tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/podemos-13452/articlesPodemos – The Conversation2023-11-23T09:56:46Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2181052023-11-23T09:56:46Z2023-11-23T09:56:46ZEurope’s radical right has made challenging Brussels a winning formula – so why hasn’t the radical left made the same gains?<p>With roughly six months to go, the radical right looks set to make <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/european-election-2024-polls-right-wing-big-gains/">significant gains</a> in the 2024 European elections. The biggest share of votes is still likely to go to parties of the centre-right, but many of these have lately <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/ef22522b-95fe-4834-bb02-162a279a7214">veered rightward</a>, too.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, <a href="https://left.eu/">the European parliament’s radical left group</a> is failing to make meaningful headway among voters looking for an alternative. It is predicted to increase its number of seats in the 2024 elections, but will remain the smallest group in the parliament.</p>
<p>Radical left parties did experience something of a surge during the eurozone crisis of the 2010s. Parties such as Syriza (from Greece), Podemos (from Spain) and the Left Bloc (from Portugal) rose to prominence in the countries most affected by the crisis. </p>
<p>They capitalised on <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-5965.2012.02299.x">popular dissatisfaction</a> with mainstream parties and the EU establishment, which was enforcing austerity in member states. This also translated into gains in the 2014 European elections, when <a href="https://left.eu/about-the-group/">the Left group</a> increased its number of MEPs by 50%. </p>
<p>But these electoral breakthroughs did not put an end to austerity, even in Greece, the one country where the radical left managed to come first in elections. In July 2015, after merely six months in power, Greece’s Syriza-led government agreed to further austerity and privatisation in exchange for a fresh bailout from international creditors.</p>
<p>The radical left failed to significantly challenge the EU’s “embedded neoliberalism”. Instead, in the years since, and with the new crises engulfing Europe (COVID, cost of living, war), <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/10/06/populists-in-europe-especially-those-on-the-right-have-increased-their-vote-shares-in-recent-elections/">the radical right</a> has been the main beneficiary of the anti-establishment mood.</p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-39151-4">My recent book</a> argues that if the radical left has not managed to provide a strong alternative to the neoliberal status quo in an era when people continue to seek such alternatives, it is in part because of its limited cohesion and coordination at transnational level. Several factors help explain this puzzle. </p>
<h2>A radical left paradox</h2>
<p>At least on paper, the radical left is the most internationalist party family in the European parliament. Its very existence stems from the understanding that capitalism is an international system that cannot be defeated on a national basis alone. </p>
<p>Paradoxically, though, the radical left has never been great at transnational party cooperation at EU level. It faced <a href="https://discovery.dundee.ac.uk/en/publications/contesting-capitalism-left-parties-and-european-integration">bigger challenges than others</a> in establishing and maintaining a group in the European parliament, which remains a rather <a href="https://hira.hope.ac.uk/id/eprint/1759/">heterogeneous organisation</a>. </p>
<p>Given the transnational character of the eurozone crisis and its austerity-centred management, the radical left had the opportunity to improve its underwhelming transnational cooperation. By focusing on parties from three of the countries <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13608746.2014.947700">most affected by the crisis</a> – Greece, Portugal and Spain – we can see why that opportunity was missed.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/EA2D54BEC7B58F69B78446940671710D/S0898030600000749a.pdf/the-party-of-european-socialists-networking-europes-social-democrats.pdf">preeminence of domestic over European politics</a> hinders transnational party cooperation in general, but particularly on the radical left. As parties struggle to be electorally relevant in the domestic arena, they pay less attention to European politics. </p>
<p>In turn, they have less influence over EU policymaking, which reinforces the prioritisation of domestic politics. As one of my interviewees bluntly put it: “When it comes to the moment of truth, each one is with their own electorate”. </p>
<p>The widely noted <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1467-9256.2005.00224.x">lack of a European “demos”</a>, or shared political identity, also disproportionately hampers the radical left at the EU level. Radical left parties rely more on <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13608746.2012.758447">mass mobilisation</a> than other parties. During the crisis, they allied themselves with the anti-austerity mass movements in their countries and capitalised electorally on that linkage. </p>
<p>But that kind of mobilisation was very limited at transnational level. As another interviewee remarked: “I don’t think that there is European workers’ solidarity and I think it’s becoming more and more difficult to build one.”</p>
<p>At the same time, radical left parties have been doing relatively little to facilitate such solidarity. They limit their transnational cooperation to party elites and EU institutions – the very establishment they often purport to challenge.</p>
<p>If, on a domestic level, radical left parties have understood that only by drawing on mass movements can they become credible alternatives to mainstream parties, they have failed to employ this protest strategy at a European level.</p>
<h2>Disagreements over direction</h2>
<p>Parties of the <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781315464015-10/opposing-europe-opposing-austerity-dan-keith">radical left</a> have long been divided over the EU. Some advocate EU reform while others want a complete break from Brussels. </p>
<p>These fractures only deepened during the financial crisis of the 2010s. Tensions were particularly high in the aftermath of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13608746.2016.1208906">Syriza’s U-turn in government</a>, which further entrenched the position of hard eurosceptics that leftwing policies are incompatible with the EU’s institutional architecture.</p>
<p>That cleavage also widened as <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jcms.13313">a new position emerged</a> among parties such as the Portuguese Left Bloc and La France Insoumise. They call for neither reform nor exit from the EU but “disobedience” towards the neoliberal aspects of EU legislation – such as the general prohibition on <a href="https://jacobin.com/2018/05/corbyn-labour-eu-single-market-economic-policy">state aid</a> – that would prevent the implementation of leftwing policies.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-fox-in-the-chicken-coop-how-the-far-right-is-playing-the-european-parliament-193136">The fox in the chicken coop: how the far right is playing the European Parliament</a>
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<p>This divergence was seen in the <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/eu-elections-2019/news/varoufakis-there-is-no-real-european-left-i-am-running-against-them/">European elections of 2019</a>, when the radical left stood competing lists of candidates in several member states. This is likely to occur again in 2024.</p>
<p>If anything, the radical left’s lack of cohesion has been exacerbated by recent developments, such as the war in <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/04/03/russia-s-invasion-of-ukraine-leaves-eu-s-left-fractured_6021575_4.html">Ukraine</a>. Some parties want to provide unconditional support to Ukraine while others “critically” defend Russia’s position. Others support neither side in what they see as a fundamentally <a href="https://isj.org.uk/anti-imperialism-a-reply-to-achcar/">“inter-imperialist conflict”</a>.</p>
<p>While the more structural factors are hard to overcome, the ideological differences at play might not be fundamental enough to justify the current level of fragmentation on the radical left. Ideally, differences could be played out within a common transnational project that would coalesce the parties around a shared vision for Europe. In the absence of that, it’s likely that voters disillusioned with the status quo will be lured away by rightwing populism instead.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218105/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vladimir Bortun does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Europe’s radical right and radical left share a distaste for the status quo – but while one turns disquiet into votes, the other fails to make an impact.Vladimir Bortun, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1159622019-04-29T09:44:59Z2019-04-29T09:44:59ZSpanish election: victory for Socialists as VOX surge fragments right-wing vote<p>Spain’s left-wing parties have beaten the right in the country’s most polarised <a href="https://theconversation.com/elecciones-generales-en-espana-el-ganador-el-perdedor-y-la-sorpresa-116147">election</a> in decades. With the Socialist party (PSOE) winning 123 of the national parliament’s 350 seats, and far left Unidas Podemos winning 42, the statewide left combined to take 165 seats.</p>
<p>This trumped the 147 seats secured by the three right-wing parties combined. The Conservative party (PP) took 66 seats, centre right challenger Ciudadanos (Citizens) 57, and the far right Vox 24. The remaining 38 seats went to an array of regionally-based parties across the left-right spectrum. </p>
<h2>Sánchez remains in charge</h2>
<p>The result is a huge victory for Socialist leader <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/pedro-sanchez-25607">Pedro Sánchez</a> and a historic defeat for the Conservatives. The ball is now firmly in Sánchez’s court. With the left still falling short of the absolute majority of 176 seats needed in Spain’s 350-seat parliament, Sánchez will need to secure pacts with smaller parties to secure his investiture and make it possible for the Socialist party to govern.</p>
<p>The big question is whether Sánchez will be able to form a viable, stable government with <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/podemos-13452">Unidas Podemos</a> and an array of regionally-based parties without the need for the Catalan separatist parties. It was the Catalan parties who triggered these elections in the first place. When Sánchez would not meet their demands for dialogue on Catalan self-determination, they voted against his 2019 budget in parliament, bringing the government down and forcing a vote. </p>
<p>Assuming the support of Unidas Podemos, the PSOE still needs 11 more seats to reach the minimum of 176 needed for Sánchez to win a first-round investiture vote, unless there are some abstentions. The Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) is likely to play ball with its six seats and so too are a couple of small parties in other regions with one or two seats each. But the numbers still don’t quite add up without at least one of the Catalan pro-independence parties, unless Sánchez gets the radical Basque pro-independence party Bildu on side. </p>
<p>A second-round investiture vote only needs a simple majority if it comes to that, but governing effectively thereafter will not be easy without a strong majority. News emerging from Spain in the hours after the vote suggested the PSOE will try to govern alone rather than entering into a formal coalition, which leaves open the door to shifting alliances depending on the legislation once Sánchez’s investiture is secured.</p>
<p>While the maths actually favours a centrist PSOE-Ciudadanos coalition (180 seats), PSOE voters shouting “not with Rivera” outside the party headquarters on election night made it clear they would consider any such pact a betrayal. So would many Ciudadanos voters.</p>
<p>Their leader, Albert Rivera, explicitly vetoed the possibility of any such pact ahead of the election, due to the parties’ contrasting visions on how to deal with the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/catalonia-3828">Catalan crisis</a>. Many will have voted for Ciudadanos instead of another right-wing party due to this cordon sanitaire, and Rivera currently looks set to stick to it. His first post-election declarations suggest he intends to continue challenging the PP for the leadership of the right, from the opposition. With 15.9% of the vote, Ciudadanos came very close to the PP’s mere 16.7%. </p>
<h2>Vox enters parliament</h2>
<p>While the right has declined overall compared to the 2016 elections, it has also fragmented. New far right party <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/vox-64134">Vox</a> has entered the national parliament for the first time, stealing seats primarily from the Conservatives.</p>
<p>With the emergence of this far right challenger in recent months, Spanish nationalism has resurfaced to a degree few would ever have anticipated just a year ago. Vox also pulled the Conservatives and Ciudadanos further to the right as each sought to become the lead party in the right-wing space.</p>
<p>What first sparked the resurgence of right-wing Spanish nationalism was the Catalan independence crisis. Vox argued it would clamp down on the pro-independence movements once and for all, by taking over the regional government and recentralising the Spanish state.</p>
<p>Yet it soon became clear the left-right split was about much more than Catalonia. The revival of Spanish nationalism has gone hand in hand with a resurgence of traditional Spanish right-wing social conservatism. Vox not only targets Catalan separatists and illegal immigrants, but also <a href="https://theconversation.com/spanish-election-right-wing-parties-want-to-restrict-abortion-and-ban-feminist-groups-115935">women’s</a> and LGBT rights. </p>
<p>The extreme right is not, in fact, new to politics in democratic Spain. The traditional conservative PP party has always embraced the full spectrum of right-wing sensibilities, from the moderate right through to the extreme right. Many of those who voted for Vox come from the far right of the PP, having become disillusioned with the latter.</p>
<h2>What next?</h2>
<p>The left has clearly won this vote, but if Sánchez does not quickly secure the necessary support for his investiture, Spain could be faced with weeks or months of yet more political wrangling and paralysis. With regional elections just around the corner in late May, tactical behaviour is set to continue.</p>
<p>Much will also depend on how the weakened and fragmented right composes itself, and how, in particular, the PP will attempt to reinvent itself after its losses. </p>
<p>Of course, as long as Spain remains mired in these domestic dilemmas, any aspirations it may have to play a greater role on the European or global stage will remain frustrated. Some of Spain’s top political analysts have expressed their exasperation at the almost complete absence of Spain’s role in the EU and beyond from any of the electoral debates and discussions, even with European elections just around the corner and at a time of unprecedented challenges to the EU project. </p>
<p>There is a lot hanging on whether the country can better navigate the new reality of parliamentary fragmentation this time around to make progress, within its own borders and beyond.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/115962/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Caroline Gray has received funding in the past from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) of the UK.</span></em></p>Sánchez seeks to build alliances but not a formal coalition as the Socialists win but fall short of an absolute majority.Caroline Gray, Lecturer in Politics and Spanish, Aston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1074572018-11-22T16:31:08Z2018-11-22T16:31:08ZWhat is populism – and why is it so hard to define?<p>We live in a moment in which the word <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/series/the-new-populism">“populism”</a> is never far from the lips of politicians (although oh so rarely of the populist politicians themselves). We hear the word repeated over and over, but once we try to get a handle on what it actually means, confusion abounds. There are a few good reasons for this difficulty of understanding but, at the same time, the burgeoning academic community writing on populism has increasingly forged a consensus around at least the core features of the concept.</p>
<p>The first reason for the conceptual confusion is that words don’t neatly map onto their referents. There is a struggle over the meaning of key political terms and the predominant use of populism in politics and the media is derogatory. Established politicians and journalists dismiss populism as an aberrant infant intruding into and disrupting political normality.</p>
<p>Because populists don’t understand politics, according to this establishment view, the populist intrusion will be temporary. Voters will inevitably return to their senses and see through the seductive but hollow musings of this infantile intruder. This is why the signifier “populism” tends to be used by establishment figures – such as former British prime minister <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/tony-blair-6417">Tony Blair</a> and former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg. And what they intend to signify by that word is that the public should reject populism. They are the anti-populists but, again, you don’t tend to hear those accused of being populist – <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/nigel-farage-5524">Nigel Farage</a> or Donald Trump, for instance – labelling themselves as such.</p>
<p>Invoking Blair and Clegg brings us to the second reason for populism’s conceptual confusion. Historically, populism has not been a permanent political phenomenon. It comes in waves. It disappears and reappears, usually coinciding with crisis (whether real or declared). What matters is the people have to feel that crisis, have to recognise that the crisis designated by the interloping populist performer is upon us. And this time the crisis is also a crisis of the worldview that the likes of Blair and Clegg brought into being. When in power, Blair regularly likened the version of globalisation New Labour fostered as a force of nature. As sure as night follows day, globalisation was upon us, and the only valid response was to find a way to work within this unstoppable force.</p>
<p>Nationalism began to rise in Europe several decades back. It came in response to the establishment, consolidation and growth of the EU, and the decline of the continent encapsulated by decolonisation and the end of empires. Initially it was a trickle, but it grew inexorably throughout this century. Populists began to rail against postnational institutions such as the EU and UN and against international treaties that attempt to bind all nations (relating to climate change and other environmental factors). Globalisation no longer seems quite as inevitable as Blair claimed.</p>
<h2>Rejecting the ‘elites’</h2>
<p>In this shift from Blair’s globalisation to the reassertion of nationalism, something happened to the people. This is one of the most heavily contested concepts in politics, but under the calm of Blair’s rule, the people were viewed as one – both rulers and ruled got along with one another. Blair was declared the “man of the people” and he thought his popularity resulted from his being “a normal guy”. This is not how populists treat the people. For populists, the seamless harmony between the people and their rulers no longer holds. The people have been betrayed. A gulf has opened up between the people and the elites. Instead of unity, they have entered a conflictual relationship.</p>
<p>And it is this understanding of populism – the people pitched against elites – that has now become widespread among the academic community. But this is a somewhat limited or minimal presentation of what populism is, and once academics start expanding on it, they quickly start to disagree.</p>
<p>The most contentious issue is over whether populism is an ideology as Cas Mudde, the most quoted commentator on contemporary populism <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/populism-a-very-short-introduction-9780190234874?cc=gb&lang=en&">claims</a>. This would align populism with other political ideologies, such as liberalism, socialism and conservatism.</p>
<p>Yet liberalism has core identifiable features – the centrality of the individual (and not the people), human rights, the separation (and limitation) of <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/liberalism-a-very-short-introduction-9780199670437?q=liberalism%20a%20very%20short%20introduction&lang=en&cc=gb">powers</a>. Populism does not have these.</p>
<p>Moffitt <a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=25175">suggests</a> populism is better understood as a style. It’s a manner or practice of doing politics. You identify (or declare) a crisis, invoke the people against elites, and so on. And because it is more of a style of politics than an ideology with content, there are several variants of it, most notably of the left and right. Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain are perhaps the most obvious left variants emerging in the aftermath of 2008 – although both Corbynism (far more than Jeremy Corbyn himself) and Bernie Saunders share certain affinities.</p>
<p>It is the right, however, especially in Europe and now the US under Trump, that is very much in the ascendancy. The right has proved highly effective at mobilising the national people against not only “the swamp” in Washington or Brussels, but also against those these elites are deemed to represent and protect: migrants primarily, but also other minority interests.</p>
<p>This is the final complicating factor about populism: alongside the people and the elites, there is a third group against which populists will direct their ire – migrants usually for the right; financial elites for the left. The success of right populists mobilising against the dual combination of Brussels elites and migrants (or minorities) explains why Viktor Orban is in power in Hungary, Matteo Salvini in Italy, and European politics continues to be profoundly influenced by Farage, Marine Le Pen, Geert Wilders – and plenty more besides.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/107457/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andy Knott does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>It’s a slippery concept but academics have reached agreement on some of its fundamental elements.Andy Knott, Senior Lecturer, School of Humanities, University of Brighton, University of BrightonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/975642018-06-01T10:11:49Z2018-06-01T10:11:49ZSpain’s prime minister loses no-confidence vote: what next?<p>Mariano Rajoy, the Spanish prime minister, has been forced to resign by his national parliament, which voted by 180 seats to 169 in favour of a motion of no-confidence in his leadership. The vote indicates that the Spanish electorate’s patience with corruption is at an end – and puts the country on an uncertain path at an already difficult moment.</p>
<p>Rajoy had already survived one vote of no confidence, which was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/01/podemos-press-no-confidence-vote-mariano-rajoy-spain">tabled in May 2017</a> by left-wing opposition party Podemos, over the numerous corruption scandals tainting Rajoy’s ruling Popular Party (PP). Rajoy survived the vote largely because no-confidence votes in Spain are “constructive”, meaning confidence in the prime minister can only be withdrawn if there is an absolute majority in favour of a successor – and Podemos’s leader, Pablo Iglesias, was not seen as a viable alternative. </p>
<p>But even though that move failed, Rajoy was too unpopular to be safe. And had this latest vote of no confidence failed, his sheer unpopularity meant he would most likely have faced a third one.</p>
<h2>Caught out</h2>
<p>The latest no-confidence vote was called by Pedro Sánchez, the leader of the Socialist Party. He tabled it following a long-awaited verdict in the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-44247770">Gurtel corruption case</a>, which involved high-ranking members of the PP. The verdict was damning: Spain’s National Court ruled that the PP had profited from funds obtained illegally through “an authentic and efficient system of institutional corruption”. </p>
<p>The PP’s former treasurer, Luis Barcenas, received a 33-year jail sentence after being convicted of taking bribes, money-laundering and tax crimes. Another 29 officials and businessmen were also convicted of securing bribes for municipal contracts. The businessman at the heart of the corruption scandal, Francisco Correa, was sentenced to 51 years in prison.</p>
<p>Even more damming for Rajoy personally was that his own testimony was called into question. Judges <a href="https://elpais.com/elpais/2018/05/24/inenglish/1527173372_872035.html">wrote</a> that what he told the court “does not seem plausible enough to refute the solid existing evidence” about the party’s slush fund.</p>
<p>Spaniards were once happy to turn a blind eye to corruption; it seemed a normal part of both daily and political life. But things have changed. In 2011, they didn’t even rank corruption and fraud as one of Spain’s top seven problems – but according to <a href="http://www.cis.es/cis/opencm/EN/11_barometros/index.jsp">monthly opinion poll barometers</a>, since 2013, they now regularly identify it as the second most pressing issue after unemployment.</p>
<p>Rajoy’s popularity has long been slipping in the <a href="http://metroscopia.org/barometro-electoral-enero-2018/">polls</a>. In January 2018, his approval dipped to 27%. Albert Rivera, leader of the centre-right Ciudadanos was at that time polling at 54% and Sánchez 33%. Even among his own voters, Rajoy’s approval rating stood at 73%, lower than Rivera’s 81%.</p>
<p>The vote of no confidence was therefore a perfect opportunity for rival parties to jostle for position. </p>
<h2>How the vote was won</h2>
<p>To pass, Sánchez’s no-confidence motion needed to muster an absolute majority of 176 votes, but Socialist Party only holds 84 seats. Early on in the process, Pedro Sánchez managed to secure the support of Podemos, bringing along a further 67 seats; the left-wing Republican Catalan party (ERC) also agreed to support the no-confidence vote with its nine votes – while other smaller nationalist formations Compromís (four seats) and Nueva Canarias (one seat) also lent their support. This brought the no-confidence total to 165.</p>
<p>On the other side were the PP’s 134 seats. Ciudadanos, with its 32 seats, refused to vote Sánchez’s motion, but would have supported a different motion that would put in place a technocrat government to immediately call new elections. Also against were smaller groups traditionally allied with the PP, such as the UPN (two seats) and Foro Asturias (one seat). This took the final vote against the motion to 169. Suprisingly, Coalición Canaria (one seat), normally a PP ally, decided to abstain. </p>
<p>As is often the case in Spain’s parliament, the balance of power was left in the hands of the small nationalist parties. In this case, the three decisive blocs were the National Basque Party (PNV, five seats), the left-wing, nationalist Basque Eh Bildu (two seats) and the Catalan European Democratic Party (PDeCAT, eight seats).</p>
<p>The PNV was keen to avoid an early elections given that the most likely victor would be Ciudadanos, which has pursued a hard line against Catalan separatism and suggested rolling back some of the financial powers enjoyed by the Basque Country. It’s also anxious to safeguard the recently approved budget, which allocates €540m for infrastructure investment in the Basque Country. </p>
<p>But once other nationalist parties supported the no-confidence vote, the pressure on the PNV simply became too intense. The fact that Podemos had announced it would present another no-confidence vote if the Socialist initiative had failed, which in turn would have raised the prospect of an election, only added to the pressure.</p>
