In an interview, José Cardoso, the leader of a left-wing party positioned to the left of the Liberal Initiative, argued that education needs to be rethought, emphasizing a focus on students, adaptability to skill development, and relevance to today’s world.
Cardoso advocates for a shift in the state’s interventionist role, stating, “Society today is very complex. The state must assume a position of public policy, acting as an efficient regulator rather than an interventionist.”
He provided examples of sectors where the state primarily regulates rather than intervenes. “There are areas where the state practically no longer intervenes, it only regulates. Take notaries and telecommunications; today when you order fiber for your house, you don’t expect the state to show up to install it, and you’re happy with that,” he said.
José Cardoso positions his party, the PLS, as an opponent to the bipolar political system dominated by PSD and PS. He claims that these parties functioned as stabilizers of democracy in the first 20 years following the April 25th revolution but have ceased to reform Portuguese society over the past 20 to 30 years.
“We are getting poorer; my father’s generation still created wealth, my generation survives by selling off our assets, and the children of my generation have emigrated,” he remarked.
