament of 132 MPs. The major opposition party is now the Socialist Party (the party of the former Prime-Minister José Sócrates) with 74 MPs. Other represented parties are the Portuguese Communist Party (16 MPs), the Green Party (2MPs) and the Left Bloc (8MPs) all to the left of the governing coalition.
Read more about this topic: Politics Of Portugal
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