Censitário

Censitário is a Portuguese term used to describe systems, practices, or people related to the census, especially in the context of political rights and electoral rules. In political science, the word is commonly associated with census-based suffrage, or suffrage censitário, where the right to vote is limited to individuals who meet criteria derived from a census, such as property ownership, tax status, or income.

Historically, censitary suffrage was a feature of many 19th-century constitutional regimes and persisted in various places into the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It created an electoral franchise that could be substantial in size but still excluded broad segments of the population, including the poor, landless workers, and often women. The size and composition of the eligible electorate depended on the thresholds established by the census and the prevailing property and tax laws.

In practice, the census acted as the gatekeeper of political participation: eligibility was defined by quantifiable criteria registered in the census, and changes to the franchise required constitutional or legislative reforms. The term is primarily found in historical or scholarly discussions of electoral systems rather than in contemporary political discourse.

Etymology and usage: the term derives from censo, meaning census, with the adjectival form censitário used to describe connections to census-based criteria or the class of voters defined by such criteria.