Freedom of the press in Portugal: José Agostinho de Macedo

Abstract

After the Liberal Revolution (1820) and the first Portuguese law concerning the freedom of the press, José Agostinho de Macedo (1761-1831) was the strongest voice of the reaction against the proliferation of newspapers, the freedom of the press and the Portuguese party press. He has stated that Portuguese party newspapers from the beginnings of the 19th century had quality problems, offended people, were exaggerated in their political criticism, offered unrealistic solutions for the country’s problems and divided the Portuguese people. So, we can say that Macedo, the first Portuguese journalism critic, has identified some of the problems that made Portuguese journalism change and became, in the second half of the 19th century, an industry that produces more news and less political polemics.