ABSTRACTThe paper analyses the change and continuity in electoral support from the pre‐dictatorship period to the years following 1974. It analyses the geography of the election results both by region and by type of area, and it also examines the results of a pre‐election opinion survey in 1981 which categorized voters by age, sex, level of education, and social class. It considers the extent to which the recent support given to the Socialists parallels that of the old Centre Union party in 1963 and 1964, and it also examines a similar continuity in voting for the main right‐wing party. It concludes that there are notable parallels, though it also highlights the exceptional uniformity of recent Socialist su