<p>The PDeCAT decided to support the motion after hearing Sánchez’s speech in the plenary, in which much was made of the desire to open a dialogue with the Catalan Government. Eh Bildu supported the desire to remove Rajoy but were not convinced Pedro Sánchez represents the necessary break with the current political regime. Ultimately they justified their support of the motion as a rejection of the PP rather than a vote for the Socialists. </p>
<h2>Now what?</h2>
<p>Spanish citizens are <a href="http://www.cis.es/cis/opencm/EN/1_encuestas/estudios/ver.jsp?estudio=14387">increasingly impatient</a> with the current political situation – and this parliamentary vote will only pile on more pressure. Yet the range of possible electoral outcomes does not present easy solutions to the current problems facing Spain – in particular, the Catalan question. </p>
<p>Ciudadanos might be the most popular political formation at the moment, but if it came to power it would immediately come up against the hostility of the Basque and Catalan nationalists. And even if the Socialists won an election – unlikely at the moment – they would still have to contend with the Catalan question. Since they’ve largely supported the PP’s approach since the independence referendum, that wouldn’t be easy. Rajoy might have been toppled, but there’s no easy road ahead for any party.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/97564/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Georgina Blakeley has previously received funding from the British Academy and Santander. </span></em></p>Leader of a corrupt party, an unpopular government and a divided country, Mariano Rajoy’s days were numbered long ago.Georgina Blakeley, Senior Lecturer in Politics, The Open UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/943092018-04-04T19:13:28Z2018-04-04T19:13:28ZItaly’s Five Star Movement: Looking at an ‘unclassifiable’ political force from a marketing perspective<p>The March 4 Italian elections were marked by the breakthrough of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/05/five-star-leader-open-to-coalition-talks-despite-founders-warning">Five Star Movement</a>, which was the leading party with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2018/mar/05/italian-elections-2018-full-results-renzi-berlusconi">32% of the vote</a>. Known as “M5S”, after its name in Italian, the Movimento 5 Stelle, the
party was founded in 2009 by the comedian Beppe Grillo and his fans. For many national and international observers, it’s unclassifiable in terms of the traditional left-right conception of political parties. For this reason, it is simultaneously defined as anti-party, anti-system and populist. </p>
<p>However, the M5S is a result of a general feeling coming from Western societies, which are less centred than they were in the past on work and the culture of production, on which the traditional political consensus is based, and are more focused on the culture of consumerism – thus the now-common expression “consumer societies” used by sociologists and marketers. In this regard, the M5S stands apart from many European populist movements because it is above all a fandom, a movement of activists who are mobilised by the messages of a brand-name celebrity from the culture industry: Beppe Grillo.</p>
<h2>Origins and achievements</h2>
<p>The M5S is rooted in Grillo’s blog, <a href="http://www.beppegrillo.it/">beppegrillo.it</a>, which he launched in 2004. In the blog he discussed economic and social issues, but also denounces the failings of the Italian political class. By 2008 the blog had become, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2008/mar/09/blogs">according to <em>The Guardian</em></a>, one of the most influential in the world. </p>
<p>From a marketing point of view, Grillo is a celebrity operating as a commercial brand, with his texts and public following. Since 2004, the comedian’s fans have organised themselves into groups of local activists, “Friends of Beppe Grillo”, who participate in local debates. In 2007 Grillo used the blog to launch a political program. The discussions concerned issues of public interest intended for presentation to the then prime minister, Romano Prodi, so that he would integrate them into the governmental agenda. This did not happen. </p>
<p>During the period 2007–2008, Grillo organized in Bologna and Turin, and streamed live for other Italian cities, two “V-Day” protest rallies. Signatures were collected for peoples’ bills to reform the political class, intended to be presented to public institutions, but once again this was not followed up. The year 2008 saw for the first time the inclusion of civic lists in local elections for Beppe Grillo. On October 4, 2009, M5S was officially established. In 2010, the parties’ activists participated in regional elections – Campania, Emilia-Romagna, Lombardy, Piedmont and Veneto – with promising results.</p>
<p>In the 2013 national elections, and against all the odds, the M5S achieved the same scores as the traditional left-wing and right-wing parties, gaining about 25% of the vote. From 2013 to 2018, the M5S took a position within the opposition in the Italian Parliament, where it denounced acts it claimed were carried out against the interests of the Italian people and in favour of the groups holding power. In 2016, the party won local elections in major cities such as Rome and Turin. In 2018, in the March 4 elections, the M5S became the leading party <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/05/five-star-leader-open-to-coalition-talks-despite-founders-warning">with 32% of the vote</a>, followed by the Partito Democratico, with just 18%.</p>
<figure>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Helena Norberg-Hodge of Local Futures speaks with Beppe Grillo, founder Five-Star Movement (subtitled).</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A populist movement… in a consumer society</h2>
<p>M5S is part of the wave of “populist” parties that have emerged in Europe recently. They range widely across the political spectrum, including the left-wing, anti-austerity <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/12/podemos-pablo-iglesias-spain-re-election-inigo-errejon">Podemos</a> in Spain, the Europhobe <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/09/ukip-group-fails-bid-restore-eu-funding-amid-inquiry">UK Independence Party</a> (UKIP), the extreme-right <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/29/germanys-far-right-afd-leader-margaret-thatcher-is-my-role-model">Alternative for Germany</a> (AfD) and the overtly neo-fascist <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/donald-trump-muslim-ban-greece-neo-nazi-golden-dawn-athens-march-protest-a7555706.html">Golden Dawn</a> in Greece. All these movements appeared in response to crises within the traditional parties.</p>
<p>Yet M5S also has characteristics in common with the party of current French president Emmanuel Macron, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/18/emmanuel-macron-marches-on-majority-french-parliament">La République en Marche</a>, in particular its transversality between left and right. M5S also distinguishes itself through its origins: it was created by the comedian Beppe Grillo, with the support of a digital entrepreneur, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/03/italy-five-star-movement-internet">Gianroberto Casaleggio</a>, and the movement’s fans. </p>
<p>What seems unclassifiable in terms of traditional political alignments has proved to be reasonably consistent with current general feeling within Western society, which is, above all, a consumer society. Moreover, it is not simply by chance while the M5S found it difficult to gain ground among those over 50, it found its support among the young.</p>
<h2>Fandom’s power</h2>
<p>The relationship of Beppe Grillo to his fansin this case – known as “grillini” – and they to each other often plays out through the Internet. Fandoms are the result of mass or popular consumer culture, where media texts, and celebrities in particular play a central role. The fans claim ownership of media content, used in turn for the creation of new content, with the aim of challenging the establishment’s political, economic and financial powers. In this scenario, a large part of the media and news programming acts as a defending wall for the dominant elites, while the Internet is the weapon with which supporters wage their guerrilla war against the system, as they spread counter-information and an alternative vision of life within society. </p>
<p>As a fandom, the M5S has come up against the status quo and the mechanisms that govern it. The M5S subverts the traditional classifications of left and right, while at the same time proposes a universal income for all citizens living below the poverty line and support for small and medium-sized businesses. The Internet – including Grillo’s blog as well as its <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/28/world/europe/italy-election-davide-casaleggio-five-star.html">Rousseau platform</a> – is not only a means of communication, but is also an infrastructure for the movement’s operations, the selection of its candidates, the proposal and discussion of its ideas and the development of its programs. The Internet is the means by which the M5S aims to replace one of the fundamental institutions of modern democracies, representative democracy. Instead, it will be direct democracy, enabled by the Internet.</p>
<p>Therein lies the difference between the M5S and other European “populist” movements. While they may have acquired more fluid forms adapted to contemporary society, they remain linked to political categories and/or the history of the traditional parties. The M5S is pure expression of the power that consumer culture – the brand and its fans – exerts on Western societies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/94309/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gregorio Fuschillo is a member of the Five Star Movement.</span></em></p>While often lumped with other European populist parties, Beppe Grillo’s M5S is a movement of activist fans mobilized by the messages of his “celebrity brand”.Gregorio Fuschillo, Professeur assistant de marketing et de consumer culture « theory », Kedge Business SchoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/866692017-11-03T16:51:04Z2017-11-03T16:51:04ZWhy independence movements in Scotland and elsewhere are tongue-tied over Catalonia<p>Catalonia’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/catalonia-declares-independence-and-spain-enters-uncharted-territory-86489">unilateral declaration of independence</a> already seems so long ago. It’s hard to believe it is only a week since the provocative move by Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont unleashed a chain of events including Madrid resuming direct rule of the region, Puigdemont retreating to Belgium and Spanish premier Mariano Rajoy <a href="https://theconversation.com/catalonia-the-prospect-of-an-election-has-everyone-nervous-86631">calling</a> snap Catalan elections for December. </p>
<p>Whether the ringleaders of the UDI will be allowed to stand is unclear at the time of writing: eight <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/02/spanish-court-question-catalonia-separatists-except-puigdemont">have been jailed</a> by a Madrid court pending an investigation over charges of sedition, rebellion and misuse of public funds. An international arrest warrant has been issued against Puigdemont to extradite him from Brussels. </p>
<p>Leaders of Europe’s other independence and autonomy movements, particularly in Scotland but also in Corsica, Flanders and the Basque Country, are doubtless following every twist and turn. So how are these events likely to impact on their ambitions? </p>
<p>At the outset, it is worth remembering these separatist surges tend to have roots in common. They are often less about nationalism for its own sake than part of the anti-establishment insurgency following the <a href="https://theconversation.com/six-charts-that-show-how-much-the-world-has-changed-since-the-2007-08-financial-crisis-83477">financial crash of 2007/08</a>. Even though Spain has been caught in a perfect storm that included the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17549970">eurozone crisis</a>, radical and populist parties on the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/31/podemos-revolution-radical-academics-changed-european-politics">left</a> and <a href="http://www.euronews.com/2017/05/15/meet-ciudadanos-the-party-dreaming-of-a-spanish-remake-of-macrons-success">right</a>, <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/spain-corruption-pp-rajoy-never-ending-problem-graft-ignacio-gonzalez/">corruption scandals</a> and high youth unemployment, there are sufficient parallels with movements elsewhere to make events in Catalonia seem of much broader importance. </p>
<p>In Scotland, there’s an additional similarity. The rise of the Ciudadanos party in Catalonia was partly due to its anti-independence stance – much like the revival of the Scottish Conservatives under Ruth Davidson. On the other hand, the Basque Country may share all the Spanish context but <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/28/world/europe/spain-catalonia-basque-independence.html">was weary</a> of separatism at the time of the crash after decades of division over the issue. In that part of Spain it was the anti-establishment pro-Madrid Podemos that won the most votes in the last national election.</p>
<h2>Bullets or ballots?</h2>
<p>The non-violent tactics of the Catalan separatists are among the most notable characteristics of the crisis. They contrast sharply, of course, with the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11183574">separatist terrorism</a> in the Basque Country before ETA gave up arms <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/20/basque-separatist-eta-historic-weapons-mariano-rajoy">in 2014</a>. This has probably helped the Catalan separatists to win more sympathetic coverage in the international media. </p>
<p>Puigdemont, a former journalist, is generally considered to have played a subtler and more reasonable game than Rajoy – particularly after the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/03/catalonia-tensions-rise-as-strikes-held-over-police-violence-during-referendum">obstructive actions and violence shown by</a> the Guardia Civil on October 1, the day of the independence referendum. Appealing over the heads of EU leaders, repeatedly making statements in English to the international media, has not been a bad strategy when trust in the political establishment is at an all-time low.</p>
<p>If this is <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/catalan-threat-to-unleash-mass-civil-disobedience-8vgf9w65b">followed by</a> successful use of peaceful mass civil <a href="https://theconversation.com/catalonia-civil-disobedience-and-where-the-secession-movement-goes-now-86425">disobedience</a> in the wake of Spain revoking Catalonia’s autonomy, it could inspire other independence movements. Such tactics were famously effective in the US against racial discrimination <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/nonviolencekey-to-civil-rights-movement/1737280.html">in the 1960s</a>, albeit Catalans neither appear to have the law on their side nor the ability to shame the government to intervene on their behalf. Whether this ultimately means such disobedience would fail, however, is far from certain. </p>
<h2>Europe snub</h2>
<p>The EU presents opportunities and challenges for its minority nations. Like the Catalans, Scotland’s SNP is deeply wedded as a party to the EU – even if some of its supporters <a href="http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/14950013.36__of_SNP_and_Labour_supporters_backed_Brexit__finds_survey/">are not</a>. But with the EU broadly seen to be siding with Spain against the Catalans, it could be increasingly difficult for the party to maintain its current policy. </p>
<p>If the price of independence is for Catalans to be ejected from the EU, for example, where does this leave the SNP strategy of pursuing independence inside the EU? And where does it leave the Flemish nationalists’ aim of increasing the powers of Flanders within Belgium until it is independent?</p>
<p>These fault lines have already been visible since the Catalan UDI. Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon and her government have been <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/nicola-sturgeon-snp-catalonia-the-scottish-nationalists-catalan-dilemma/">careful to</a> call for dialogue rather than for the declaration of independence to be recognised. Perhaps fearful of Spain blocking a potential bid for EU membership by an independent Scotland in years to come, the Scottish government has left it to a group of members of the parliament <a href="http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/msps-call-for-independent-republic-of-catalonia-to-be-recognised-1-4601309">to welcome</a> the declaration instead. Contrast this with the president of the Corsican assembly <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-28/corsican-assembly-president-hails-birth-of-catalan-republic">welcoming</a> the birth of a new republic, for instance. </p>
<p>Meanwhile in Belgium the Flemish nationalist party N-VA, which is part of the ruling coalition, has been put in an awkward position with the arrest warrant. <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-28/belgium-s-nationalists-keep-their-distance-from-catalan-campaign">So far</a>, at a national level, the party line <a href="https://sceptr.net/2017/11/catalaanse-ministers-gevangenis-vlaamse-n-va-ministers-ontzet/">has been that</a> this is a legal, not a political, matter and that it is inappropriate to intervene. In contrast, at a regional level Geert Bourgeois, minister-president of Flanders, has <a href="https://sceptr.net/2017/11/catalaanse-ministers-gevangenis-vlaamse-n-va-ministers-ontzet/">condemned</a> the Spanish government and has been tweeting in opposition to the latest moves by the Spanish courts. </p>
<h2>Events, dear boy</h2>
<p>Overall, the Catalonia crisis may lead to a rise in minority nationalism around Europe in the short-term. But what happens in the longer term is likely to depend on how events in Spain play out. A peaceful and prosperous Republic of Catalonia within the EU would greatly encourage other minority nations to assert themselves – just like the independence of the Baltic states did in the early 1990s. </p>
<p>Equally a descent into chaos would have the opposite effect, as would a decisive victory by pro-Spanish parties in the Catalan election on December 21. In this scenario, the analogy would be the break-up of the former Yugoslavia <a href="https://www.petergeoghegan.com/2014/09/02/what-scotland-can-learn-from-balkanisation/">putting independence movements</a> on the defensive about the dangers of nationalism. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/193203/original/file-20171103-1032-1jv3538.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Forward march!</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/madrid-spain-october-7-2017-manifestation-731383261?src=1wNqzlk6wRxCRjH390l0TQ-1-45">Lord Kuernyus</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A sobering and crushing defeat for Catalan separatists would reinforce the view in the SNP that they should tread carefully. It would perhaps convince the <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/happened-catalonia-happen-scotland-171030134957987.html">Flemish</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/28/world/europe/spain-catalonia-basque-independence.html">Basque</a> separatists that their gradualist approaches are the right ones. </p>
<p>Despite this uncertainty around the lessons from Catalonia, central governments in London, Paris and Madrid will be in no doubt about the challenge facing them. They have to find a way of rebuilding support for their centralised countries while continuing to retrench their welfare states. Whatever happens in Catalonia, that looks like being one of the key conundrums for decades to come.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86669/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>William McDougall does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Barcelona has become the test case for separatists Europe over.William McDougall, Lecturer in Politics, Glasgow Caledonian UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/843542017-09-26T11:49:41Z2017-09-26T11:49:41ZThe world needs a new generation of citizen lobbyists<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187557/original/file-20170926-19571-jl2ly6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=77%2C73%2C2563%2C1695&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/many-hands-air-718475959?src=3feOIDsSyem3EKj33hEL1Q-4-33">pratilop prombud/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Elections aren’t sports events with winners and losers, despite how it is sometimes presented. As our nations grow increasingly polarised and political discourse more toxic, electoral victory – <a href="https://theconversation.com/angela-merkel-wins-a-fourth-term-in-office-but-it-wont-be-an-easy-one-84578">be it in Germany</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/britains-new-political-tribes-need-something-different-from-their-parties-84001">or the UK</a> – delivers no honeymoon period of societal acceptance.</p>
<p>Once upon a time, when communication and access to knowledge were limited, delegating the workings of democracy to elected representatives made sense. But things have changed. Today, a growing number of people not only demand, but also play, a more active role in political life through tiny participatory acts: likes, shares, petition signatures, donations. </p>
<p>Participation now happens with little cost or effort. And it means that a greater number of citizens – who have traditionally not participated – are becoming <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jefffromm/2016/06/22/new-study-finds-social-media-shapes-millennial-political-involvement-and-engagement/#58add29e2618">more politically active</a>, or at least more open to persuasion by those that are. People have also become politically more promiscuous. Today’s digitally-empowered citizens express allegiances to multiple issues, without necessarily adhering to a political organisation. They may support causes that don’t traditionally fit, often without a political motivation.</p>
<p>If citizens are offering up a pluralistic, chaotic input into the political conversation, then there is an urgent need for new forms of participation that can make sense of it. People are disillusioned with traditional politics, but there is also a resurgence of interest in politics. The gap needs to be filled.</p>
<h2>Five Stars</h2>
<p>Mainstream parties are reluctant to innovate, and so this space has been left to two disparate forces which were the first to realise how the internet might affect political participation. On the one hand, we have self-proclaimed “direct democracy” movements from across the political spectrum. They include Italy’s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Star_Movement">Five Star Movement</a>, Germany’s anti-Islam <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pegida">Pegida</a> and the left-wing populist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podemos_(Spanish_political_party)">Podemos</a> in Spain. They aim to capitalise on popular discontent, challenging the structure of representative democracy with direct democracy which establishes new channels of communication with their membership. </p>
<p>On the other hand, we have a new generation of political advocacy groups, including online petition platforms such as <a href="https://front.moveon.org/">MoveOn</a> or <a href="https://secure.avaaz.org/page/en/">Avaaz</a>, as well as the more community-oriented UK-based <a href="https://home.38degrees.org.uk/">38degrees</a> and its European transnational version <a href="https://www.wemove.eu/">WeMove</a>. These have shaped the <a href="https://medium.com/obama-white-house/in-review-the-most-memorable-we-the-people-petitions-2f26797d00c">emerging political space</a> in between elections. In addition, there is a host of experimental initiatives across liberal democracies, including transnational movements like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_of_Europe">Pulse of Europe</a>. </p>
<p>These new players have novelty and potential aplenty, but they struggle to translate their mobilising capacity into meaningful forms of political participation. Technology-enabled experiences of direct democracy haven’t proven to be viable responses to many of society’s challenges. </p>
<p>Too often they distort popular input to match an agenda as you can argue <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/546be098-989f-11e7-a652-cde3f882dd7b">is happening</a> with the Five Star Movement. Online petition platforms, meanwhile, are one-click wonders that may briefly make us feel better about ourselves but fall short on empowerment. They do not mobilise a citizen’s talents, expertise and desire to gain a voice in the policy process. Have you ever gone on to more direct action after signing a petition?</p>
<p>If there’s anything we have learned from recent political events, it is that citizens have a growing desire to contribute to the political debate, and that they deserve the means to do so. <a href="http://assets.cambridge.org/97811070/39261/frontmatter/9781107039261_frontmatter.pdf">Research</a> supports this claim by demonstrating that societies which enable citizens to be assertive and critical of public authorities tend to have governments that are more effective and accountable.</p>
<p>What better way then to render citizens assertive than to turn them into lobbyists? This is the provocative suggestion I make <a href="http://www.iconbooks.com/ib-title/lobbying-for-change/">in my new book</a>.</p>
<h2>Interest groups</h2>
<p>Now, while most people associate lobbying with “bad guys” such as Big Tobacco or powerful financial interests, lobbying can be a powerful force for good. This is illustrated by several successful instances of citizen lobbying in the UK, Europe and around the world. </p>
<p>Think of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Schrems">Max Schrems</a>, the Austrian student who challenged Facebook’s use of private data and won. My own students have got involved too. They petitioned the EU Commission to put to an end to mobile roaming charges in 2012, adding their voice to a growing clamour that eventually <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/unitedkingdom/news/agreement-end-roaming-charges-june-2017_en">forced a change in policy</a>. </p>
<p>A citizen lobbyist taps into the repertoire of techniques generally used by professional lobbyists to promote a cause they care about deeply. It is more than than merely voting, donating, or signing a petition. Here, citizens set the agenda and prompt policymakers to act, or react to a policymaker’s agenda with potential solutions.</p>
<p>A citizen concerned about fracking might go to a protest or campaign meeting, but to think like a lobbyist means filing requests for access to documents to learn government plans, identifying key decision-makers to lobby, and preparing an advocacy plan to counter lobbying from corporate interests. </p>
<p>Citizen lobbying might sound like an oxymoron. Surely lobbyists represent the interests of the few rather than the many? That needn’t be the case. Organised interests, notably corporations, have historically monopolised lobbying, but the same factors which have prompted the rise of direct democracy movements and online petitions mean lobbying itself can be democratised. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Last straw?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/straw-glass-orange-drink-661415743?src=s2L3q0m8nOkulRksgwS91A-3-2">Sergey Granev/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Citizen lobbyists can take full advantage of opportunities for participation: public consultations; administrative complaints; and unconventional forms of campaigning. They can help level the playing field. By challenging the undue influence of special interests, they can help elected representatives to better identify the public interest of the many. We have seen this already on issues like whistle-blower protection or even <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/aug/16/sugar-tax-industry-opponents-launch-campaign-levy-soft-drinks-obesity">soda taxes</a>. Brexit, with its potential effect on millions of people around Europe, looks a prime target for citizen lobbyists of all political stripes.</p>
