Working for Vargas: Secret Agents, Spies and Whistleblowers in the Estado Novo

Abstract

We intend to elucidate the forms of recruitment, formation and involvement of the individuals who worked in the secret service during Estado Novo. We consider this service, put into practice by the political police, as the HUMINT, and start with the acronym MICE (money, ideology, compromise, ego), proposed by analysts of this field, in order to ascertain the possible motivations for citizens to take up the repressive demand of the State.