The COVID-19 Pandemic and the State of Emergency: Lessons from Portugal

Abstract

The present chapter analyses the normative response of Portugal to the coronavirus crisis. As in other European Member States, the reaction to the pandemic was developed through a combination of enactment of the constitutional state of emergency, in the first and third phases, with the resort to the statutory administrative emergency regime. Under both frameworks, there has been a strengthening of the role of the executive at the expense of a parliamentary retreat. This chapter covers both responses to the pandemic and their shortcomings mainly concerning the lack of democratic legitimation of the fight against the pandemic in the face of a parliamentary circumvention and abdication.

Keywords: state of emergency, constitutional exception, constitutional emergency, administrative emergency, separation of powers, fundamental rights’ restrictions