<p>At its heart, citizen lobbying is not really about giving everyone an equal voice but about delivering a plausible, legitimate form of civic participation that complements rather than antagonises representative democracy. Much of the political engagement we see is about rousing support or driving emotions; lobbying, by contrast, is rooted in practical efforts to meet achievable goals.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84354/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alberto Alemanno ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>At a time when our political future is uncertain, the only way to guarantee change is to do it yourself.Alberto Alemanno, Chair professor of European Union Law, HEC Paris; Global Professor, NYU School of Law; Founder The Good Lobby, HEC Paris Business SchoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/825922017-09-21T02:14:25Z2017-09-21T02:14:25ZIs populism democracy’s deadly cure?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182702/original/file-20170821-17116-1oyq2r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Is populism a poison or a cure for democracy, or both, depending on the circumstances?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Londre_wellcome_institute_boilly_vaccinee.jpg">Louis Boilly/Wikipedia Commons</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>This article is part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/democracy-futures">Democracy Futures</a> project, a <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/democracy-futures/">joint global initiative</a> between The Conversation and <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/">Sydney Democracy Network</a>. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies in the 21st century.</em></p>
<p><em>This piece is part of a series, <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/after-populism-39385">After Populism</a>, about the challenges populism poses for democracy. It comes from a talk at the <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Populism-Symposium-6-April-2017.pdf">Populism: What’s Next for Democracy?</a> symposium hosted by the <a href="http://www.governanceinstitute.edu.au/">Institute for Governance & Policy Analysis</a> at the University of Canberra in collaboration with <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/">Sydney Democracy Network</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>It is impossible to follow the news without catching reference to the rise of populism. A once little-used term that denoted a handful of parties in otherwise unconnected political contexts, populism now seems almost definitive of a political moment in time.</p>
<p>It also elicits a wide range of responses from specialists. The most common reaction is a negative recoil against the emergence of forces that seem to <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-the-unspeakable-and-democracy-in-america-68943">threaten</a> democracy. The emergence of far left and far right political forces seems redolent of the 1930s, and look where that left us.</p>
<p>On the other hand, there are influential figures who argue that there is nothing to be afraid of in populism. Far from it: populism represents an appeal to <a href="https://theconversation.com/populism-and-democracy-dr-jekyll-and-mr-hyde-67421">The People</a>, and on this basis is not just consonant with democracy, but with any kind of politics that seeks universal appeal. </p>
<p>Since political parties seek power, broad, if not universal, appeal is what they crave. Populism on this account is nothing more than “the logic of politics”, assuming politics to be what is of public or collective concern. A non-populist politics is doomed to fail, or to be the preserve of groups or identities who set their face against the <em>demos</em>.</p>
<p>So populism can be defined as something menacing and threatening to democracy, but also as something redemptive, celebratory and expressive of democracy. The question is, which of these two senses is the right one? Which gets closer to the “truth” about populism?</p>
<h2>Populism as democracy’s pharmakon</h2>
<p>In a famous essay on Plato’s Phaedus, Jacques Derrida explores the concept of “<a href="http://www.occt.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/derrida_platos_pharmacy.pdf">pharmakon</a>” as an example of a term with apparently self-contradictory meanings. </p>
<p>Pharmakon, from which we derive the terms pharmacology and pharmacy, denotes a toxic substance used to make someone better, but which might also kill them.</p>
<p>Pharmakon is in this sense both poison and cure. It cannot be one or the other; it is both. Whether it is one or the other depends on dosage, context, receptivity of the body to the toxin, and so forth. In short, pharmakon expresses contingency and possibility, both life and death.</p>
<p>Now think back to what we have just been discussing in relation to populism. Do we really want to say that populism is always and everywhere a threat to democracy, something to be opposed or fearful of? Are there not moments or contexts where an appeal to the people versus corrupt or decadent elites might make sense in terms of saving democracy – from itself?</p>
<p>By contrast, are we really convinced that the appeal to the people is a necessary and constructive feature of politics, indeed something that we cannot avoid? Don’t we want to say, rather, that whether this appeal to the people versus the elites is to be celebrated or not depends on the position of the individual observer or participant in a vortex of political choices?</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182703/original/file-20170821-17116-10xmwen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182703/original/file-20170821-17116-10xmwen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182703/original/file-20170821-17116-10xmwen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182703/original/file-20170821-17116-10xmwen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182703/original/file-20170821-17116-10xmwen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182703/original/file-20170821-17116-10xmwen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182703/original/file-20170821-17116-10xmwen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Though Podemos’s populist message resonated with many on the streets, it has led the party into trouble.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Paolo Di Tommaso/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The emergence of a populist discourse in <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-spanish-political-laboratory-is-reconfiguring-democracy-74874">Spain</a> accompanied a near-complete collapse in faith in the political elites. Millions of people flooded the streets in 2011 to protest against those who were inflicting austerity from the luxury of the presidential palace. </p>
<p>It was a manoeuvre pitched in the midst of well-documented examples of corruption, clientelism and cronyism – not to mention the extraordinary waste of public money on useless megaprojects that seemed to rub the noses of ordinary people in the dirt of their own powerlessness.</p>
<p>So the emergence of the populist <a href="https://theconversation.com/podemos-find-itself-caught-between-the-battle-lines-of-spanish-politics-69771?sa=google&sq=podemos&sr=1">Podemos</a> and its potent message of “yes we [the people] can” chimed. However, it sounded a false note for others: fear of “charisma”, of leader-centred politics, and thus of the snuffing out and rendering irrelevant of the street protesters and micro-initiatives that had fostered the conditions for its creation in the first place. </p>
<p>The celebration of populism “from below” is mixed with an anticipation of <a href="https://theconversation.com/podemos-find-itself-caught-between-the-battle-lines-of-spanish-politics-69771">problems</a> to come – not least the cutting off of “the below” itself in a fanfare of triumphant, mediatised politics.</p>
<p>Consider too the emergence of France’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-emmanuel-macrons-big-gamble-to-save-the-eu-really-pay-off-81980">Emmanuel Macron</a>, centrist saviour of the European project. Through clever semantics he countered the populist charge of Marine Le Pen with a neat populist manoeuvre. </p>
<p>Le Pen was the “parasite” living off the system she criticised, not he. He was the political outsider who had given up on the elites; she was the product of the elites – or least one part of it. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182704/original/file-20170821-17144-cgfcrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182704/original/file-20170821-17144-cgfcrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182704/original/file-20170821-17144-cgfcrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182704/original/file-20170821-17144-cgfcrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182704/original/file-20170821-17144-cgfcrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=670&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182704/original/file-20170821-17144-cgfcrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=670&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182704/original/file-20170821-17144-cgfcrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=670&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Emmanuel Macron as ‘Le Kid’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lorde Shaull/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Macron was the figure untainted by association with the failed political order, while Le Pen reeked of stale battles and a lost France. He embodied France’s future, she its dark and gloomy past. Not a battle royale but a bataille Republican of Pharmaka. </p>
<p>But isn’t all this talk of outsiders and elites a little iffy stemming from someone who made millions as a banker with <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/05/18/emmanuel-macron-is-about-to-face-five-years-of-crazy-conspiracy-theories/">Rothschild</a>? How long before this outsider rhetoric <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/why-does-emmanuel-macrons-presidential-approval-rating-keep-falling/2017/08/19/c48a069a-82a4-11e7-9e7a-20fa8d7a0db6_story.html?utm_term=.51e55e7861b5">collides</a> with the reality of budget cuts and labour market reforms?</p>
<h2>Will it work?</h2>
<p>Accepting the ambivalence of populism and pharmakon, so what? Why does it matter what kind of spin we put on the term?</p>
<p>Contemporary politics has by and large become a politics of reconstituting democracy after the <a href="https://theconversation.com/european-movements-could-mark-the-end-of-representative-politics-42369?sa=google&sq=simon+tormey&sr=4">collapse</a> of the narrative of representation under which we have been living for at least two centuries. We have become less inclined to believe in the benign intentions of our representatives, of politicians. </p>
<p>We have become populists in the sense of seeing elites as disconnected or uncoupled from the people, and thus ourselves.</p>
<p>We seem inclined to believe those who set themselves up as defenders of the people against the elites, no matter how preposterous a gesture that is, and there are few gestures more preposterous than that of a billionaire property developer setting himself up as defender of the people against the elites.</p>
<p>We’re not quite sure what the “cure” entails: the election of the outsider (<a href="https://theconversation.com/donald-trump-both-the-old-crazy-and-the-new-normal-58728?sa=google&sq=coleman+trump&sr=1">Donald Trump</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/progressives-should-accept-corbyns-triumph-its-the-price-of-democracy-66120">Jeremy Corbyn</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/dutch-election-why-geert-wilders-failed-to-destroy-the-mainstream-government-74710?sa=google&sq=wilders&sr=2">Geert Wilders</a>) or the assumption of some non- or post-representative strategy that will reduce, if not eliminate, the distance between the people and political power (<a href="https://theconversation.com/deliberative-democracy-must-rise-to-the-threat-of-populist-rhetoric-76576">deliberative assemblies</a>, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/pablo-mancini/wiki-democracy-begins-in-_b_934331.html">wikidemocracy</a>, <a href="https://blog.liquid.vote/2016/09/21/what-is-liquid-democracy/">liquid democracy</a>). </p>
<p>We’re not sure if the cure, the exuberant outsider, will “work” and make life better, make America “great”, or whether it will kill politics stone dead. </p>
<p>We’re not sure if there is life after representative democracy, or whether some alternative model will work better or fail, leaving our world in tatters. But we are inclined to experimentation as the certainties that have sustained our politics for the past two centuries wither. </p>
<p>We watch the toxin descend with an admixture of hope and fear – populism: democracy’s pharmakon.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82592/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Tormey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>We’re not sure if the cure, the populist outsider, will work and make life better. but we are willing to experiment as the old certainties of representative politics wither.Simon Tormey, Professor of Political Theory and Head of the School of Social and Political Sciences, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/776392017-05-18T14:09:21Z2017-05-18T14:09:21ZSouth African protesters echo a global cry: democracy isn’t making people’s lives better<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169516/original/file-20170516-11966-ti6qia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Kim Ludbrook</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="http://www.sabc.co.za/news/a/69574d004112cc428595f510d2cccae0/ServiceundefineddeliveryundefinedprotestsundefinedspreadundefinedacrossundefinedJoburg-20170905">Recent violent protests in South Africa</a> have refocused attention on the growing number of demonstrations over government failure to provide basic services, such as water and electricity. The country is known as the <a href="http://www.sabc.co.za/news/f1/b9ad4d8042b5df199f1a9f3d86b55090/South-Africa:-">“protest capital of the world”</a>. </p>
<p>Research by the Centre for Social Change, University of Johannesburg seems to bear this out. Based on estimates from <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/304076282_Counting_Police-Recorded_Protests_Based_on_South_African_Police_Service_Data?_iepl%5BviewId%5D=5KxFFchge3DcotG82x6t7YVe&_iepl%5BprofilePublicationItemVariant%5D=default&_iepl%5Bcontexts%5D%5B0%5D=prfpi&_iepl%5BtargetEntityId%5D=PB%3A304076282&_iepl%5BinteractionType%5D=publicationTitle">South African Police Service data</a>, we found that between 1997 and 2013 there were an average of 900 community protests a year. In recent years the number has climbed to as high as 2,000 protests a year.</p>
<p>The situation in South Africa is not unique. <a href="http://www.cadtm.org/IMG/pdf/World_Protests_2006-2013-Final-2.pdf">Protests have been increasing</a> globally, particularly since the <a href="https://www.globalpolicy.org/social-and-economic-policy/the-world-economic-crisis.html">2008 global economic crisis</a>. </p>
<p>In a <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Southern-Resistance-in-Critical-Perspective-The-Politics-of-Protest-in/Paret-Runciman-Sinwell/p/book/9781472473462">new book</a>, my colleagues from the Centre for Social Change and I attempt to understand South Africa as part of the global protest wave.</p>
<p>On the face of it, protests in South Africa look quite different. They tend to be fragmented and happen mostly in black townships and informal settlements. The occupation of central public spaces in towns and cities, as we are seeing in <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/04/venezuelan-opposition-renews-protests-maduro-170420173517381.html">Venezuela</a>, happens seldom. </p>
<p>While there are important differences there are also commonalities. Whether protests focus around the “1%” as they did during the <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2015.1043318">Occupy movement</a> or around the lack of service provision in townships, protesters around the world are critiquing the failure of a representative democracy to provide socio-economic equality.</p>
<h2>Broken promises</h2>
<p>South Africa’s governing ANC came into power in 1994 on the promise of a <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/better-life-all">“better life for all”</a>. There have been important gains, such as increasing access to electricity from 51% of the population in 1994 to <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2014-04-25-africa-check-does-the-anc-have-a-good-story-to-tell/#.WRwOQJKGOpp">85% in 2012</a>, but inequality remains endemic. Recent data from the World Bank confirms that South Africa remains one of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/datablog/2017/apr/26/inequality-index-where-are-the-worlds-most-unequal-countries">the most unequal countries in the world</a>. </p>
<p>As part of research by the Centre for Social Change we spoke to protesters all over the country. A new book from the centre highlights the extent to which protesters are raising not just concerns about the quality of service delivery but also about the quality of post-apartheid democracy. As Shirley Zwane, from <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/place/khayelitsha-township">Khayelitsha</a>, near Cape Town, explains:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We don’t have democracy!… We [are] still struggling… you see if we are in democracy there’s no more shacks here… No more bucket system… we supposed to have roads, everything! A better education… There is a democracy?…. No, this is not a democracy! They have, these people in Constantia, Tableview, Parklands, they have a democracy, not for us!</p>
</blockquote>
<p>For Shirley the quality of post-apartheid democracy is linked to the provision of basic services. She is not alone in this view. </p>
<p><a href="http://afrobarometer.org/publications/wp8-views-democracy-south-africa-and-region-trends-and-comparisons">Research by Afrobarometer</a> has found that compared to other countries in the region South Africans are much more likely to emphasise the realisation of socio-economic outcomes as crucial to democracy. That South Africans should view housing and services as central to post-apartheid democracy is unsurprising given that apartheid systemically denied the majority of people these rights. </p>
<h2>Crisis of affordability</h2>
<p>Community protests are fundamentally about the exclusion from democracy experienced by many black working class citizens since the <a href="http://overcomingapartheid.msu.edu/unit.php?id=65-24E-6">end of apartheid in 1994</a>.</p>
<p>Although the provision of services to the previously marginalised black majority has increased substantially, black working class households face an increasing crisis of affordability.</p>
<p>In sectors covered by a minimum wage, the real median wage <a href="https://www.academia.edu/31349234/Is_South_Africa_at_a_Turning_Point">increased by 7.5%</a> between 2011 and 2015. But last year inflation on an <a href="http://www.pacsa.org.za/images/food_barometer/2016/2016_PACSA_Food_Price_Barometer_REDUCED.pdf">average working class food basket was 15%</a> and certain staple foods, such as maize meal, increased by as much as 32%. This has put a real squeeze on working class households especially when, due to high levels unemployment, each black South African wage earner <a href="http://www.pacsa.org.za/images/food_barometer/2016/2016_PACSA_Food_Price_Barometer_REDUCED.pdf">supports four people</a>. </p>
<h2>Structural challenges</h2>
<p>The crisis of affordability facing black working class households also compounds the structural crisis within local government.</p>
<p>In South Africa local governments are responsible for delivering services. Over the past 15 years local municipalities have increasingly had to find ways to fund these services through their own tax base. Many have resorted to cost recovery measures, for example by introducing prepaid meters. Their introduction <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/pimville-residents-protest-against-eskoms-prepaid-meters-20170327">has been behind many protests.</a></p>
<p>The financial difficulties for local and provincial governments looks set to get worse. In the country’s <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/documents/national%20budget/2016/speech/speech.pdf">latest budget</a> the National Treasury cut their funding as part of R25 billion budget cuts. In the case of Gauteng, the scene of the most recent protests, this amounted to a R2.9 billion rand cut <a href="http://www.iol.co.za/business-report/economy/tight-budget-for-gauteng-1995372">over three years</a>. </p>
<p>To fill the gap, municipalities and provinces are going to have to look increasingly to their own tax base to fund service provision. A difficult prospect when slightly more than half the population survives on <a href="http://beta2.statssa.gov.za/publications/Report-03-10-11/Report-03-10-11.pdf">R779 or less a person a month</a>.</p>
<h2>A global crisis</h2>
<p>As Professor Michael Burawoy argues in our new book, the nature of the crisis varies from country to country. In South Africa the crisis represents the <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=gCmEDgAAQBAJ&pg=PT48&lpg=PT48&dq=Michael+Burawoy+forcible+exclusion&source=bl&ots=YPlKuMoX0L&sig=Aagamv6XQL7XWlwXy52qBjgaBmM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiD0u_61PbTAhUkDsAKHXPhA7AQ6AEIKDAB#v=onepage&q=Michael%20Burawoy%20forcible%20exclusion&f=false">forcible exclusion</a> of many black working class households from democratic institutions, largely because of their inability to afford socio-economic goods. For instance, while access to electricity has increased, access is increasingly mediated by prepaid meters, therefore the ability to access service is inextricably linked to the ability to afford them. </p>
<p>It’s this exclusion that leads many to say that <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=gCmEDgAAQBAJ&pg=PT48&lpg=PT48&dq=Michael+Burawoy+forcible+exclusion&source=bl&ots=YPlKuMoX0L&sig=Aagamv6XQL7XWlwXy52qBjgaBmM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiD0u_61PbTAhUkDsAKHXPhA7AQ6AEIKDAB#v=onepage&q=democracy%20only%20for%20the%20rich&f=false">democracy is only for the rich</a>. Globally, people are beginning to search for new solutions to these problems with many being drawn to left-wing movements and political parties, such as <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/can-europe-make-it/cristina-flesher-fominaya/%E2%80%9Cspain-is-different%E2%80%9D-podemos-and-15m">Podemos</a> in Spain. Whether such a comparable movement can emerge in South Africa remains to be seen.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/77639/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Carin Runciman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Protests in South Africa are about more than just service delivery of basic services such as water and electricity. They reflect a wider crisis about the failure to build a more equitable society.Carin Runciman, Senior Reseacher, Centre for Social Change, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/711422017-02-06T07:42:36Z2017-02-06T07:42:36ZHow storytelling explains world politics, from Spain to the US<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/de-podemos-a-trump-el-storytelling-explica-la-politica-mundial-97969">Leer en español</a></em>.</p>
<p>How is Donald Trump like the leader of Spain’s Podemos movement, a long-haired, left-wing university professor named <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFq2Z0NukUE">Pablo Iglesias</a>?</p>
<p>It’s tempting to say he’s not.</p>
<p>It’s quite another thing to compare <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/09/21/donald-trump-is-americas-silvio-berlusconi/?utm_term=.9d3aa379c856">Trump and former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi</a>. Aside from language and birthplace, Trump is basically the American Berlusconi, both political outsiders and businessmen who rose to the heights of power. </p>
<p>The paradox is that although Trump and Iglesias are ideological opposites – and, of course, Trump says and does things that Iglesias would never even think – both leaders have employed the same narrative tactic to get where they are: <a href="http://www.maspoderlocal.es/ediciones/gestion-de-la-comunicacion-municipal-en-america-latina-no9/">political storytelling</a>. </p>
<h2>Narrative as a political tool</h2>
<p>The key lies in their communication strategy and the intended recipients of their messages: the despairing masses on both sides of the Atlantic, from the “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/10/upshot/why-trump-won-working-class-whites.html?_r=0">working-class whites</a>” in the US to Spain’s “<em><a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-18070246">indignados</a></em>” (the indignant). </p>
<p>Here’s <a href="http://beerderberg.es/las-fases-del-storytelling/">how it works</a>: the more desperate and fed-up people are with hearing the same unfulfilled promises, and the more they think about how their kids will probably end up worse off than they are now, the more predisposed they are to listen, believe and vote for candidates who propose doing something different within the confines of the political system. </p>
<p>They feel moved. Something – a story, a tale – with more emotion than reason makes their hearts beat faster. Because, whether we like it or not, emotions lie in the same area of our brain where we <a href="http://www.apa.org/monitor/feb08/brain.aspx">process political information</a>.</p>
<p>That’s what political storytelling is all about. Both the progressive Spaniard and the atypical Republican have used the tactic to great effect, each in his own way. So have Latin American presidents of the past decade, many of them masters of narrative. </p>
<p>Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez is <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/article/hugo-chavez-and-venezuela-a-leader-s-destiny">a powerful case</a>, taking his narrative – based on Simon Bolivar’s Latin American liberation movement – to the extreme of <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/70">renaming his country</a> the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. The Kirchners <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/celia-szusterman/argentine-fable-cristina-kirchners-tall-stories">in Argentina</a> and Evo Morales <a href="http://revista.drclas.harvard.edu/book/first-take-1">in Bolivia</a> also mastered the art. </p>
<p>They have all shown the power of narratives in seducing disillusioned voters. Here are the nine key features of a powerful narrative.</p>
<h2>Nine characteristics of political narrative</h2>
<ol>
<li><p>They are tales of power, wherein the “good guys” are victims of the “bad guys”. Trump’s <a href="http://theconversation.com/of-boldness-some-rhetorical-pointers-on-trumps-inauguration-address-71695">recent inauguration speech</a> showed numerous antagonistic relationships, pitting “Washington” against the people; evil politicians, who did nothing while “the jobs left and the factories closed”, versus poor citizens. </p></li>
<li><p>They blame inept or unscrupulous politicians for letting insidious interests win – for example, Iglesias has railed against the monsters of “financial totalitarianism” that have <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/31/podemos-revolution-radical-academics-changed-european-politics">humiliated Spaniards</a> – and position themselves as the heroes who will recapture past righteousness (with an epic battle of good and evil). </p></li>
<li><p>They use a direct, simple and emotionally charged messages: “I will build a wall and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yfIxBjOw3o">Mexico will pay for it</a>!” </p></li>
<li><p>They offer solutions, which must seem feasible, even if they aren’t. They have to show that another future is possible. Former Brazilian president Lula’s “zero hunger” <a href="http://www.fao.org/docrep/016/i3023e/i3023e.pdf">campaign</a> is a good example.</p></li>
<li><p>They seek to recover a mystical past, connecting people to their roots and lost values. Where and when? That doesn’t matter, as long as the narrative revives people’s dreams: “<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-make-america-great-again-slogan-history-2017-1">Make America Great Again</a>”</p></li>
<li><p>They construct, or reconstruct, an identity whose sole reference point is often a leader who defines themselves as something different and new. Adding an “ism” to the end of a name supports this idea: “<em>El Chavismo</em>”, “Kirchnerism”, “Maoism”. The narrators of the greatest political stories are charismatic leaders who can easily devolve into authoritarianism. This isn’t always the case, and South Africa’s Nelson Mandela and Spain’s Felipe González are notable exceptions.</p></li>
