This book is a contribution to European comparative history involving Portugal and Slovakia, but also the larger geographic units of Iberia and Slavic Central Europe. While developments in Portugal and Slovakia predominate, Spain, the Czech lands, and other regions are discussed as well. The subjects investigated include the position of women and the activities of messianic thinkers in the seventeenth century as well as semi-fascist Catholic political movements in the twentieth century. The authors look at the subject matter from the viewpoint of politics, social phenomena, and culture. The cultural dimension includes religion and ideology, both of which have clearly been of critical importance in Portuguese and Slovak history. It also includes problems of ethno-linguistic and national identity and the more recent phenomenon of multiculturalism, whose social promotion is controversial and uncertain.