Head of the University of Lisbon Speaks Out Against Austerity

Chris here.  Meanwhile in Portugal, the Constitutional Tribunal's ruling that the 2013 state budget contained 1.3 billion Euros of unconstitutional cuts to public employees, unemployed people, and pensioners.  In response, the Minister of Finance has frozen "non-basic" spending, which includes education. The photo was taken at a protest in March 2012. The sign reads, "If education were a bank, it would be rescued."

In response, the Rector of the Universidade de Lisboa, António Sampaio da Nóvoa, issued a statement condemning the "intolerable measures" and promising resistance. H/t to Ruth Wilson Gilmore, who also provides the translation below.


"Closing the country does not resolve the country's problems"

1. In an order from the Minister of Finance, dated 8 April 2013, the Government decided to close the country and impede the functioning of public institutions: ministries, local administrative units, universities, etc. The order is a form of reaction against the Constitutional Tribunal's decision, as is explained early in the first sentence. The Government adopts the policy of "the worse, the better". In a restrictive and difficult situation, whoever has been trying to secure normal institutional functions feels tricked by this blind measure that is against the country's interests.

2. We all know that we are in the midst of an extremely grave crisis. But it is precisely such situations that require clarity in policies and direction - economizing as much as possible, but searching, to the extent possible, for ways that institutions continue to function without major disruptions. The Minister of Finance's order produces the opposite effect, hurling disruption and chaos with no practical result.

3. It is an unwise and unacceptable gesture, that doesn't resolve any problem and that seriously endangers the future of Portugal and its institutions. The Government uses the worst authority to suspend the State of Rights and install a State of exception. Taken literally, the Minister of Finance blocks the simplest expenses, no matter their purpose. Just three examples among thousands. We are forbidden to obtain ordinary things for our laboratories, food for our cafeterias, or paper for our students' diplomas. Is this the way Portugal's problems are solved?

4. In the case of the university, there are also important engagements involved -- particularly international and research projects that will be blocked, without any savings for the State, but with enormous damage on the institutional, scientific, and financial level.

At the University of Lisbon we will know how to rise to this occasion and resist intolerable measures that have neither compass nor destination, and are absurd. There is no worse policy than the policy of the worst.

Lisbon, 9 April, 2013
António Sampaio da Nóvoa
Rector, University of Lisbon