<li><p>They revive founding myths by citing, for example, America’s Founding Fathers (or in Trump’s case <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/4672/trump-abraham-lincoln-arrgghh-hank-berrien">Abraham Lincoln</a>) or their society’s revolutionary origins (as in Cuba and China).</p></li>
<li><p>They impose an us-versus-them dialectic. The “enemies” may be Muslims or immigrants <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2015/12/07/politics/donald-trump-muslim-ban-immigration/">(for Trump)</a>), or the insatiable European Union (<a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/pablo-iglesias-how-the-leader-of-the-podemos-party-upset-spains-elites-to-reach-the-brink-of-power-a6786291.html">for Iglesias</a>). With time, this tends to rip apart the social fabric; consider the case of the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/southamerica/argentina/11948859/Queen-Cristina-leaves-behind-a-deeply-divided-Argentina.html">Kirchners in Argentina</a> who left a divided nation behind them. </p></li>
<li><p>They use simple analogies and linear explanations. Pablo Iglesias often says “blessed people, damned caste” to differentiate the citizenry from the political elites who’ve clung to power in Spain for <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.es/2015/12/05/video-electoral-podemos_n_8728428.html">the past 40 years</a>.</p></li>
</ol>
<h2>The end of the story</h2>
<p>Beyond demonstrating an ignorance of world history, underestimating the power of a candidate who mobilises the base using this kind of emotional messaging can be electoral suicide. </p>
<p>In many countries, traditional political parties have already learned this lesson, entering into serious democratic crises that are undermining the foundations of their political system. Venezuela is a <a href="https://theconversation.com/political-dialogue-is-a-lost-art-in-venezuela-and-the-vaticans-intervention-wont-help-68906">critical case</a>.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-yfIxBjOw3o?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Donald Trump spinning his yarns.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Still, in the political narrative script, Trump and Podemos are the heroes: finally, someone has arrived who “truly” represents those who’ve been <a href="https://theconversation.com/trumps-inauguration-ushers-in-2017-the-year-of-the-strongman-70846">excluded and abandoned</a> by politics as usual. Both leaders would say that these marginalised folks – the protagonists of their tale – are the best society has to offer.</p>
<p><a href="http://compolitica.com/acerca-de-la-construccion-de-relatos-politicos/">Such narratives</a> are nothing new. They can be traced back to the Greeks, with their mythology, and the Romans, with their commemorative constructions, like the emperors columns in every Roman Forum. </p>
<p>Political tales don’t last forever; like empires, they go through phases of development, consolidation and decline. Unless they can reinvent themselves, counter-narratives will appear and the story starts over again. </p>
<p>The French, American, Soviet, Cuban, Chinese, Chavista Bolivarion revolutions – these are all stories laden with epic characteristics and heroic symbolism, without which it’s possible that their historic value would have expired long ago. Instead, they are still leveraged to overcome political and social crises. </p>
<p>One final curiousity: many of these stories involve building walls, from Troy to the Berlin wall to, yes, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-wall-and-the-beast-trumps-triumph-from-the-mexican-side-of-the-border-68559">Beautiful Mexican Wall</a>.</p>
<p>In the end they all failed, of course, some more ignominiously than others. History can be merciless to leaders who offer desperate people simple solutions to complex matters.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/71142/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Orlando D'Adamo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>What do Nelson Mandela, Chairman Mao and Spanish politician Pablo Iglesias have in common with Donald Trump?Orlando D'Adamo, Director, Center for Public Opinion, Universidad de BelgranoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/697712016-12-15T02:57:37Z2016-12-15T02:57:37ZPodemos find itself caught between the battle lines of Spanish politics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148781/original/image-20161206-25742-utfxq4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Podemos must reconsider who is above and who is below – who are the people and who are the people's enemy.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/podemosuvieu/13967966118/">Podemos Uviéu/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>This article is part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/democracy-futures">Democracy Futures</a> series, a <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/democracy-futures/">joint global initiative</a> with the <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/">Sydney Democracy Network</a>. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies in the 21st century.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>Podemos has shaken up Spanish politics in ways <a href="https://theconversation.com/postcard-from-spain-where-now-for-the-quiet-revolution-43779">unimaginable</a> when it was created in early 2014. Other political parties and the media have been forced to adjust to the populist, left-wing Podemos as it became an established part of Spanish politics. </p>
<p>However, this has created challenges for the party itself. Initially formulated as an assault against the establishment, Podemos is now part of the political system that it set out to fight.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=647&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=647&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=647&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=813&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=813&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/149354/original/image-20161209-31383-1gok6yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=813&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Podemos has been influenced by Argentinian political theorist Ernesto Laclau.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/dgcomsoc/7223711286/in/photolist-bZMgey-bZMi7u-bZAsdA-cf73oY-cf71ey-mhHx8h-cf728m-cf6ZFm-cf6YPS-r8r2W8-cf7bGU-cf6X5w-mkuD5M-cf6W79-mkvt1e-mkuGwM-mkwxmY-mkuQ14-c1kpGj-mhJbQw-bZMgD3-mhFVuM-mhGmdH-mhJ5Rs-mhFr8g-z2Xrx8-c1kpkw-yD3Vqt-mhG6Er-mhGQ5z-mhGDxx-mhHBMY-n5wMpR-c1kpYG-bZEBSL-c1kp5u-z2Xvnx-yZDVwy-yKs2BR-y65SzM-y5W83d-yKmTfE-yKs42z-yKs2Z4-y65Q3c-y5W9k3-z1X57W-bZAssE-HWqd4p-HWqYbx">Cancillería del Ecuador/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Podemos does not refer to itself as populist, but by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/feb/09/ernesto-laclau-intellectual-figurehead-syriza-podemos">Ernesto Laclau’s standards</a> the party is, or at least used to be. Laclau developed a theory of populism with three simple, if highly abstract, components: a chain of equivalence, an empty signifier and an antagonistic frontier.</p>
<p>Imagine a country in crisis. Unemployment is high, youth unemployment even higher, and the middle class is squeezed. The financial and economic institutions have lost their legitimacy, and so have the legal and political institutions.</p>
<p>In this country, old and new demands can no longer be channelled through the usual institutions. A big part of the population no longer feels represented. Society has been dislocated, with the different demands left floating around.</p>
<p>This sort of situation is ripe for populist intervention. What populist discourse does, according to Laclau, is connect different demands together in a chain of equivalence. Those demands – cheaper <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/08/barcelona-en-comu-ada-colau-podemos-catalonia-housing/">housing</a>, get rid of corrupt politicians, and so on – become equivalent because they are represented by the same empty signifier. </p>
<p>An empty signifier could be a populist leader – say, Pablo Iglesias, the leader of Podemos – or it could be a slogan – for instance, “enough is enough”. From the perspective of the different demands, the signifier becomes the solution to every one of them: if Podemos comes to power, they’ll stop the eviction of people from their homes, corrupt politicians will be a thing of the past etc.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148777/original/image-20161206-25753-ka06cd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148777/original/image-20161206-25753-ka06cd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148777/original/image-20161206-25753-ka06cd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148777/original/image-20161206-25753-ka06cd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148777/original/image-20161206-25753-ka06cd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148777/original/image-20161206-25753-ka06cd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148777/original/image-20161206-25753-ka06cd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In 2013, thousands demonstrated in Madrid against corruption in government.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Adolfo Lujan/Wikipedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The empty signifier has to be understood in tandem with the third element of Laclau’s theory of populism: <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13569310500244313?journalCode=cjpi20">antagonism</a>. Populist discourse divides society in two: those below and those above. This is precisely what Podemos did from the beginning: those below (the people – <em>la gente</em>) were pitted against those above (the establishment – <em>la casta</em>).</p>
<p>Laclau refers to this division as an antagonistic frontier: you are either on the side of the people, or on the side of the people’s enemy. And if getting rid of the people’s enemy is the solution to all of the people’s problems, it follows that all the different demands of the people can only be met if we get rid of the old establishment.</p>
<h2>Redrawing the antagonistic frontier</h2>
<p>Iglesias recently said that Podemos must decide whether to continue being populist or not. After the December 2015 general <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/20/peoples-party-wins-spanish-election-absolute-majority">elections</a>, the question became urgent.</p>
<p>Since then, Spanish politics has been in a stalemate: the conservative Partido Popular (PP) <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21711525-mariano-rajoy-having-learn-negotiate-opposition-spains-uncertain-experiment">lacked the numbers</a> to form a majority government, and the centre-left Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) and Podemos were unable to reach any agreement on forming an alternative government.</p>
<p>PSOE is part of the political establishment, and so ought to be an antagonistic enemy of Podemos. But Podemos is torn between two antagonistic enemies: the establishment as a whole (including PSOE) and the conservative wing of the establishment (foremost PP). </p>
<p>In aiming to overtake PSOE to become the second-largest party in Spain, Podemos has portrayed PSOE as part of the establishment. But the electoral reality is that Podemos remain smaller than PSOE. Podemos can only oust PP from power by entering into an alliance with PSOE.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iPxeaEQDdDA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Alone we cannot change Europe,’ says Podemos councillor Rita Maestre.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>For Podemos the problem lies in how the party wishes to draw the antagonistic frontier. They must decide, in other words, who to conceive of as the antagonistic enemy of the people. Is PSOE an antagonistic enemy or an agonistic adversary for Podemos?</p>
<p>Chantal Mouffe uses the term <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-defence-of-left-wing-populism-55869">“agonism”</a> to characterise a form of democracy where antagonism is not suppressed, but rather translated into agonistic struggles between agonistic adversaries. The latter disagree, but they agree to respect one another’s right to be part of the political space.</p>
<p>Some members of Podemos – including Íñigo Errejón, the party’s number two – believe that Podemos must think of itself as engaged in agonistic struggles within and outside the political system. Others, like Iglesias, lean towards a more antagonistic attitude.</p>
<p>The problem with the strategy of agonism is that you are forced to accept some of the rules of the game, even as you try to subvert them. The problem with the strategy of antagonism, on the other hand, is that it is difficult to change government policy in the short and even medium term.</p>
<p>Hence, it is not just a matter of how Podemos acts towards PSOE, but of how the party relates to the whole political system, which it is now part of.</p>
<h2>Divided over strategy</h2>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148780/original/image-20161206-25727-dy9u0e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148780/original/image-20161206-25727-dy9u0e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=698&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148780/original/image-20161206-25727-dy9u0e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=698&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148780/original/image-20161206-25727-dy9u0e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=698&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148780/original/image-20161206-25727-dy9u0e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=877&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148780/original/image-20161206-25727-dy9u0e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=877&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148780/original/image-20161206-25727-dy9u0e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=877&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias during the 2015 campaign.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ahora Madrid/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Podemos has been divided over these questions since spring, and the divide is personified in Pablo Iglesias and Íñigo Errejón. It extends to the symbols they use: Iglesias uses a raised fist, Errejón a V sign. Although there may be subtle ideological divisions, the divide is first and foremost a strategic one.</p>
<p>This became apparent when Podemos formed an electoral alliance with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/12/unidos-podemos-spain-election-leftwing-alliance-united-left">Izquierda Unida</a> (United Left) during the re-run of the general elections in June this year. The thinking was that, by uniting the two parties, the new list – called Unidos Podemos – would pick up more seats because the electoral system is biased against smaller parties.</p>
<p>The result, however, was that many of Podemos’ and Izquierda Unida’s voters either stayed at home or went elsewhere.</p>
<p>Introducing the new opposition between below and above allowed Podemos to position itself as representative of those below and of the new, thereby appealing to voters across the political spectrum. This <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/can-europe-make-it/juan-antonio-gil-de-los-santos/understanding-transversality">transversality</a>, or the ability to introduce new signifiers into the political and social space, was supposed to realign forces and pave the way for a new majority – and a new hegemony.</p>
<p>Instead, the alliance with Izquierda Unida placed Podemos even more firmly on the left of the old political spectrum. Indeed, it robbed Podemos of some of its transversal force.</p>
<p>Even though Errejón self-identifies as someone of the left, he pushed transversality the most, arguing that it was necessary to create a new majority. But in an interesting twist to this debate, Mouffe argues – against Errejón – that Podemos ought not to shed itself of the “left” label. The “left” is connected to equality and social justice, and this is what distinguishes left-wing from right-wing populism.</p>
<p>In short, it is not enough to speak in the name of the people – Marine le Pen <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-marine-le-pen-could-become-the-next-french-president-68765">does that too</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148773/original/image-20161206-25749-jrozkg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148773/original/image-20161206-25749-jrozkg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148773/original/image-20161206-25749-jrozkg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148773/original/image-20161206-25749-jrozkg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148773/original/image-20161206-25749-jrozkg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148773/original/image-20161206-25749-jrozkg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148773/original/image-20161206-25749-jrozkg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Íñigo Errejón believes that Podemos must broaden its appeal to capture a larger portion of the electorate – not just those on the left.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ministerio de Cultura de la Nación Argentina/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Blurring the antagonistic frontier</h2>
<p>The other parties, along with the mainstream media, have tried to break the antagonism that Podemos articulates between the people and the establishment. Open shirts have even become fashionable among PSOE members who now understand that they have to look less like men and women in suits and more like ordinary people.</p>
<p>At the same time, PSOE (which has most to fear from Podemos) has been quick to cast a dark cloud over what it characterises as Podemos’ populism (a word with very negative connotations in Spanish society) by associating this with <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/01/what-hugo-chavez-built-the-legacy-of-latin-american-chavismo/267149/">Chavismo</a> in Venezuela. Right-wing politicians and media outlets did the same, branding Podemos as just another political elite interested in power.</p>
<p>All of this compromised Podemos’s transversal appeal. By rebranding Podemos as a threat to ordinary Spanish people (not unlike the old communist threat), PSOE and the right pushed Podemos closer to the establishment and further away from the people. </p>
<p>In doing so, PSOE and the right are trying to blur the antagonistic frontier and break the chain of equivalence established by Podemos. This is precisely what hegemony á la Laclau and Mouffe is about: the creation of new meanings and new chains of equivalence.</p>
<h2>What does the future hold for Podemos?</h2>
<p>Given all of the drawing, redrawing and blurring of boundaries from all sides of politics, Podemos faces major challenges over the next couple of years. </p>
<p>Should the party opt for a more transversal strategy, or present itself as a party of the left? How can Podemos maximise support: go for a thin slice of the whole electorate, or a big slice of the left?</p>
<p>These challenges are more like tensions than anything that can be wholly overcome. Podemos will have to negotiate them carefully, fully aware that, whatever it does, it can’t have it all.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69771/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lasse Thomassen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Podemos positioned itself as leading a revolt by the people against the political system. Now, as Spain’s third-largest party, it is part of that system and has some difficult decisions to make.Lasse Thomassen, Senior Lecturer, Queen Mary University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/679702016-11-02T13:35:07Z2016-11-02T13:35:07ZThe messy politics behind Spain’s new government<p>When Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy was finally able to announce the formation of a minority government after 10 months of deadlock, he called for <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/28/spain-to-get-government-after-10-month-political-impasse-mariano-rajoy">political unity</a>. The national parliament must work together to make up for lost time, he said. </p>
<p>But that unity will not easily be achieved while most other political parties are embroiled in their own internal struggles. Rajoy was only able to make his breakthrough thanks to a decision by the Socialist Party (PSOE) to abstain from a vote to allow him to form a government, rather than voting against him. That decision has split the party and led to the resignation of its leader, Pedro Sánchez.</p>
<p>Spain has endured <a href="https://theconversation.com/spain-steels-itself-for-another-election-after-months-with-no-government-60675">two elections</a> in the past year alone, and Rajoy’s centre-right People’s Party (PP) was the only major party to increase its vote and number of seats between those two votes. Rajoy’s strategists will therefore already be planning their next move. </p>
<p>The PP may be looking to dissolve parliament to call a fresh election. That could happen as early as May 2017 – as soon as is constitutionally possible. Rajoy sees a chance to secure a more stable share of the vote and even to form a majority government. It will not have escaped his attention that the PSOE’s abstention in his investiture vote was linked to its desire to avoid going to the polls at such a moment of weakness.</p>
<h2>Socialists in disarray</h2>
<p>The current political environment is challenging for social democratic parties all over the world, but the PSOE appears more hapless than most.</p>
<p>Having <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-37529610">resigned</a> as party leader at the beginning of October, Sánchez stepped down from parliament altogether on the eve of Rajoy’s successful investiture vote. His departure drew a close to an alarming month of infighting for the socialists.</p>
<p>The caretaker leadership that took over was keen to avoid another election. Given how many votes the party had lost between the elections in December 2015 and June 2016 votes, its position is weak. Its chances of being able to form a government, even in coalition, were slim at best. It would have needed the support of left-wing upstart Podemos and independence-supporting regional parties. That was acceptable to Sánchez, but not to some of his opponents in the party, many of whom were involved in the caretaker leadership.</p>
<p>While the party membership generally backed Sánchez’s stance of voting against Rajoy’s minority government and forcing another election, 68 of the party’s 85 deputies abstained on the orders of the caretaker leadership.</p>
<p>Essentially, the split within the party centred on whether the Socialists should pragmatically acknowledge their own fragility and permit Rajoy to form a government on the basis that his party obtained the most seats in June, or whether, as Sánchez suggested, they should, on principle, vote against a party which has enthusiastically implemented harsh austerity. This while conspicuously failing to address numerous allegations of corruption within its own ranks. </p>
<h2>The Podemos problem</h2>
<p>Other parties have profited from the PSOE’s plight too. Podemos has wasted no time in proclaiming itself the genuine opposition to the PP government, given the decisive role played by the PSOE in securing Rajoy’s parliamentary endorsement. </p>
<p>Younger voters have been attracted to <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/podemos-13452">Podemos</a> because they see both major parties as representing their parents’, or even their grandparents’, interests. Many have still not forgotten the austerity policies introduced by the PSOE when it was last in government under Rodríguez Zapatero.</p>
<p>The new-media-savvy Podemos has been a major beneficiary as austerity has borne down on the young and the poorest in society. Its critique of the status quo is immeasurably more convincing than its policies but party leader Pablo Iglesias’s Manichean approach, based on a reductionist confrontation between “the people” and the corrupt establishment, appeals to many. </p>
<p>Podemos has problems of its own, though. A disappointing performance in the June 2016 election – more than 1 million votes down on the December result – has caused division. Iglesias’ lieutenant Íñigo Errejón has advocated a more measured, pragmatic strategy to reassure voters disquieted by the leader’s often heavy-handed rhetorical spasms.</p>
<p>It remains to be seen whether the PSOE and Podemos are able to find common ground in order to mount a rigorous, yet constructive, opposition capable of holding the new PP government to account.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67970/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>After two elections and months of deadlock, a minority administration has been agreed. But the situation is far from stable.Paul Kennedy, Lecturer in Spanish and European Studies, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/639572016-09-27T09:21:19Z2016-09-27T09:21:19ZLessons for Jeremy Corbyn from the world’s left-wingers and populists<p><em>Jeremy Corbyn <a href="https://theconversation.com/jeremy-corbyn-wins-again-heres-what-happens-now-65432">has been re-elected</a> leader of the UK’s Labour Party, with overwhelming grassroots support. Here, four experts look at how movement politics have changed countries around the world – and some of the pitfalls their leaders have faced.</em></p>
<hr>
<h2>Argentina: the struggles of Kirchnerismo</h2>
<p><strong>Pia Riggirozzi, University of Southampton</strong></p>
<p>Once Jeremy Corbyn had easily seen off Owen Smith’s leadership challenge, he heartily reiterated his intention to give more power to “the people”, to “do things differently”, and to “build a more just and decent society”. These promises put a decidedly leftist spin on the Labour Party, staking out a defiantly leftist plot of political turf in the UK. But they also stake out a role in the global resistance to neoliberalism. </p>
<p>When Corbyn first won the Labour leadership in September 2015, he drew effusive praise from the then-president of Argentina, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who <a href="http://www.buenosairesherald.com/article/198591/cfk-praises-corbyns-victory-as-triumph-of-hope-">described his victory</a> as a “triumph of hope”, and a victory for those “putting politics at the service of people and the economy at the service of the well-being of all citizens”.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139264/original/image-20160926-31847-1q50clk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139264/original/image-20160926-31847-1q50clk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=879&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139264/original/image-20160926-31847-1q50clk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=879&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139264/original/image-20160926-31847-1q50clk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=879&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139264/original/image-20160926-31847-1q50clk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1104&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139264/original/image-20160926-31847-1q50clk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1104&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139264/original/image-20160926-31847-1q50clk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1104&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Kirchners in their prime.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACristina_con_baston_y_banda.jpg">P. N. Argentina/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Effusive praise indeed from someone of such standing on the global left. For 12 years, Fernández de Kirchner and her late husband Néstor led Argentina as a part of a global challenge to neoliberalism, one driven by electorates that refused to accept parties committed to free markets. </p>
