Taking as its starting point the changes in the regulation and organization processes of such fields as curriculum, school provision, teacher training and recruitment, school management and financial resources and socio-educational partnership, this paper de scribes the recent evolution of the Portuguese educational system (at both primary and secondary level). This analysis is centered on the concept of "institutional regulation", understood as the intervention of public authorities to produce "rules" and "constraints" either on the market or in the social action. Thus, the main goal is to use the regulation mode evolution to analyze the recent changes that have affected the Portuguese educational system, highlighting the coexistence of political measures that reinforce school autonomy and of new forms of control and school inequality. The meaning of these political measures will also be analyzed within context of the global changes of the regulation modes in education that are taking place in several countries, which promote a redefinition of the role of the "State as Educator" and the emergence of a "market regulation".
Regulation of education; Educational policies; Portuguese educational reforms