Portugal's Prime Minister Jose Socrates has suffered a severe defeat in parliamentary elections on Sunday, 5^th of June after six years in power. The Socialists were beaten by the right the Social Democratic Party head (PSD, center right) Pedro Passos Coelho, who will form the next government, with the support of the right wing Christian Democrats party, the CDS-PP, to hold an overwhelming majority in the Parliament.The forth anf the fifth forces more voted were the Communist Party and the Left Bloc, correspondingly. The left Bloc has seen a decrease of the percentage obtained in previous elections, but F. Louca, the party coordinator promised to fight side by side with people for a social state and a better future despite the current crisis and the austerity measures.

All over Europe, in each election, voters are giving a penalty for the governments who have been imposing austerity measures in the last months. However, the newly elected PM, Passos Coelho, who has been a critic of Socrates austerity policy, already announced that s even more drastic reform should come in a close future. He is now supposed to meet the demands of the European Union (EU) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which will concede to Portugal a loan of 78 billion euros over three years to cope the public debt.

More privatization, more austerity, slow or any growth, were already prophesized by the new leaders in this historic turnout for Portugal – a right wing President, a right wing government, a substantial public debt and the progressive destruction of a social state built during forty years of his young democracy.

However, this was not the choice of nearly half of Portuguese population as 41% have not voted. It is not an isolated case, but it reflects a broader phenomenon in Europe. The crisis is being felt by the populations of several countries pursued by poverty and unemployment and the abstention has been a symptom of this condemnation in the different elections: municipal elections in Spain and Italy, legislative in Ireland, regional in German and cantonal in France.

The harsh economical and social crisis is also showing a deep crisis of representative democracy, the societies are suffering from a lack of support and trust in the dominant political classes and people’s, especially the young ones, answer with indifference to the current political leaders, but, on the other hand, they reaffirm their will of change with movements against precariousness that spread all around Europe.