<p>The Kirchners’ agenda, known as <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21676824-and-beginning-saner-economic-policies-perhaps-end-kirchnerismo">Kirchnerismo</a>, depended on rising commodity prices and strong commercial and financial links with China to focus efforts on Argentina’s poor. Under their stewardship, Argentina <a href="http://www.ipsnews.net/2015/10/social-programmes-here-to-stay-in-argentina/">tackled poverty</a>, introduced <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2011/sep/05/argentina-child-allowance-poor-schools">universal child benefits</a>, and extended civil rights such as <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/16/world/americas/16argentina.html">same-sex marriage</a>. </p>
<p>But the Kirchner era was highly divisive. To some, it was a real commitment to prosperity and justice, but for others, it was an embrace of quasi-authoritarian state-led interventionism that fostered <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2014/jan/24/argentina-peso-devaluation-blue-dollar-tourism">misconceived exchange rate policies</a>, <a href="http://panampost.com/belen-marty/2014/07/24/argentina-devours-energy-subsidies-budget-in-six-months/">ruinous energy subsidies</a> and an unsustainable <a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/americasview/2014/06/argentinas-economy">fiscal deficit</a>. </p>
<p>With the economy slowing and inflation worsening, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s successor was defeated in the November 2015 election. The country swung towards political and economic conservatism and elected <a href="https://theconversation.com/argentina-departs-from-the-kirchner-model-but-mauricio-macri-now-has-to-govern-a-divided-nation-51060">Mauricio Macri</a>, who has already started mending fences with the neoliberal financial agents – including the IMF the Kirchneristas so despised – while showing worrying signs of authoritarianism in his approach to social and political opposition.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Spain: Podemos on the wane?</h2>
<p><strong>Georgina Blakeley, The Open University</strong></p>
<p>A left-wing movement and political party which <a href="https://theconversation.com/are-you-ready-for-a-new-kind-of-left-wing-politics-33511">burst on to the Spanish political scene</a> in 2014, Podemos (“we can”) has fallen on hard times of late. Its leadership is <a href="http://politica.elpais.com/politica/2016/09/20/actualidad/1474365298_939669.html">deeply and publicly divided</a>, and the party elite is increasingly seen as centralist and distant by its grassroots activists, who are struggling to maintain momentum within their local assemblies (or “circles”). </p>
<p>These divisions come down to disagreements over strategy. After two general elections that have failed to produce a government, the Spanish electorate is growing increasingly weary of politics and politicians – and the prospect of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/spain-is-a-third-election-in-a-year-on-the-horizon-63681">third general election</a> won’t help. </p>
<p>Podemos tried to make inroads by forming an electoral alliance with the United Left party under the name Unidos Podemos, but it failed to boost the left’s performance in the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/26/spanish-elections-exit-polls-show-deadlock-likely-to-continue">June 2016 general election</a>: Unidos Podemos retained the same number of seats as in the December 2015 general election, but its share of the vote declined by approximately 1m voters.</p>
<p>The dilemma is: does Podemos move to the centre, possibly in alliance with the Socialist Party, to try to seduce those voters who still regard it with distrust, or does Podemos shore up support among those activists and voters who fuelled its initial success but are now increasingly disenchanted by what they see as the continuous dilution of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-austerity_movement_in_Spain">the 15M</a> [anti-autsterity] spirit of Podemos? </p>
<p>Podemos’ results in the <a href="http://politica.elpais.com/politica/2016/09/25/actualidad/1474807081_234283.html">Basque and Galician elections</a> did little to clear the fog. Mario Cuomo’s dictum rings true: politicians campaign in poetry, but they govern in prose.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Thailand: the Thaksinites thwarted</h2>
<p><strong>Brian Klaas, London School of Economics</strong></p>
<p>In 2001, populist politics came to Thailand when former police officer-turned-billionaire media mogul Thaksin Shinawatra became prime minister. </p>
<p>In his first term, Thaksin earned major popular support both within Bangkok and in the agricultural centres of north-east Thailand for his signature programmes of reducing poverty and providing universal, low-cost healthcare for Thais. His party, initially founded as the Thai Rak Thai party, became known by the colloquial term “Red Shirts”. That name came from the colour worn by protesters whenever they took to the streets in support of his regime against more conservative elements in Thai society, such as the Democrat Party or the People’s Alliance for Democracy (known as “Yellow Shirts”). </p>
<p>Thaksin’s charisma and populist leadership style carried him to re-election in 2005, but he could not escape the cycle of military coups d'état that continually keeps Thailand away from full democracy. Thanks to his populism – which his critics decry as corrupt, crony patronage politics – he and his party are still Thailand’s most popular political tendency, but his populist legacy isn’t one tied to a coherent political project or ideology. Instead, it’s much more about prioritising state spending on his network of supporters rather than the Democrat Party’s rival network. </p>
<p>That rivalry was Thaksin’s downfall. On September 19 2006, the Thai military intervened and toppled Thaksin; he has been in exile since 2008. His sister Yingluck later took up his mantle and served as prime minister from August 2011 until she was also removed in a coup d'état by the Thai military in May 2014.</p>
<p>Ultimately, Thaksin managed to activate dormant political constituencies in the countryside and turn them into a popular movement – but in the end, that movement entrenched a political culture that still tends toward patronage rather than robust and detailed policy.</p>
<hr>
<h2>South Africa: Malema on the march</h2>
<p><strong>Daniel Conway, University of Westminster</strong></p>
<p>If you want to provoke a strong reaction about politics from a South African, mention left-wing firebrand Julius Malema and his Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party. Citing Marxism-Leninism and Frantz Fanon while extolling the anti-white policies of the Zimbabwean government and admiring Hugo Chavez, the EFF demands full redistribution of land from the white community to the black majority without compensation and the wholesale nationalisation of mines and banks.</p>
<p>To some, Malema is just what the governing African National Congress (ANC) deserves for failing to improve the prospects of the poor while cosying up to big business and allowing the white minority to dominate the economy. To others, Malema is an irresponsible extremist and a threat to South Africa’s economy and democracy.</p>
<p>Before he was expelled as leader of the ANC Youth League, Malema promised to “<a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/julius-sello-malema#sthash.fF5lpfLa.dpuf">take up arms and kill</a>” for President Jacob Zuma – but he’s now become one of Zuma’s loudest critics, heckling his state of the nation address from the floor of parliament and successfully taking him to the Constitutional Court to reclaim money fraudulently spent on the president’s private residence, Nkandla. </p>
<p>Upon winning 6% of the vote in the 2014 general election, the EFF’s 25 MPs announced they wouldn’t wear suits in parliament, describing them as <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/the-coded-clothes-of-south-africas-economic-freedom-fighters/375366/">the clothes of European imperialists</a>; instead they sport red jumpsuits and the headgear of either miners or domestic workers. This and other populist stunts have continually kept Malema and his followers in the headlines.</p>
<p>But the EFF isn’t the ANC’s main opposition: in the latest municipal elections, it was the centre-right Democratic Alliance that gained the most ground, <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-african-elections-politics-shuffled-but-not-transformed-63481">forcing the ANC from power</a> in Pretoria, Johannesburg and Port Elizabeth. Malema has not broken the mould of South African politics, though he has helped loosen the ANC’s near-stranglehold on the black vote. But South Africa’s proportional electoral system, ongoing poverty and still-stark racial inequality may well mean the EFF wields greater political influence for years yet.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63957/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pia Riggirozzi have received funding from ESRC-DfID (grant/s on Poverty Reduction and Regional Integration: SADC and UNASUR Health Policies)</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian Klaas, Daniel Conway, and Georgina Blakeley do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Labour’s leader has a renewed mandate to put his party at the vanguard of the left – but others have walked that road before.Georgina Blakeley, Senior Lecturer in Politics, The Open UniversityBrian Klaas, LSE Fellow in Comparative Politics, London School of Economics and Political ScienceDaniel Conway, Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Studies, University of WestminsterPia Riggirozzi, Associate Professor in Global Politics, University of SouthamptonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/636812016-08-10T10:52:55Z2016-08-10T10:52:55ZSpain: is a third election in a year on the horizon?<p>Despite holding <a href="https://theconversation.com/spain-steels-itself-for-another-election-after-months-with-no-government-60675">two elections</a> in the past year, Spain still doesn’t have a functioning government. The People’s Party increased its representation yet fell short of the required majority. As intense negotiations and political dealings continue, is a third trip to the polls in a year looming?</p>
<p>When the first of the two recent votes took place in <a href="http://theconversation.com/explainer-the-spanish-general-election-52545">December 2015</a>, it was widely expected that austerity would drain support for the country’s two main parties – the incumbent conservative People’s Party (PP) and the socialist PSOE. The newer reformist parties – Podemos and Ciudadanos (the Citizens’ Party) – capitalised on civic mobilisation to serve notice on the bipartisan system. Both made momentous gains. Podemos came away with 42 seats in the lower house of the parliament and the the Citizens’ Party 40. The socialists, meanwhile, had their worst election ever.</p>
<p>The results plunged Spain into <a href="http://theconversation.com/spain-votes-for-change-but-has-no-idea-what-government-itll-end-up-with-52583">uncertainty</a>. For the first time since Spain’s transition to democracy in 1977, following the death of Franco, no candidate secured enough electoral support to lead the country. Negotiations between the parties seeking to form a government dragged on without resolution.</p>
<p>The 11th Spanish parliament was to become the shortest in Spain’s modern democracy – and the only one to pass without a government ever being formed. <a href="http://theconversation.com/spain-steels-itself-for-another-election-after-months-with-no-government-60675">Fresh elections</a> were called for June.</p>
<h2>Double dip</h2>
<p>This second election was a notably lower-key affair than the first. Again, though, it failed to produce a workable majority for any party. The new left-wing grouping of parties headed by Podemos failed to make any significant gains. The PP increased its share of the vote but not by enough to secure the majority it had enjoyed since 2011. Once again, the PSOE obtained its worst historic result, compounding further the losses suffered in 2015.</p>
<p>Although provisional ministerial positions were allocated and political groupings formed, no agreement was reached about who should be Prime Minister. Former PM Mariano Rajoy continued as caretaker but ambiguity remained about the longer term solution. </p>
<p>Frustration grew among politicians and the general public. It is the role of the king to meet with representatives from the various parties to encourage consensus and dialogue, yet even he is said to have been demonstrably <a href="http://politica.elpais.com/politica/2016/07/26/actualidad/1469518087_208008.html">more sombre</a> in the wake of the second vote.</p>
<p>King Felipe has <a href="http://www.eldiario.es/politica/Ana-Pastor-Congreso-PP-Ciudadanos_0_538946198.html">indicated</a> that he believes Rajoy would now have the support to form a new government. Unlike earlier in the year, when Rajoy did not put himself forward to lead a potential government, the caretaker Prime Minister has this time accepted the monarch’s charge that he should lead the country.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, Rajoy must still submit himself to a parliamentary vote in order to become prime minister. He maintains that he will not attend such a debate unless he is sure of the support of the house. His stance is being contested by legal experts who suggest that, having already accepted the king’s nomination, Rajoy must now appear before the house.</p>
<p>Constitutionally, there is no specific time limit between the election and the first parliamentary vote for prime ministerial candidates. However, should Rajoy attend and lose – something which he is of course keen to avoid – he then has a maximum period of two months to continue negotiations to win the support of parliament. If this happens and he fails, an unprecedented third election would become necessary.</p>
<h2>Do you really want to do it all again?</h2>
<p>The Citizens’ Party has been making noises about abstaining from the vote. However, Rajoy is in <a href="http://www.elmundo.es/espana/2016/08/03/57a10d23468aeb8d488b459c.html">constant contact</a> with its members and increasingly likely to make concessions on issues such as <a href="http://politica.elpais.com/politica/2016/08/09/actualidad/1470730007_572777.html">political reform and regeneration</a> in order to secure favourable votes from them.</p>
<p>The Citizens – seeing themselves as key players in securing progress – are also attempting to persuade PSOE representatives to follow suit and at least abstain rather than voting against Rajoy, based on the promise of reform and a continued fight against corruption. That might enable the PP candidate Rajoy to win the vote and govern in a minority government.</p>
<p>PSOE leader Pedro Sánchez has so far refused to contemplate any vote other than one against a PP government. He believes abstention would effectively hand the role of opposition to the more radical Podemos and would see the socialists exiled to the back benches for a considerable time.</p>
<p>However, the party’s electoral performance under his leadership leaves Sánchez in a weak position. Pressure is mounting from unlikely sources – including the centre-left newspaper <em>El País</em> and former socialist Prime Ministers Felipe González and José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. Their inclination is to allow the PP to govern and take time to rebuild their own party, benefiting from holding the government to account. Sánchez may therefore be forced to change his stance or risk losing the backing of his own party.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, as all this political wrangling continues, important decisions need to be made. The EU agreed last month not to impose a fine on the Spanish for missing deficit targets, but only in exchange for further austerity measures. The Spanish people are growing increasingly frustrated as 2016 continues in economic and political instability and uncertainty. Unless Rajoy can win over his critics, a third election could be held later in the year. But the indications are that politicians on all sides will strive to avoid this and the undoubted chastisement of an impatient electorate.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63681/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mark McKinty does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>With two votes failing to produce a government, caretaker PM Mariano Rajoy is running out of options.Mark McKinty, Early Career Researcher in Spanish Studies, Queen's University BelfastLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/624642016-07-20T19:58:33Z2016-07-20T19:58:33ZSpain’s Civil War and the Americans who fought in it: a convoluted legacy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131278/original/image-20160720-31117-16v9rmp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Lincoln Brigade Memorial in San Francisco.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lincoln_Brigade_Memorial_San_Francisco.jpg#/media/File:Lincoln_Brigade_Memorial_San_Francisco.jpg">Tom Hilton</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Eighty years ago this week, in the Spanish North African enclave of Melilla, a group of right-wing generals staged a military coup, aimed at overthrowing Spain’s democratically elected government. </p>
<p>The July 1936 uprising unleashed what would come to be known – somewhat inaccurately – as the Spanish Civil War, a horrific conflagration that lasted almost three years. </p>
<p>The general consensus is that the war sent about a half-million Spaniards into exile, and another 500,000 to their deaths. Still today, more than <a href="http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=13800&LangID=S">100,000 Spaniards</a> lie in hundreds of <a href="http://mapadefosas.mjusticia.es/exovi_externo/CargarMapaFosas.htm">unmarked mass graves</a> strewn all over the Iberian peninsula.</p>
<p>Those mass graves still haunt contemporary Spain, and the question of how the Spanish Civil War ought to be commemorated is still far from buried, not only in Spain, but also in the U.S.</p>
<p>Just two weeks ago, when President Obama visited Spain, <a href="http://elpais.com/elpais/2016/07/11/inenglish/1468224007_858914.html">the gift he received</a> from Pablo Iglesias, the leader of the upstart left-wing political party Podemos, generated controversy. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"752152021105537024"}"></div></p>
<p>The present was a copy of the book <a href="http://zinnedproject.org/materials/the-lincoln-brigade/">“The Abraham Lincoln Brigade: A Picture History,”</a> and in it, Iglesias penned a dedication to President Obama: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The first Americans who came to Europe to fight against fascism were the men and women of the Lincoln Brigade. Please convey to the American people the gratitude felt by Spanish democrats for the antifascist example provided by these heroes.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>To understand the symbolism and the controversial nature of this gift, we must examine the convoluted legacy of that war whose 80th anniversary is commemorated this week. </p>
<h2>International war</h2>
<p>Pablo Iglesias’ inscription points to why the term “Civil War” is a misnomer when applied to Spain, 1936.</p>
<p>Though the Spanish war did pit Spaniard against Spaniard, the conflict quickly became international. Within days of the onset of the coup, Hitler and Mussolini intervened on the side of the insurgent generals. Before long, the Soviet Union would come to the aid of the Loyalists, also known as the Republican forces, who supported the government. </p>
<p>To the chagrin of Spain’s elected government, the U.K., France and the U.S., in full appeasement mode, decided to remain neutral. They even imposed – and enforced – <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-spanish-civil-war-a-very-short-introduction-9780192803771?cc=es&lang=en&">an embargo on the sale of arms to the Republic</a>. </p>
<p>Despite – or perhaps because of – that embargo, for the duration of the war, Spain would be on almost everybody’s mind in the U.S., whether they liked it or not. </p>
<p>Moviegoers, for example, eager to see newly released movies such as Charlie Chaplin’s “Modern Times” or Walt Disney’s “Snow White,” had to sit through newsreels depicting the new form of modern warfare being premiered in Spain. With melodramatic music swirling and swelling in the background, audiences would hear foreboding <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOUQIwDaQjc">newsreel narrators exclaiming</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“hundreds of thousands of noncombatants suffer the indescribable horrors of a continuous nightmare of fear and destruction.”</p>
</blockquote>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/FOUQIwDaQjc?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Second Year of Spain’s Civil War’ at 1'30"</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The new medium of photojournalism – <a href="http://time.com/3638051/capas-falling-soldier-the-modest-birth-of-an-iconic-picture/">Life Magazine</a> began circulation in 1936 – would bring fresh and horrifying images of the faraway conflict into the living rooms of average Americans. </p>
<p>Indeed, the war in Spain was felt with such immediacy in the U.S. that in an unprecedented display of international solidarity, some <a href="http://www.alba-valb.org/about-us/faqs/">2,800 American men and women</a> risked life and limb to travel to Spain and join the International Brigades: the 35,000 volunteers from 50 nations who were recruited and organized by the Communist International to defend Spain’s Republic. </p>
<p>The first contingent of Americans arrived to Spain in January of 1937, and they called themselves the “Abraham Lincoln Battalion,” invoking the leader who had successfully presided over a Civil War in their own country. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131163/original/image-20160719-8005-1dt4rlt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131163/original/image-20160719-8005-1dt4rlt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=343&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131163/original/image-20160719-8005-1dt4rlt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=343&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131163/original/image-20160719-8005-1dt4rlt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=343&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131163/original/image-20160719-8005-1dt4rlt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131163/original/image-20160719-8005-1dt4rlt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131163/original/image-20160719-8005-1dt4rlt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">U.S. volunteers in Spain, spring 1938.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">New York University's Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Ernest Hemingway’s portrait of Robert Jordan in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/books/99/07/04/specials/hemingway-forwhom.html">“For Whom The Bell Tolls”</a> would become the iconic image of an American volunteer in the Spanish Civil War. But if Hemingway’s protagonist was a solitary and rugged WASP from Montana, most of the nonfiction volunteers emerged from vast, politically active communities, which were decidedly <a href="http://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=2509">urban, working-class and ethnic</a>. </p>
<p>The closest thing to a rifle that most of the volunteers had ever handled before Spain was probably a picket sign. Unlike Hemingway’s outdoorsman, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUkRP_9o8Hg">real-life volunteers</a> were likely to have had more experience sleeping on tenement fire escapes than in field tents.</p>
<p>And for each individual who made the ultimate sacrifice of taking up arms in Spain, there were thousands of Loyalist sympathizers who stayed behind. <a href="http://www.mcny.org/exhibition/facing-fascism">They raised funds</a> to send medical supplies to the besieged government. They urged the FDR government to <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=00wEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA19&lpg=PA19&dq=Life+the+embargo+against+loyalist+spain&source=bl&ots=g38tFEOA6J&sig=wKBwhFnBc9BbfS7VkHFQ2I9qtSc&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiI24rX9P_NAhWG4yYKHR2XD1YQ6AEIJTAB#v=onepage&q=Life%20the%20embargo%20against%20loyalist%20spain&f=false">“Lift the embargo Against Loyalist Spain.”</a> They did their bit, as the popular slogan went, <a href="http://libraries.ucsd.edu/speccoll/visfront/oso.html">“to make Madrid the tomb of fascism.”</a> </p>
<h2>Anti-fascist war</h2>
<p>The Republic, hamstrung by the embargo, and splintered by internal differences, eventually fell. Franco’s troops marched into Madrid in April of 1939. Exactly six months later, Hitler invaded Poland and, <a href="http://time.com/3194657/world-war-ii-anniversary/">according to most standard accounts</a>, World War II was officially underway. </p>
<p>The horrors of that war help explain why the memory of Spain was subsequently eclipsed and almost forgotten. But there were other forces at work that would contribute to the transformation of how Spain would be remembered. </p>
<p>The fact is that, at the time, for many contemporary observers, the war in Spain was of a piece with the war against Hitler. </p>
<p>For starters, the Lincoln volunteers frequently depicted themselves as soldiers attempting to stave off another world war. In November, 1937, for example, volunteer <a href="http://www.alba-valb.org/resources/lessons/document-library/letter-from-hyman-katz-to-his-mother">Hy Katz</a> would write home to his mom:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“If we sit by and let them grow stronger by taking Spain, they will move on to France and will not stop there; and it won’t be long before they get to America. Realizing this, can I sit by and wait until the beasts get to my very door – until it is too late, and there is no one I can call on for help? And would I even deserve help from others when the trouble comes upon me, if I were to refuse help to those who need it today? If I permitted such a time to come – as a Jew and a progressive, I would be among the first to fall under the axe of the fascists; – all I could do then would be to curse myself and say, ‘Why didn’t I wake up when the alarm-clock rang?’”</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131147/original/image-20160719-8014-1a674yg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131147/original/image-20160719-8014-1a674yg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131147/original/image-20160719-8014-1a674yg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131147/original/image-20160719-8014-1a674yg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131147/original/image-20160719-8014-1a674yg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=612&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131147/original/image-20160719-8014-1a674yg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=612&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131147/original/image-20160719-8014-1a674yg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=612&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">First National Conference of the Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade n 1938. Robert Raven, in the middle, lost his eyesight while fighting.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:First_National_Conference_of_the_Veterans_of_the_Abraham_Lincoln_Brigade.jpg#/media/File:First_National_Conference_of_the_Veterans_of_the_Abraham_Lincoln_Brigade.jpg">Harris&Ewing, Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<blockquote>
</blockquote>
<p>In March of 1945, President Roosevelt himself, in a <a href="http://www.albavolunteer.org/2011/02/wikileaks-avant-la-wiki-fdr-on-franco-in-1945/">missive</a> to a diplomat, would characterize the continuity he perceived between the Spanish war and WWII, between the Axis and Franco’s regime:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Having been helped to power by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, and having patterned itself along totalitarian lines, the present regime in Spain is naturally the subject of distrust by a great many American citizens […] Most certainly we do not forget Spain’s official position with and assistance to our Axis enemies at a time when the fortunes of war were less favorable to us, nor can we disregard the activities, aims, organizations, and public utterances of the Falange [Spain’s Fascist party], both past and present.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Even a publication like “Stars and Stripes,” a semi-official organ of the U.S. Armed Forces, would, in its European edition of July 1945, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ALBAclassroom/photos/a.1546264042353855.1073741828.1543596215953971/1558352301145029/?type=3&theater">unhesitatingly affirm</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Nine years ago last week, the first blow was struck in World War II. On July 17, 1936, in the picturesque garrison town of Melilla, in Spanish Morocco, a Spanish general and his Moroccan regiments proclaimed civil war against the infant, five-year-old Republic and its government…” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In 1945, the general contours of how the Spanish Civil War was likely to be remembered into the future were quite clear: as part and parcel of the long struggle against international fascism, perhaps even as the opening salvo of World War II. </p>
