When Russia invaded Ukraine, there were heroic Portuguese who filled their cars with bottles of water, blankets and canned goods and tore through Europe to help the Ukrainian refugees. With every war, flood, earthquake or forest fire, there is an epic gesture, a humanistic decision, a benevolent action. A television camera.
But the Portuguese are one of the least generous people (World Giving Index, 2023) and with the least collective sense in Europe (Eurobarometer, OECD). There is an arrhythmia between our public perception of a country focused on others and the statistics that demonstrate that we are a country of people focused on themselves.