<p>But a funny thing happened on the way to the fifties…</p>
<h2>Cold War</h2>
<p>Between 1945 and 1955, Francisco Franco managed to refashion himself completely. No longer an ally of the Axis – in fact, he claimed that he had never been such a thing. Franco repackaged himself as a stalwart anti-communist, ruling over a strategic land mass at the corner of Africa and Europe. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Franco-Biography-Paul-Preston/dp/0465025153">And it worked</a>.</p>
<p>If, for FDR, Franco had been an illegitimate ruler, for Truman and Eisenhower, the generalissimo would become a crucial partner in the war between “freedom” and “communism.” Truman and <a href="https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1243&dat=19591219&id=5DtYAAAAIBAJ&sjid=XPcDAAAAIBAJ&pg=1234,6171957&hl=en">Eisenhower</a> helped end the Franco regime’s post-war diplomatic ostracism. In exchange, the U.S. got to build <a href="http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/sp1953.asp">an archipelago of Cold War military bases</a> on Spanish soil. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131150/original/image-20160719-7906-1oxpwlr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131150/original/image-20160719-7906-1oxpwlr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131150/original/image-20160719-7906-1oxpwlr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131150/original/image-20160719-7906-1oxpwlr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131150/original/image-20160719-7906-1oxpwlr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=532&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131150/original/image-20160719-7906-1oxpwlr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=532&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131150/original/image-20160719-7906-1oxpwlr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=532&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">General Franco and President Eisenhower in Madrid in 1959.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Franco_eisenhower_1959_madrid.jpg">US National Archives</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As Franco morphed from “Adolph’s Man in Madrid” to “Ike’s Man in Madrid,” and as the Spanish Civil War came to be viewed more and more through the retrospective lens of the Cold War, much history would get rewritten, on both sides of the Atlantic. </p>
<p>Franco actively <a href="http://www.albavolunteer.org/2011/02/the-resynchronization-of-a-regime-1940-1950/">destroyed or altered evidence</a> of his dalliance with the Axis. And in the U.S., as historian <a href="http://www.kentstateuniversitypress.com/2014/from-guernica-to-human-rights/">Peter Carroll reminds us</a>, it was precisely in anti-communist crusader <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/joseph-mccarthy">Joseph McCarthy’s</a> 1950s that George Orwell’s <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Homage-Catalonia-George-Orwell/dp/0156421178">“Homage to Catalonia”</a> became a fixture of the Cold War canon. Orwell’s book was a powerful indictment of the Communist Party’s ruthless behavior in the war, and it was used to cast a shadow over the experiences and motivations of the Lincoln Brigade. </p>
<p>Before long, in both Spain and the U.S., the Spanish Civil War would be talked about not so much as an early battle of the anti-fascist World War II, but rather as a <a href="http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1812421-wolfftestimony.html">chapter in the annals of communist mischief and perfidy</a>. </p>
<p>The actions of American volunteers, rather than being seen as heroic and prescient, would become suspect. And that is why, even 80 years on, Iglesias’s gift to Obama could still seem laden with symbolism and wrapped in controversy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62464/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James D. Fernandez is Vice-Chair of the Board of Governors of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives (ALBA).</span></em></p>For many contemporary observers, the Spanish Civil War was seen as very much of a piece with the war against Hitler and Mussolini. But then things changed. Why?James D. Fernandez, Professor of Spanish and Portuguese, Vice-President, Board of Governors, Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives, New York UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/614652016-06-27T16:25:11Z2016-06-27T16:25:11ZOnce again a Spanish election saves the establishment and deals Podemos a blow<p>Judging by the results of Spain’s <a href="http://www.thelocal.es/20160626/spain-election-results">second general election in six months</a>, held just three days after the Brexit referendum, Spanish opinion pollsters are as unreliable as their British counterparts.</p>
<p>Although all polls correctly predicted that Mariano Rajoy’s Popular Party (PP) would once again obtain the largest number of seats, almost all of them confidently forecast that leftist insurgents Podemos, this time in alliance with the post-Communist United Left (IU) under the name of Unidos Podemos (UP), would condemn the Socialist PSOE to third place, and thus to irrelevance. </p>
<p>But while the PP was able to improve on its performance last time around by picking up 14 more seats for a total of 137, UP obtained precisely the same number of seats – 71 – as Podemos and IU did separately in the election of six months ago, which failed to yield a government.</p>
<p>In fact, the UP drew more than 1m votes fewer than its two component parties did at the last election, and it failed to live up to predictions that it would overtake the flagging socialists of the PSOE.</p>
<p>The other relative newcomer to the Spanish political arena, Ciudadanos, obtained perhaps the most disappointing result of all the major parties. Even though its vote declined by less than 1% it won just 32 seats, down from the 40 it netted in December. The party’s leader, <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/spain-elections-albert-rivera-is-the-new-boy-in-spanish-politics-and-kingmaker-in-waiting-a6773391.html">Albert Rivera</a>, has complained that his party was unduly punished by an unjust electoral system.</p>
<h2>The establishment survives</h2>
<p>In the end, the PP vote has not only remained solid, but has in fact grown since the last election. Although the party continues to be mired in a seemingly never-ending torrent of <a href="http://www.thelocal.es/20160128/nine-spanish-corruption-scandals-that-will-take-your-breath-away">corruption allegations</a> and Mariano Rajoy consistently obtains the <a href="https://theconversation.com/spain-steels-itself-for-another-election-after-months-with-no-government-60675">worst ratings</a> of any of the leaders of the four main parties, the PP’s status as Spain’s dominant party has not been seriously challenged since it entered office five years ago. </p>
<p>This raises the question of whether the PP would be even more successful under alternative leadership. Although still well short of an overall majority, the party is now in a position to govern Spain as a minority administration, since there’s hardly an appetite for a third general election within a year. The question for the PP is whether a spell in government can offer the party the chance of a much-needed renewal.</p>
<p>For the PSOE, meanwhile, the result is something of a relief, given that many had written off its chances of withstanding the challenge from the left. But even though it’s managed to survive as the second largest party, the PSOE is still unmistakably in decline, blighted by the same malaise that’s <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21695887-centre-left-sharp-decline-across-europe-rose-thou-art-sick">eroding social democratic parties all over Europe</a>. </p>
<p>Faced with what will inevitably be a relatively weak government, the PSOE will have the next four years to burnish its credentials as a more credible alternative government capable of stepping in – especially if the Spanish people finally draws the line at the PP’s seeming incapacity to rein in the corruption within its ranks. </p>
<p>Party leader Pedro Sánchez can also take heart from the fact that his main leadership challenger, Andalusian premier Susana Díaz, hardly covered herself with glory when the PP overtook the PSOE in her home region.</p>
<h2>Left out</h2>
<p>Further left, things are rather more bleak. Podemos, in its latest guise as part of UP, has good reason to feel disappointed. </p>
<p>Whatever their criticism of swashbuckling leader Pablo Iglesias over the last two years, Podemos’s opponents have been unable to deny Iglesias’s aptitude in the area of political strategy and marketing which has taken his party from strength to strength. Given the disappointing result, this reputation for deftness will be reassessed and Iglesias will be a diminished figure. </p>
<p>He squandered much of his cachet with the electorate between the two elections. He had it in his power to evict the PP from office in March, but he instead chose to vote with Rajoy against a PSOE-led government. He may now rue that decision, as well as his choice to form an alliance with the post-Communists instead of trying to broaden Podemos’s appeal across the political spectrum, as advocated by his lieutenant, Íñigo Errejón.</p>
<p>Albert Rivera’s Ciudadanos, meanwhile, will be deeply despondent at its poor result. Polling has indicated that his party’s voters are far from loyal, and it appears that a significant proportion of them has gravitated back to the PP. The animosity between Rivera and Rajoy has been plain in the wrangling since last December, so it remains to be seen whether Ciudadanos will provide the support that the PP government requires over the next four years.</p>
<p>Over the coming weeks the PP will nevertheless try to secure Ciudadanos’s backing, together with that of the Basque Nationalist party, the PNV, which has five deputies, and that of the Canaries Coalition, which has a single seat. If it can wrangle their support, the PP will have the support of 175 deputies, just one short of an overall majority. Although it may take two votes to get Rajoy endorsed as prime minister, a PP government is now on the cards.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/61465/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Spain couldn’t form a government after its last election, so it had to try again. And it looks like the radicals are shut out.Paul Kennedy, Lecturer in Spanish and European Studies, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/606752016-06-22T08:31:16Z2016-06-22T08:31:16ZSpain steels itself for another election after months with no government<p>At Spain’s most recent general election in December 2015, the electorate voted overwhelmingly for change yet the results produced the most fragmented parliament since 1977. No party secured a majority, and none has since been able to form a government. The numbers <a href="https://theconversation.com/just-a-reminder-that-spain-still-doesnt-have-a-government-55884">simply don’t add up</a>. </p>
<p>The most obvious combination was an alliance between the largest party, Mariano Rajoy’s Partido Popular (PP), and the smaller, centre-right <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/10/centre-party-ciudadanos-throws-spanish-election-results-into-question">Ciudadanos</a> (Citizens) party, who together had 162 seats, just 13 short of the 176 needed for an overall majority. But this was scotched by Ciudadanos’s leader <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/newsworld/europe/spain-elections-albert-rivera-is-the-new-boy-in-spanish-politics-and-kingmaker-in-waiting-a6773391.html">Albert Rivera</a>, who was reluctant to ally himself with a leader and party tainted by <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/party-corruption-undermines-mariano-rajoy-survival-strategy-spain-president-popular-party-pp-partido-popular-ciudadanos-podemos-psoe-pedro-sanchez-rivera-iglesias/">corruption scandals</a>. </p>
<p>A rather less plausible proposal for a coalition between Ciudadanos and Pedro Sánchez’s <a href="http://www.demsoc.org/2014/05/20/spanish-socialist-workers-party-psoe/">Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party</a> (PSOE) was effectively blocked in parliament, where the 69 deputies from the left-wing collective Podemos <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/podemos-members-reject-socialist-ciudadanos-coalition-pablo-iglesias/">voted it down</a>. </p>
<p>The only other feasible coalition option, an <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/podemos-proposes-leftist-coalition-for-spain-mariano-rajoy-pablo-iglesias/">alliance</a> of the PSOE, the United Left (IU) and Podemos, would have been enough to form a left-wing minority government – but this was scuppered when Podemos insisted that any deal should include a referendum on Catalan independence. </p>
<p>The spirit of consensus and compromise that Spanish political elites prided themselves on since the transition to democracy in the 1970s seems to have foundered. The question now is whether fresh elections will be capable of breaking the deadlock and producing a viable governing majority. But there are at least some indications that there may be a way out of this unprecedented impasse.</p>
<h2>Come together</h2>
<p>Podemos, IU and several other minor left-wing parties have now formed an alliance called <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/12/unidos-podemos-spain-election-leftwing-alliance-united-left">Unidos Podemos</a> (United We Can), which they hope to establish as the main alternative to the right-wing PP. </p>
<p>There are signs that it might just be working. Recent opinion polls show that Unidos Podemos has overtaken the PSOE nationally: in a recent <a href="http://elpais.com/elpais/2016/06/10/media/1465583144_175047.html">Metroscopia survey</a>, the PP’s estimated share of the vote was 28.9%, followed by Unidos Podemos on 25.4%, the PSOE on 20.8% and Ciudadanos on 15.9%. </p>
<p>These numbers seem to show Ciudadanos and the PSOE getting stranded in the centre ground as voters become more polarised, gravitating to Unidos Podemos on the left and the PP on the right. Yet both the PSOE and Ciudadanos could also have the potential to play a crucial role in any coalition government. </p>
<p>This is where leadership comes in. Support for parties is one thing, but support for leaders is something else. For example, the Metroscopia poll shows that Ciudadanos’s Rivera is the leader whom other parties’ supporters are least put off by, something that might help him lead his party Ciudadanos into a coalition deal. </p>
<p>Conversely, the PP’s Rajoy draws deep antipathy from other parties’ supporters. According to the same poll, the net difference between voters (from all parties) who approve of Mariano Rajoy and those who disapprove is -40, whereas for Rivera it is 0. Pedro Sánchez’s net rating is -37. The surprise perhaps is the net rating of -45 for Pablo Iglesias, the leader of Podemos. The <a href="http://datos.cis.es/pdf/Es3141mar_A.pdf">CIS May Barometer</a>, meanwhile also shows Rajoy and Iglesias lagging behind Rivera.</p>
<p>This is less of a problem for Iglesias than Rajoy, who’s seen as the epitome of the “old politics” which voters rejected so roundly last December. When Metroscopia asked if, as a condition of forming a coalition, the PP should change its leader if it wins the most votes, 74% of those asked said it should. Even 57% of PP voters would be content to see Rajoy go.</p>
<p>As for Iglesias, his poor standing relative to his party’s might mean his days as leader of Unidos Podemos are numbered. One possible successor is <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/26/ada-colau-barcelona-most-radical-mayor-in-the-world">Ada Colau</a>, currently mayor of Barcelona. Given her leadership in the <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/opensecurity/carlos-delcl%C3%B3s/victims-no-longer-spain%E2%80%99s-anti-eviction-movement">Platform for those Affected by Mortgages</a> (PAH), she’s is seen as embodying the spirit of the anti-austerity <a href="http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Spains-Indignados-20160514-0030.html">15-M movement</a>, also known as Los Indignados, a vital stimulant for the electorate’s hunger for change. </p>
<p>The PP’s resounding victory in 2011 seemed to prove that the 15M protests had amounted to nothing. Its remaining foot-soldiers will be hoping to keep the desire for change alive, but optimism, it seems, is not forthcoming. </p>
<p>An overwhelming 67.4% of those asked in the CIS pre-election barometer believed that the PP would gain the most votes of any party. If that happens, and if Rivera rethinks his scruples about the PP to join it in coalition, it could make Ciudadanos the real face of Spain’s “new politics” – and the two parties could leave the apparently galvanised Left out in the electoral cold once again.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/60675/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Georgina Blakeley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As Spain found out at its last election, voting for change is one thing, but achieving it is quite another.Georgina Blakeley, Senior Lecturer in Politics, The Open UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/558692016-04-29T22:44:48Z2016-04-29T22:44:48ZIn defence of left-wing populism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114819/original/image-20160311-11277-ap5ubd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There is no better alternative than the rise of the populist left for Europe and beyond.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.thepeoplesassembly.org.uk/graphics_photography">The People's Assembly Against Austerity</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>This article is part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/democracy-futures">Democracy Futures</a> series, a <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/democracy-futures/">joint global initiative</a> between The Conversation and the <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/">Sydney Democracy Network</a>. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies in the 21st century.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>We are witnessing a crisis of representative democracy in most European countries. As I argued in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Political-Thinking-Action-Chantal-Mouffe/dp/0415305217">“On the Political”</a>, this is the outcome of the “consensus at the centre” established under the neoliberal hegemony between centre-right and centre-left parties. </p>
<p>This post-political situation has led to the disappearance from political discourse of the idea that there is an alternative to neoliberal globalisation. This forecloses the possibility of agonistic debate and drastically reduces the choice offered to citizens through elections.</p>
<p>There are people who celebrate this consensus. They offer it as a sign that adversarial politics has finally become obsolete so that democracy can mature. I disagree.</p>
<h2>A vote but not a voice</h2>
<p>The “post-political” situation has created a favourable terrain for populist parties that claim to represent all who feel unheard and ignored in the existing representative system. Their appeal is to “the people” against the uncaring “political establishment” that, having abandoned the popular sectors, concerns itself exclusively with the interests of the elites.</p>
<p>The problem, however, is that in general the populism of those parties has a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/11/world/europe/voter-insecurities-feed-rise-of-right-leaning-populist-politicians.html?_r=0">right-wing character</a>. Often, the way they bring together a series of heterogeneous social demands is by using a xenophobic rhetoric. This constructs the unity of “the people” through the exclusion of immigrants.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114814/original/image-20160311-11285-7tdfo6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114814/original/image-20160311-11285-7tdfo6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114814/original/image-20160311-11285-7tdfo6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114814/original/image-20160311-11285-7tdfo6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114814/original/image-20160311-11285-7tdfo6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114814/original/image-20160311-11285-7tdfo6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114814/original/image-20160311-11285-7tdfo6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Members of the People’s Assembly Against Austerity in the UK protest against the right’s marginalisation of immigrants.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">David Holt/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So, the crisis of representative democracy is not a crisis of representative democracy per se but a crisis of its current post-democratic incarnation. As Spain’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/spain-dispatches-from-the-frontline-of-the-indignados-movement-7091">Indignados</a> protest:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We have a vote but we do not have a voice.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>On face value, it seems the best way to restore the partisan nature of politics and thereby remedy the lack of agonistic debate is by reviving the adversarial dimension of the left-right opposition that “third way” politics has evacuated. However, this is simply not going to be possible in most countries. Another strategy is needed.</p>
<p>When we examine the state of the “centre-left” parties in Europe we realise they have become too complicit in the workings of neoliberal hegemony to offer an alternative. This became evident during the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_debt_crisis">crisis of 2008</a>. Even in their window of opportunity, these parties were unable to regain initiative and use the power of the state to put forward a more progressive politics. </p>
<p>Since then, the centre-left’s compromise with the system has deepened. These parties have not only accepted but also contributed to the politics of austerity. The resulting disastrous measures have brought misery and unemployment in Europe.</p>
<p>If the “centre-left” advocates what Stuart Hall calls “<a href="http://www.mas.org.uk/uploads/100flowers/The%20neo-liberal%20revolution%20by%20Stuart%20Hall.pdf">a social liberal version of neoliberalism</a>”, it is no surprise that resistance to those measures, when it finally came from the progressive side, could only be expressed through protest movements like the Indignados and <a href="https://theconversation.com/rethinking-the-occupy-movement-7121">Occupy</a>, which called for the rejection of representative institutions. </p>
<p>While these movements brought to the fore the widespread potential of dissatisfaction with the neoliberal order, their refusal to engage with political institutions limited their impact. Without any articulation with parliamentary politics, they soon began to lose their dynamism.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114816/original/image-20160311-11302-1khl2z2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114816/original/image-20160311-11302-1khl2z2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114816/original/image-20160311-11302-1khl2z2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114816/original/image-20160311-11302-1khl2z2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114816/original/image-20160311-11302-1khl2z2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114816/original/image-20160311-11302-1khl2z2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114816/original/image-20160311-11302-1khl2z2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The left’s recent refusal to engage with political institutions has left it struggling for long-term representation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Hernán Piñera/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Progressive politics finds a new way</h2>
<p>Fortunately, two exceptions stand out. They indicate how a new progressive politics <a href="https://theconversation.com/are-you-ready-for-a-new-kind-of-left-wing-politics-33511">can be envisaged</a>. </p>
<p>In Greece, <a href="https://theconversation.com/syrizas-not-so-radical-politics-and-europes-economic-choice-36229">Syriza</a>, born of a coalition of different left movements around <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synaspismos">Synaspismos</a>, the former eurocommunist party of the interior, succeeded in creating a new type of radical party. Its objective was to challenge neoliberal hegemony through parliamentary politics. The aim was clearly not the demise of liberal democratic institutions but rather their transformation into vehicles for the expression of popular demands.</p>
<p>In Spain, the meteoric rise of <a href="https://theconversation.com/postcard-from-spain-where-now-for-the-quiet-revolution-43779">Podemos in 2014</a> was due to the capacity of a group of young intellectuals to take advantage of the terrain created by the Indignados to organise a party-movement. The group intended to break the stalemate of the consensual politics established through the transition to democracy but whose exhaustion was now evident. Their strategy was to create a popular collective will by constructing a frontier between the establishment elites (la Casta) and “the people”.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=704&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=704&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=704&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=884&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=884&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118298/original/image-20160412-15861-spkp45.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=884&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Pablo Iglesias, Podemos secretary-general since 2014, was a lecturer in political science.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/culturaargentina/16104083334/in/photolist-qx4CVd-pcF8Mt-qrN4rU-rcGTCz-okacrN-qrNH4u-pRSMxA-tjRT13-nYGgcE-pcrH9Y-pcrGoQ-p7aX3o-pRZEBM-pRZFaa-oBDN7K-pRRWwC-oBDJuf-oBnPwB-pcrGGf-pS1T9X-q9r6Fz-oBDCyX-oncJQx-oDtaCu-oFqxJ6-oncDNi-onb3Es-onc2eN-oDFBye-oBDY7q-onbYAo-oDoWAT-oDs6Bf-oDoZWR-onbFLD-oDsV6U-onb3hU-oDp1Q4-onbNMc-onbdFt-pRZF3X-pcrHku-pS1TP4-q9fND4-q9r7s4-pRZEKx-q79CMu-onbLmk-onbkoW-oFqzo8">flickr/Ministerio de Cultura de la Nación Argentina</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In many European countries we now encounter what can be called “a populist situation”. A vibrant democratic politics can no longer be conceived in terms of the traditional left-right axis. </p>
<p>This is due not only to the post-political blurring of this type of frontier, but also to the fact that the transformations of capitalism brought about by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-Fordism">post-Fordism</a> and the dominance of financial capital are at the origin of a multiplicity of new democratic demands. These can no longer be addressed by simply reactivating the left-right confrontation: they require the establishment of a different type of frontier.</p>
<p>What is at stake is the connection of a variety of democratic demands with the potential to create a “collective will” struggling for another hegemony. It is clear that the democratic demands in our society cannot all be expressed through a “verticalist” party form that subordinates mass movements. </p>
<p>Even if it was reformed, it is not always possible or desirable to force democratic demands expressed through horizontal social movements into the hierarchical verticalist mode.</p>
<p>We need a new form of political organisation that can articulate both modes, where the unity of progressive people will be constituted not, as in the case of right-wing populism, by the exclusion of immigrants, but by the determination of an adversary represented by neoliberal forces. This is what I understand by “<a href="https://theconversation.com/populism-and-democracy-friend-or-foe-rising-stars-deepen-dilemma-39695">left-wing populism</a>”.</p>
<h2>Reclaiming populism for the left</h2>
<p>“Populist” is usually used in a negative way. This is a mistake, because populism represents an important dimension of democracy. Democracy understood as “power of the people” requires the existence of a “demos” – a “people”. Instead of rejecting the term populist, we should reclaim it.</p>
<p>The agonistic struggle is more than a struggle between conflicting hegemonic projects. It is a struggle about the construction of the people.</p>
<p>It is important for the left to grasp the nature of this struggle. Seen in terms of a “collective will”, “the people” are always a political construct.</p>
<p>There is no “we” without a “they”. It is how the adversary is defined that will determine the identity of the people. In this relationship lies one of the main differences between right-wing and left-wing populism. </p>
<p>Many of the demands that exist in a society do not have an essentialist reactionary or progressive character. It is how they are to be articulated that determines their identity.</p>
<p>This brings to the fore the role that representation plays in the constitution of a political force. Representation is not a one-way process going from the represented to the representative, because it is the very identity of the represented that is at stake in the process. </p>
<p>This is the central flaw of those who argue that representative democracy is an oxymoron and that a real democracy should be direct or “presentist”. What needs to be challenged is the lack of alternatives offered to the citizens, not the idea of representation itself.</p>
<p>A pluralist democratic society cannot exist without representation. To begin with, identities are never already given. They are always produced through identification; this process of identification is a process of representation. </p>
<p>Collective political subjects are created through representation. They do not exist beforehand. Every assertion of a political identity is thereby interior, not exterior, to the process of representation.</p>
<p>Second, in a democratic society where pluralism is not envisaged in the harmonious anti-political form and where the ever-present possibility of antagonism is taken into account, representative institutions, by giving form to the division of society, play a crucial role in allowing for the institutionalisation of this conflictual dimension.</p>
<p>Such a role can only be fulfilled through the availability of an agonistic confrontation. The central problem with our current post-political model is the absence of such confrontation. This is not going to be remedied through “horizontalist” practices of local autonomy, self-management and direct democracy that turn away from institutions and the state.</p>
<h2>The place of passion in politics</h2>
<p>Another important aspect of left-wing populism is that it acknowledges the central role played by affects and passions in politics. I use “passions” to refer to the common affects at play in the collective forms of identification that constitute political identities. Passions perform a central role in the construction of a collective will at the core of any left-wing populist project.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=773&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=773&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=773&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118300/original/image-20160412-15895-3qrai2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Marine Le Pen has harnessed political passions to establish her right-wing National Front as a political force in France.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/68651617@N07/7421302448">flickr/Blandine Le Cain</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The attempt by so many liberal-democratic political theorists to eliminate passion from politics – they refuse to accept its crucial role – is no doubt one of the reasons for their hostility to populism. This is a serious mistake. Only because this terrain has been abandoned to right-wing populists have they been able to make such progress in recent years.</p>
<p>Fortunately, thanks to the development of left-wing populist movements, this could change. It is urgent to understand that the only way to counter right-wing populism is through left-wing populism. </p>
<p>I am convinced we are witnessing a profound transformation of the political frontiers that used to be dominant in Europe. The crucial confrontation is going to be between left-wing populism and right-wing populism.</p>
<h2>Crisis and opportunity in Europe</h2>
<p>The future of democracy depends on the development of a left-wing populism that could revive interest in politics by mobilising passions and fomenting an agonistic debate about the availability of an alternative to the neoliberal order driving de-democratisation. This mobilisation should take place at the European level. To be victorious, a left-wing populist project needs to foster a left-wing populist movement fighting for a democratic refoundation of Europe.</p>
<p>We urgently need an agonistic confrontation about the future of the European Union. Many people on the left are beginning to doubt the possibility of constructing, within the EU framework, an alternative to the neoliberal model of globalisation. </p>
<p>The EU is increasingly perceived as being an intrinsically neoliberal project that cannot be reformed. It seems vain to try transforming its institutions; the only solution is to exit. Such a pessimistic view is no doubt the result of the fact that all attempts to challenge the prevalent neoliberal rules are constantly presented as anti-European attacks against the EU’s very existence.</p>
<p>Without the possibility of making legitimate criticisms of current neoliberal policies, it is unsurprising that a growing number of people are <a href="https://theconversation.com/rise-of-euroscepticism-masks-general-apathy-about-eu-vote-25984">turning to Euroscepticism</a>. They believe the European project itself is the cause of our predicament. They fear more European integration can only mean a reinforcement of neoliberal hegemony.</p>
<p>Such a position endangers the survival of the European project. The only way to counter it is by creating the conditions for a democratic contestation within the EU.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114812/original/image-20160311-11274-hds1pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114812/original/image-20160311-11274-hds1pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=386&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114812/original/image-20160311-11274-hds1pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=386&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114812/original/image-20160311-11274-hds1pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=386&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114812/original/image-20160311-11274-hds1pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=485&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114812/original/image-20160311-11274-hds1pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=485&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114812/original/image-20160311-11274-hds1pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=485&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rather than surrender to Euroscepticism, it’s possible to rebuild popular support for the European project by taking it in a new democratic direction.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dave Kellam/flickr</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>At the root of the disaffection with the EU is the absence of a project that could foster a strong identification among the citizens of Europe and provide an objective to mobilise their political passions in a democratic direction. </p>
<p>The EU is currently composed of consumers, not of citizens. It has been mainly constructed around a common market and has never really created an European common will. So it is no wonder that, in times of economic crisis and austerity, some people will begin to question its utility. They forget its important achievement of bringing peace to the continent.</p>
<p>It is a mistake to present this crisis as a crisis of the European project. It is a crisis of its neoliberal incarnation. This is why current attempts to solve it with more neoliberal policies cannot succeed.</p>
<p>A better approach would be to foster popular allegiance to the EU by developing a sociopolitical project that offers an alternative to the prevailing neoliberal model of recent decades. This model is in crisis but a different one is not yet available. We could say, following Gramsci, that we are witnessing an “organic crisis” where the old model cannot continue but the new one is not yet born.</p>
<p>The only way to counter the rise of anti-European sentiments and stop the growth of right-wing populist parties that excite them is to unite European citizens around a political project that gives them hope for a different, more democratic future. </p>
<p>Establishing a synergy between left parties and social movements at the European level would enable the emergence of a collective will that aims to radically transform the existing order.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55869/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chantal Mouffe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The future of democracy depends on developing a left-wing populism that can revive public interest by mobilising political passions in the fight for an alternative to neoliberal de-democratisation.Chantal Mouffe, Professor of Political Theory, University of WestminsterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/577062016-04-14T09:34:58Z2016-04-14T09:34:58ZAre France’s #NuitDebout protests the start of a new political movement?<p>It’s a familiar script for anyone who knows recent French history: the government rolls out a reform, citizens react with outrage, and Paris is filled with demonstrations and strikes. </p>
<p>The current turmoil began in March, when President François Hollande proposed reworking the country’s <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/09/end-of-term-protests-threaten-francois-hollande-labour-legacy">labour code</a>. Known as the “El Khomri law” after the minister responsible, Myriam El Khomri, the reform shares some elements with earlier attempts – including providing companies with more flexibility in hiring and firing – but the results have been the same: widespread resistance.</p>
<p>This started with an <a href="https://www.change.org/p/loi-travail-non-merci-myriamelkhomri-loitravailnonmerci">online petition</a> that gathered more than a million signatures in two weeks, and has since shifted into the public realm. <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/apr/08/nuit-debout-protesters-occupy-french-cities-in-a-revolutionary-call-for-change">Thousands</a> of protestors have occupied the city’s Place de la République with all-night meetings and debates, and the protest is now known as “<em>Nuit Debout</em>” (roughly, “standing up all night”). </p>
<p>The ambition is to create a shared space that allows citizens to exchange stories, express shared outrage, and imagine a better world. Recently, the movement has spread beyond Paris to <a href="http://www.nicematin.com/index.php/politique/les-visages-de-la-contestation-du-mouvement-nuit-debout-a-nice-40449">Nice</a>, <a href="http://www.sudouest.fr/2016/04/11/le-pari-des-citoyens-noctambules-2327158-2780.php">Bordeaux</a> and <a href="https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/france/060416/lyon-une-nuit-debout-est-improvisee-sous-un-pont">Lyon</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"719976231891034112"}"></div></p>
<p>In early 2006, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/16/AR2006031601908.html">similar protests</a> broke out in France against a proposed “first-hire contract”. Students, unions and left-wing political parties united against the proposed contract, and after months of protests, then-prime minister Dominique de Villepin <a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/85c031e6-c8f7-11da-b642-0000779e2340.html">abandoned the idea</a>.</p>
<p>In <em>Nuit Debout</em> key roles have been played by author, filmmaker and activist François Ruffin, whose film <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/13/arts/international/the-film-merci-patron-emerges-as-a-rallying-cry-in-france.html">Merci Patron!</a> has been a touchstone for the protesters, and economist Frédéric Lordon. There are echoes of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/sep/19/occupy-wall-street-financial-system">Occupy Wall Street</a> and Spain’s <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/apr/28/spain-indignados-protests-state-of-mind"><em>indignados</em></a> (“the outraged”). In Spain, the protest movement gave rise to the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/31/podemos-revolution-radical-academics-changed-european-politics">political party Podemos</a>, which made significant gains in the December 2015 election and is now playing a key role in the negotiations to <a href="https://theconversation.com/just-a-reminder-that-spain-still-doesnt-have-a-government-55884">form a national government</a>.</p>
<p>And as the protests have grown in France, supporters have gone beyond the initial objective of forcing the withdrawal of the labour law, as happened in 2006, to the idea of launching a wider political movement.</p>
<h2>The law that started it all</h2>
<p>Of course, simple frustration isn’t enough to launch a mass mobilisation – a trigger is needed. The proposed labour reform allowed the protests to spread beyond the core group of <a href="https://theconversation.com/qui-sont-les-organisations-etudiantes-quel-est-leur-role-et-qui-representent-elles-56311">high-school students</a>, activists and labour unions, and to gain visibility in the mass media. The law also provided the framework for a regular series of demonstrations, allowing the movement to establish a cohesive form. As <a href="http://lexpansion.lexpress.fr/actualite-economique/frederic-lordon-l-economiste-qui-dit-merci-a-la-loi-el-khomri_1779193.html">Frédéric Lordon said</a> during the first <em>Nuit Debout</em> on March 31:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We will never be able to sufficiently thank the El Khomri law for having woken us from our political slumber.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>What distinguishes social movements from mere protests is that they have a larger purpose, not one specific demand. From the first meetings of university and high school students on March 9, the El Khomri law served as an opportunity to express general indignation. In protest leaflets, students called for resistance “against government policy” rather than just this one bill. During marches, protesters expressed their disappointment with the political left in general and the ruling Socialist Party in particular.</p>
<h2>Standing up to the elites</h2>
<p>The students denounced the collusion between the country’s political and economic elites, much like the Occupy movements that swept the world in 2011. They joined many activists, intellectuals, and progressive politicians from the “left of the left”, a political movement that forced a <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/16/french-prime-minister-vote-of-confidence-parliament">vote of confidence</a> against Prime Minister Manuel Valls in 2014.</p>
<p>The lack of viable political alternatives in France makes it a particularly favourable time to mobilise outrage and propose a more participatory democracy, centred around the people. French citizens no longer identify with national and European political elites. The system appears to them to be “democracy without choice”, where voting for either the left-wing Socialist Party or the right-wing Republicans barely changes the government’s social and economic policies.</p>
<p>Debates over finance minister Emmanuel Macron’s <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/11/business/france-labor-market-jobs-unemployment.html">economic programme</a> (passed only with a manoeuvre that sidestepped a parliamentary vote) only strengthened this conviction. As did the failed proposed constitutional amendment to <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/30/francois-hollande-drops-plan-to-revoke-citizenship-of-dual-national-terrorists">strip French citizenship</a> from convicted terrorists with dual nationality.</p>
<p>With disappointment in the government widespread, and established leftist movements such as the Green Party and the <em>Front de Gauche</em> torn by internal dissent, the only option for progressive citizens has been to express disapproval and build “another policy” from the streets. In <em>Nuit Debout</em>, as in the Occupy camps, it has all been about “getting our act together as citizens” to question the relevance of representative democracy.</p>
<h2>A youth with no future?</h2>
<p>During the events on the Place de la République and on social networks (<em><a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23OnVautMieuxQueCa&src=typd">#OnVautMieuxQueCa</a></em>, <em><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NuitDebout?src=hash">#NuitDebout</a></em>, <em><a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=loitravail&src=typd">#LoiTravail</a></em>, <em><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/32mars">#32mars</a></em>), young people express their fears of being “deprived of their future”.</p>
<p>If Occupy, the <em>indignados</em> and <em>Nuit Debout</em> aren’t specifically youth movements, young people are the driving force behind them. Through these demonstrations, they affirm and express themselves as individuals, as a force for democracy, willing to re-imagine the world. This all-encompassing desire can be seen embodied in a <a href="https://twitter.com/marillerpat/status/706267757965344768">single tweet</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We need to think of tomorrow’s society, with humanism, freedom, equality, fraternity.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Where next?</h2>
<p>So will <em>Nuit Debout</em> fizzle like Occupy or follow the same path as <em>Los Indignados</em>, which sparked political change in Spain? </p>
<p>While both movements refused to engage in the electoral process, some of their activists chose to do so. The campaigns of <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/jeremy-corbyn">Jeremy Corbyn</a>, elected to the head of the British Labour Party in 2015, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/bernie-sanders">Bernie Sanders</a>, currently running against Hillary Clinton to be the Democratic nominee for US president, have been empowered by young activists angry and frustrated with politics as usual. </p>
<p>The rise of the Podemos political party in Spain was both the continuation and inversion of the <em>indignados</em> movement: it showed that political change is possible, but only by moving from <a href="http://www.laviedesidees.fr/Espagne-de-l-indignation-a-l-organisation.html">indignation to organisation</a>. To do so, Pablo Iglesias, secretary-general of Podemos since 2014, betrayed certain core values of the <em>indignados</em>, including its leaderless structure and the requirement that decisions be made by the largest possible number of participants.</p>
<p>While <em>Nuit Debout</em> borrows some of the Spanish movement’s codes, the political situation in France and Europe is quite different from 2011, with the rise of far-right parties and security concerns. <em>Nuit Debout’s</em> centre on the Place de la République is where the huge public memorials were held after <em>Charlie Hebdo</em> and the November 13 attacks. Some politicians, including former prime minister and presidential candidate François Fillon, have criticised the movement as being a <a href="http://www.lemonde.fr/politique/article/2016/04/10/francois-fillon-critique-le-mouvement-nuit-debout-tolere-en-plein-etat-d-urgence_4899572_823448.html">security risk</a>. </p>
<p>With France’s recently extended <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/22/france-considers-extending-national-state-of-emergency">state of emergency</a>, authorities haven’t just targeted potential terrorists. Muslims and young people are regularly brutalised by the police, and some student demonstrations have been <a href="http://www.liberation.fr/france/2016/04/05/un-policier-m-a-dit-que-ca-lui-faisait-plaisir-de-nous-matraquer_1444126">violently suppressed</a>.</p>
<p>The <em>Nuit Debout</em> movement in France will have to find its own way forward, building on both the successes and the limitations of its predecessors. Without predicting what its future may be, bringing together thousands of citizens of all generations to reaffirm that “another world is possible” – that there are progressive alternatives centred on democracy, social justice and dignity – is already a huge success.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Translated from the French by Leighton Walter Kille.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/57706/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Geoffrey Pleyers is president of the "social movements" research committee of the International Association of Sociology.</span></em></p>Proposed labour reforms in France have sparked mass protests led by young people who want to reclaim democracy from the elite.Geoffrey Pleyers, Sociologue, FNRS-Université de Louvain & Collège d’études mondiales, Université catholique de Louvain (UCLouvain)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/559032016-03-08T11:11:49Z2016-03-08T11:11:49ZWhy Spain’s politicians can’t form a working government<p>On May 15 2011, Spain made worldwide headlines after a huge number of people spontaneously mobilised against mainstream politicians. During a deep recession, the <em><a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-18070246">indignados</a></em> (indignant) movement sprang up with no connection to traditional political parties. The most widely repeated motto: “They don’t represent us”.</p>
<p>Protesters were referring to the two main political parties which had exchanged power during since Spain became a democracy in 1982: the conservative People’s Party (PP) and the social democratic Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE).</p>
<p>The parties were considered the main culprits of the suffering caused by austerity policies and cutbacks in the welfare state. Just that month, the parties won <a href="http://www.infoelectoral.mir.es/min/busquedaAvanzadaAction.html?vuelta=1&codTipoEleccion=2&codPeriodo=201111&codEstado=99&codComunidad=0&codProvincia=0&codMunicipio=0&codDistrito=0&codSeccion=0&codMesa=0">18 million votes</a> between them in the national election and backed the severe adjustments demanded by a European Union which, at the time, only protected creditor nations’ interests. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">‘They don’t represent us.’</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Cut to the <a href="http://resultados.elpais.com/elecciones/generales.html">most recent election</a>, held on 20 December 2015, and the electoral base of the major parties has nearly halved, with only 12 million Spaniards still supporting one or the other. Sitting prime minister Mariano Rajoy’s People’s Party lost its majority but won the most seats, while the PSOE polled its worst results ever but maintained its second position. </p>
<p>More than two months later, Spain still does not have a government.</p>
<h2>Spain searches for a coalition</h2>
<p>The leftist newcomer <em>Podemos</em> (We Can), whose origins are connected to the <em>indignados</em> movement and which obtained a similar number of votes to the PSOE, ranked third in the December. Far behind the top three, another new party, <em>Ciudadanos</em> (Citizens), came fourth. Its anti-nationalist centre-left position focuses on defending the unity of Spain – that is, preventing Catalonia from gaining independence – and has evolved towards the centre-right with a liberal vision of the economy. </p>
<p>This unprecedented situation in Spain’s parliamentary democracy has forced the main players to search for coalitions in order to form a new government, a common procedure in many other European democracies but a process foreign to Spain.</p>
<p>Forming what could be the first coalition government in the history of Spain’s democracy is not proving to be an easy task. This is primarily due to Rajoy’s inability to find partners to govern with. </p>
<p>Although a large coalition between the two main parties is the favourite option for Spain’s elites, including the leading communication groups, big companies and even previous PSOE leaders, it is the least popular scenario among Spaniards. Above all, it is the <a href="http://cadenaser.com/m/ser/2016/01/24/politica/1453670162_236071.html">most widely rejected</a> among those who didn’t vote for the People’s Party. </p>
<h2>Whose recovery?</h2>
<p>Why don’t any parties want to form part government with Rajoy? </p>
<p>Despite macroeconomic data hinting at <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/business-35193487">economic recovery</a> and the creation of jobs in Spain, the majority of the population is still feeling the economic crisis. Spain has some of the <a href="http://www.abc.es/sociedad/abci-oxfam-espana-pais-mas-desigual-ocde-despues-chipre-y-14-veces-mas-grecia-201601181044_noticia.html">highest levels of inequality</a> in the eurozone. </p>
<p>Poverty linked to joblessness has particularly impacted the young, most of whom think their standard of living will be <a href="http://economiaaloclaro.blogspot.fr/2015/11/jovenes-viven-peor-que-padres-paro-juvenil-empleo-jovenes-sueldo-jovenes.html">lower than their parents’</a>. The new jobs being created in Spain following the last labour reform are extremely precarious. </p>
<p>In addition to structural unemployment, with <a href="http://www.tradingeconomics.com/spain/unemployment-rate">20% of all Spaniards</a> and <a href="http://www.statista.com/statistics/266228/youth-unemployment-rate-in-eu-countries/">45% of those under 25 unemployed</a>, the lives of the employed have become precarious: they work longer hours for lower salaries and have no bargaining power to improve their working conditions. </p>
<h2>Corruption</h2>
<p>Corruption scandals in the People’s Party have become another major issue in Spain. Concern about corruption was residual (under 10%) until January 2013, when <a href="http://www.cis.es/cis/export/sites/default/-Archivos/Indicadores/documentos_html/TresProblemas.html">it spiralled to 43%</a>, coinciding with the <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-21349763">publication of handwritten accounts by Luis Bárcenas</a>, the former PP treasurer. </p>
<p>The documents demonstrated that the party kept a parallel bookkeeping system for illegal donations and paid bonuses to most of the senior members of the party in sealed envelopes, including Rajoy. The former treasurer was found to have up to <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-23088204">€48 million in a Swiss bank account</a>. </p>
<p>In the past month, the People’s Party has been accused of destroying evidence. Bárcenas’s computer was <a href="http://www.eldiario.es/politica/PP-declare-querellado-ordenadores-Barcenas_0_476302897.html">destroyed</a>. People’s Party leaders had to resign in Madrid and Valencia, the two autonomous communities where the PP had the most support and the <a href="http://www.infolibre.es/noticias/opinion/2015/05/25/corrupcion_tiene_coste_electoral_33148_1023.html">highest number of corruption scandals</a>.</p>
<h2>Running out of options</h2>
<p>Nor is it easy for Socialist Party leader Pedro Sánchez to head a coalition government. He has only two options without the PP’s support: a coalition government formed by leftist parties with the abstention of the nationalist parties, or a central-right government. </p>
<p>PSOE’s leadership was in favour of the latter option. Sánchez accepted his party’s mandate and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-spains-acting-pm-to-renew-push-for-coalition-with-socialists-2016-3?IR=T">failed in his most recent bid</a> to form government, as he was only supported by <em>Ciudadanos</em>. Negotiations to see if a leftist government can be formed with the support of the nationalist parties will be held in the next two months. If these attempts are unsuccessful and the PSOE fulfils its commitment not to form government with the People’s Party, elections will be held again on 26 June. </p>
<p>The need to find a solution to fit Catalonia into Spain will come up again during these negotiation. A PSOE-Podemos pact could only be formed with the abstention of the Catalonian independent parties. </p>
<p>Unfortunately for Spain, in the event that elections are held again, surveys of the post election scenario predict that the situation will remain every bit as complicated as it is now.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55903/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Braulio Gómez ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>More than two months after the election, Spanish politicians still can’t provide the people with the government they demanded.Braulio Gómez, Researcher, Universidad de DeustoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/558842016-03-07T15:18:47Z2016-03-07T15:18:47ZJust a reminder that Spain still doesn’t have a government<p>There appears to be little chance of Spain’s political stalemate being broken any time soon. Just listen to the divisive tone of <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/parliament-rejects-socialist-sanchezs-bid-to-form-spains-government-1456948996">parliamentary debates</a> held in the first week of March – two-and-a-half-months after a <a href="http://nottspolitics.org/2015/12/14/the-2015-spanish-general-election-how-a-sea-change-may-not-yet-have-reached-the-shore-of-spanish-politics/">national election</a> failed to deliver a government. </p>
<p>Pedro Sánchez, leader of the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) had sought to form a coalition government with the centre-right <a href="http://elpais.com/elpais/2016/02/24/inenglish/1456308182_056329.html">Ciudadanos</a> (Citizens) Party. He secured the backing of his own party and his proposed coalition partner but failed to get enough support from other MPs following heated debate in the chamber. </p>
<p>In the end, he gathered just 131 votes – well short of the simple majority required to pass a vote in the 350-seat parliament. Crucially, the 69 deputies from left-wing collective <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/podemos">Podemos</a> blocked Sánchez’s bid to become prime minister by voting against him.</p>
<p>This is the first time in Spain’s 40 years as a democracy that a candidate standing for prime minister has failed to win the necessary parliamentary support. It now seems likely that fresh elections will be held in June. The only other option would be for the country’s politicians to display a capacity for compromise that has so far evaded them.</p>
<h2>Why the stalemate?</h2>
<p>At first glance, it’s surprising that the largest party, Mariano Rajoy’s Partido Popular (PP), has not been able to piece together a coalition with smaller party Ciudadanos.</p>
<p>Rajoy was prime minister between 2011 and 2015 and has been acting as a caretaker in the role since the <a href="https://theconversation.com/spain-votes-for-change-but-has-no-idea-what-government-itll-end-up-with-52583">December election</a>. Together the two parties have 163 seats – just 13 short of the 176 needed for an overall majority.</p>
<p>In the past, this shortfall might have been made good by calling on the support of the centre-right Catalan nationalists. They provided vital backing to minority PSOE and Popular Party governments in the 1990s, for example. </p>
<p>But those same Catalan nationalists have started to push so hard for <a href="https://theconversation.com/catalan-election-a-leap-into-the-unknown-48262">independence</a> from Spain that they cannot be considered acceptable allies for any of the parties hoping to form a Spanish government. </p>
<p>A PP-Ciudadanos coalition has also been scuppered by the antipathy displayed by Ciudadanos leader Albert Rivera towards Rajoy. It now looks like Rajoy’s resignation would be a prerequisite of any future understanding between the two parties.</p>
<p>A seemingly never-ending stream of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/27/mariano-rajoy-spaniards-cant-stomach-stench-of-corruption-peoples-party">corruption allegations</a>, implicating senior members of the PP, up to and including Rajoy himself, has also deterred other parties from seeking an agreement with the party.</p>
<p>Rajoy has nevertheless indicated that he has no intention of stepping down. For the time being, he insists that being the leader of the largest party entitles him to stay on as caretaker prime minister, or at the head of a “grand coalition” of the PP, the PSOE and Ciudadanos.</p>
<h2>What now?</h2>
<p>The PP has 123 seats in parliament, which makes it difficult for any of the other parties to form a coalition government. As has been noted, Podemos’s willingness to vote alongside the PP against a PSOE-Ciudadanos coalition was sufficient to put an end to that initiative.</p>
<p>The obvious alternative is therefore a coalition of the left, the option favoured by Podemos. If the PSOE was able to put together a deal with Podemos and United Left (IU), it would have 161 seats. That would still be short of the 176 needed for an overall majority but would make a minority administration possible. But Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias is hostile towards doing a deal with the PSOE. At any rate, Podemos’s insistence that a referendum on Catalan independence be included in any coalition agreement effectively renders any accord between Sánchez and Iglesias impossible.</p>
<p>Sánchez, for his part, maintains that a cross-party deal of left and right – excluding the PP – is the only means of forming a viable government.</p>
<p>And so the deadlock continues. Either the parties form a government within the next two months, and by 2 May at the very latest, or new elections will have to take place on 26 June. Based on their failure so far to put their differences aside, it seems unlikely that a government will be formed in that time. </p>
<p>Even then, polling suggests that fresh elections won’t break the deadlock either. It currently looks as though the PSOE will once again win fewer seats than the PP. It will, however, be interesting to see if voters reward Ciudadanos with greater support after its attempts to form a government with the PSOE. Similarly, Podemos could be punished by the electorate for blocking a government from being formed. </p>
<p>Spain is facing an uncertain future. The electorate has opted for change – albeit on the basis of a spectacularly fragmented set of general election results – but the bitter divisions between the major parties are preventing that change from taking place.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55884/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Parliamentarians have again failed to form a coalition, nearly three months after the election.Paul Kennedy, Lecturer in Spanish and European Studies, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/525892015-12-22T12:47:29Z2015-12-22T12:47:29ZBullfighting: what I found during a year on breeding estates<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106794/original/image-20151221-27894-c3fz2c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Modern enough?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robin Irvine</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Bullfighting appears to be facing tough times once more. As many as <a href="http://www.hsi.org/world/europe/news/releases/2013/04/spain_bullfighting_ipsos_poll_042313.html">76% of</a> the Spanish public may oppose it receiving public funding. What’s more, the conservative Partido Popular has just <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-35149983">lost its</a> absolute majority in the Spanish parliament, which it had been using to support bullfighting. This follows the loss of key city councils to allies of Podemos, which recently resulted in Madrid <a href="http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2015-12-16/news/69090888_1_bullfighting-marcial-lalanda-main-bullring">scrapping</a> its longstanding subsidy to the oldest of the country’s 52 bullfighting academies. </p>
<p>The European parliament <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/11961010/EU-cuts-subsidies-that-support-Spanish-bullfighting.html">also recently voted</a> to prevent Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) subsidies going to breeders of fighting bulls – potentially affecting bull-breeding estates in France and Spain, where bulls die in the arena. </p>
<p>Opponents see bullfighting as a barbarous and medieval relic which has no place in modern Europe. But who are these 21st-century “barbarians” who breed fighting bulls? And what do we know about the lives of the animals themselves, beyond their deaths on the torero’s sword? Probably not very much, in most cases. But as an anthropologist who worked for 15 months on a bull-breeding estate in Andalusia, I can offer some insight into the people who care for and know these animals. </p>
<p>“Care” and “know” are the right words here, incidentally. The job of the foreman on bull-breeding estates is to care for (“<em>cuidar</em>”) the herd. To care for fighting bulls means to know (“<em>conocer</em>”) them, so the foreman is often referred to as the “<em>conocedor</em>”: the one who knows. The <em>conocedor</em> is in charge of the everyday well-being of the bulls, with a particular focus on feeding up and exercising animals which will bear the colours of the estate at bullfights. </p>
<p>I worked closely with Joaquín, the <em>conocedor</em> of the <a href="http://www.artetur.es/visitar-ganaderia-partido-de-resina.html">Partido de Resina</a> bull-breeding estate. He was an animal lover. His little dogs, Mona and Mono, were sleek working animals. They got more cuts of cured ham than I did. And while Joaquín was aware that raising bulls was a commercial endeavour, caring and good animal husbandry were central aspects of his job. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=323&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=323&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=323&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106847/original/image-20151221-27858-1qkvmju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Joaquín returning a calf to its mother on the Partido de Resina estate.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robin Irvine</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Bull welfare</h2>
<p>The bulls’ psychological and physical well-being is part of what determines whether they perform to their potential. This encourages breeders to raise them as “naturally” as possible: in herds, with varied grazing, space, shade, dust baths, water and hidden spots to which they can retreat. These formidable creatures are incredibly sensitive to change. To ensure proper care and minimise disruptions, the foreman works with a team of cowhands, working horses, the estate owner/manager, secretaries, grounds staff, vets, ethologists and even nutritionists.</p>
<p>As with any industry, standards can vary. I cannot speak for all bull breeders, but I certainly saw how seriously people took correct care and a modern approach in Andalusia. The world of the bulls is often labelled “traditional”, but breeders don’t oppose modernity. These “barbarians” have their own vision of the future, which actually complements the CAP in some respects. Aside from food production – and let’s not forget fighting bulls are <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/aug/20/fighting-bull-beef-most-ecological-meat-in-world">high-quality beef animals</a> – CAP subsidies are intended to support the sustainable management of natural resources and rural economies. Partido de Resina is an island of biodiversity: around 500 hectares of open woods and marshland surrounded by a sea of monotonous orange, olive and peach plantations. </p>
<p>You could of course argue that commercial horticulture employs more locals, or that there are other ways of protecting biodiversity which do not involve bullfighting. You might be right. Right now though, outside Seville – and across Spain, France, Portugal and Latin America – there are vast stretches of bull breeding land that are already spaces of biodiversity. The Common Agricultural Policy is modern: progressive, science-based, future-oriented and bureaucratic. So are many estates in the world of breeding fighting bulls.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106797/original/image-20151221-27863-13yr6za.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two mature bulls on the Partido de Resina estate, with orange and olive plantations in the background.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robin Irvine</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Reality check</h2>
<p>Whatever your view, the European parliament’s decision to ban subsidies for bull breeders <a href="http://www.toroslidia.com/2015/10/28/la-enmienda-del-grupo-de-los-verdes-aprobada-hoy-por-el-parlamento-europeo/">will be</a> diffiult to enact. It would require legistlative change to the CAP, which is a <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22512726">sticky</a> area of EU politics. After the vote, the European Commission <a href="http://www.abc.es/cultura/toros/abci-comision-europea-dice-enmienda-contra-toros-inejecutable-201510301518_noticia.html">informed</a> the parliament that there was no legal basis upon which to enact the amendment. Every such challenge pushes the scattered bullfighting lobby to unite and strengthen its <a href="http://www.taurologia.com/futuro-fiesta-toros-pasa--3893.htm">legal position</a>. That could be important in future battles, but for now the victory for the European Greens who tabled the budget amendment is purely symbolic. </p>
<p>As for the the state of bullfighting more generally, things are more complicated than they might appear. Recent <a href="https://laeconomiadeltoro.wordpress.com/2015/09/25/la-asistencia-a-festejos-taurinos-en-2014-2015-supera-en-un-12-la-registrada-en-2010-2011/">attendance figures</a> from the Spanish ministry of culture don’t support a simple narrative of decline. Though there was a clear dip during Spain’s economic crisis, attendance in the year 2014/2015 overtook pre-crisis figures. The industry was also placed under government protection in Spain after the government <a href="http://spanishnewstoday.com/bullfighting-in-spain-now-protected-by-law_19021-a.html">voted in 2013</a> to give bullfighting intangible cultural heritage status. We are certainly not talking about a one-way losing battle. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=19%2C28%2C3161%2C1580&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=19%2C28%2C3161%2C1580&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=305&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=305&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=305&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106791/original/image-20151221-27897-9g4zu7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The fight begins… Joaquín looks on as a bull he has spent four years caring for sallies to meet its fate.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robin Irvine</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So we should take care when it comes to derogative rhetoric, particularly about poorly understood traditions. It’s worth noting that attacks on bullfighting, while often out of genuine concern for the suffering of animals, also come from a tradition of northern moral supremacy. Not surprisingly, the European parliament vote on the anti-bullfighting amendment largely divided along a <a href="http://elpais.com/elpais/2015/10/29/inenglish/1446108998_091871.html">north-south axis</a>, with <a href="https://laeconomiadeltoro.wordpress.com/2015/10/29/todos-los-eurodiputados-de-pp-y-la-mayoria-del-psoe-votaron-a-favor-de-los-ganaderos-de-lidia/">57%</a> of Spanish MEPs voting against. </p>
<p>There is still a large public out there who appreciate bulls and bullfighting: 9.5% of Spaniards <a href="http://www.mecd.gob.es/servicios-al-ciudadano-mecd/dms/mecd/servicios-al-ciudadano-mecd/estadisticas/cultura/mc/ehc/2014-2015/Encuesta_de_Habitos_y_Practicas_Culturales_2014-2015_Sintesis_de_resultados.pdf">attended events</a> involving fighting bulls in 2014-15. These people live in the same modern Europe as the rest of us. Anyone who condemns bullfighting as barbaric should not judge until they have looked beyond the arena to the wider world of the bulls.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52589/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robin receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council. He worked for over a year on a bull-breeding estate in Andalusia, on a voluntary basis, embedded as a fully-disclosed, hands-on ethnographic researcher.</span></em></p>Spain’s most controversial sport has been in strife lately. But anthropologist Robin Irvine explains why a year working on a bull-breeding estate made him optimistic for its future.Robin Irvine, Pre-doctoral Researcher in Social Anthropology , University of St AndrewsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/525832015-12-21T11:03:39Z2015-12-21T11:03:39ZSpain votes for change – but has no idea what government it’ll end up with<p>Although Spain’s two big parties technically remain the largest after this year’s <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-35146745">general election</a>, they find themselves in a radically transformed political landscape – and neither has a clear mandate to govern.</p>
<p>The Popular Party (PP), which secured its best ever result in 2011, winning 186 parliamentary seats out of 350 and a comfortable overall majority, lost a third of its votes and 63 seats. This is its worst result in over a quarter of a century. It nevertheless remains Spain’s largest party, far ahead of the socialist PSOE. </p>
<p>While its leaders must be relieved to retain their position as the country’s second largest political force, the PSOE’s long decline hasn’t reversed. In 2011, it faced its worst ever result since democracy was re-established in the early 1980s, winning just 110 seats; it has now lost another 20. </p>
<p>Percentage-wise, the PP and PSOE together won just over half of the total vote (50.74%). But in 2011, their combined vote was 73.35%. Tellingly, the “victorious” PP won almost exactly the same percentage in 2015 (28.72%) as the PSOE did when it was routed in 2011 (28.73%). That the largest party can claim “victory” with such a small share of the vote shows the scale of what’s happened to the Spanish political system.</p>
<h2>Nipping at their heels</h2>
<p>The party which undoubtedly has most reason to feel satisfied with its result is <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/profile-of-podemos-and-its-founder-pablo-iglesias-2015-2?r=US&IR=T">Pablo Iglesias</a>’s Podemos. Though founded less than two years ago, Podemos has now won a remarkable 69 seats and 20.66% of the vote – just 1.36 points behind the PSOE. </p>
<p>Its strategy of promoting electoral coalitions in Galicia (En Marea), Valencia (Compromís-Podemos-És el moment) and Catalonia (En Comú Podem) appears to have paid off, and it has become the largest party in Catalonia – which may well have significant consequences with respect to the region’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/where-next-for-catalonia-after-its-unofficial-referendum-34028">ongoing push for independence</a> over the next four years. </p>
<p>Leader Pablo Iglesias’s decision to shun the advances of Alberto Garzón’s long-established United Left (Izquierda Unida) in the run-up to the election also appears to have been wise: that coalition won just two seats, hovering once again on the verge of extinction.</p>
<p>The other newcomer to the Spanish national stage, the centre-right Ciudadanos, led by Albert Rivera, seemed to lose momentum towards the end of the campaign, but it can still take some heart: it won a respectable 40 seats, and will be a key player in any future PP-led coalition government. That’s still a considerable achievement for a party which only became a national player beyond its Catalan heartland towards the end of 2014.</p>
<h2>Getting it together</h2>
<p>It’s now on the PP as the largest party to seek agreement with other political forces in order to form a government – and that won’t be easy. Although Ciudadanos seems like the PP’s likeliest ally, the parties’ combined seat tally is still 13 short of the 176 required for an overall majority in the 350-seat lower house. </p>
<p>Worse still, this shortfall can’t easily be made good by approaching parties outside of what can now be described as the “big four” of the Spanish party political system, such as the Basque Nationalist Party (six seats) and the Canaries Coalition (one seat). </p>
<p>An alliance with the Catalan nationalists of Democràcia y Llibertat (Democracy and Freedom) – who lent their solid support to a minority PP government between 1996 and 2000 – is now extremely unlikely, given the party now demands outright independence for Catalonia. It remains to be seen whether Mariano Rajoy is the person best equipped to put together a viable government under these circumstances.</p>
<p>A left-wing coalition is even less practical, since the PSOE and Podemos have just 159 seats between them. No doubt further support could be sought from smaller parties, but it simply wouldn’t be enough to obtain an overall majority. </p>
<p>Sánchez’s future as PSOE leader is in any case hardly guaranteed, since it was suggested throughout the campaign that if the party lost any more than 20 seats it might demand his resignation. He can at least argue that under his leadership the PSOE was able to stave off the substantial threat from Podemos – no mean feat given how spectacularly effective that party’s strategy has proven to be.</p>
<p>Then there’s the possibility of a PP-PSOE “Grand Coalition”, similar to that forged by the CDU and the SPD in Germany. It’s not likely, but it will no doubt be mooted over the coming weeks (or even months) as the parties try to prove that Spain can still be governable despite these spectacularly fragmented result. </p>
<p>One thing’s for sure: whatever the makeup of the government which emerges, it will be surprising if it manages to remain in office until the next scheduled election in four years’ time.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52583/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Spain’s two-party system is now consigned to the history books – but forming a functional government will be anything but easy.Paul Kennedy, Lecturer in Spanish and European Studies, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/525452015-12-18T12:52:03Z2015-12-18T12:52:03ZExplainer: the Spanish general election<p>Spain is on the brink of a general election that looks set to change its political system for good. How come?</p>
<p>To understand what’s going on, we need to look back at the protests that filled the squares of Spain in <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/social-movements-and-globalization-cristina-flesher-fominaya/?k=9780230360877">May 2011</a> and triggered one of the most dynamic and sustained episodes of citizen mobilisation the country has ever seen. </p>
<p>Initially youth-led but ultimately galvanising citizens of all ages, the protesters demanded “Real Democracy Now!”, calling for an end to a political system that alternated power between two parties that both served the interests of political and economic elites rather than the Spanish people. Given the acute effects of the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/3080208/Financial-crisis-Prime-Minister-Zapatero-optimistic-over-Spanish-economy.html">economic crisis</a> and ensuing <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11404367">austerity policies</a>, these demands were met with widespread support from <a href="http://www.ciberdemocracia.net/victorsampedro/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/15M-Polls.pdf">an astonishing 80% of the population</a> one year after the May 2011 protests.</p>
<p>Although the so-called <a href="http://www.movimiento15m.org/">15-M</a> was at first a staunchly anti-partisan pro-democracy movement, everything changed when a party “project” was created that aimed to combine elements of participatory social movements with an electoral challenge to the parties in power. Although not convincing all 15-M participants, many decided to put their energies into the new party – <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/can-europe-make-it/cristina-flesher-fominaya/%E2%80%9Cspain-is-different%E2%80%9D-podemos-and-15m">Podemos</a>. Just four months after forming in 2014, it <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/spains-podemos-party-wins-european-elections-2014-5?IR=T">managed to win 1.2m votes and five seats in the European Parliament</a>, heralding a radical shift in Spain’s political landscape. </p>
<p>These results spurred the setup of an array of municipal platforms that managed to take control of some of Spain’s major cities, including <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/12/madrid-manuela-carmena-deal-socialists-mayor">Madrid</a>, <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/spanish-elections-podemos-and-cuidadanos-gain-control-of-barcelona-and-major-regional-strongholds-10273960.html">Barcelona</a> and, in a historic upset in May 2015, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-spain-election-idUSKBN0NA0NN20150419">Valencia</a>. </p>
<p>The support of these coalitions for Podemos in the national elections (where Podemos is presenting on coalition lists in some regions, notably Catalonia), and especially Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau, has also been important.</p>
<p>Podemos’s ability to capture political ground rested on two key strategies: defining itself as a party of ordinary citizens that was neither left nor right, and attacking the political establishment as representing a corrupt “caste” that refused to listen to the demands and needs of ordinary citizens. </p>
<p>But the blows Podemos dealt to the established parties’ credibility and legitimacy presented an opportunity for other “new” political actors and just such a force has emerged in the form of upstart Ciudadanos. </p>
<h2>Competing upstarts</h2>
<p>Following a spectacular entrance onto the political scene, which saw Podemos shoot to the <a href="http://politica.elpais.com/politica/2015/01/09/actualidad/1420795467_727051.html">number one position</a> in the polls in January 2015, it has been somewhat upstaged by a “new” challenger, the right-wing party Ciudadanos.</p>
<p>Despite not really being new – it has existed in Catalonia for more than ten years – the party, with its young leader <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/spain-elections-albert-rivera-is-the-new-boy-in-spanish-politics-and-kingmaker-in-waiting-a6773391.html">Albert Rivera</a>, has managed to sell itself as a more centrist alternative to Podemos. It has made anti-corruption a key part of its rhetoric, and even adopted a slight modification of Podemos’ campaign slogan in the European parliamentary elections for its campaign slogan in the general elections: “¿Cuándo fue la última vez que votaste con ilusión?” (when was the last time you voted with hope/excitement?) became Ciudadanos’ slogan “Vota con ilusión” (vote with hope/excitement).</p>
<p>But despite being perceived as fresh new alternatives that hope to capture the political centre, the two parties remain profoundly different. </p>
<p>Ciudadanos is a socially and fiscally conservative party with an ideology close to the ruling Popular Party, although it uses primaries for candidate selection and has written anti-corruption measures and restrictions on party donations into its “<a href="https://www.ciudadanos-cs.org/propuestas-contra-la-corrupci%C3%B3n">commitment to democratic regeneration</a>”. Podemos, on the other hand, is a socially and fiscally progressive party, close to the main opposition Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) on many issues, with decentralised and participatory mechanisms for internal party decision-making, solely crowdfunded finances, and a general commitment to transparency.</p>
<p>Most citizens see Ciudadanos as a centrist party that scores well across a wide range of social and economic issues and Podemos as a left-wing party that scores very high in social issues but lower on economic issues. The support they have garnered has changed the profile of both the PSOE and the Popular Party (PP), who are now moving further left and right respectively.</p>
<p>Whereas Podemos is taking votes from the PSOE, Ciudadanos has managed to take votes from both the PP and the PSOE. Both receive support from young voters.</p>
<h2>Generational split</h2>
<p>The polls show a marked generational split, with Podemos as the favourite party among voters younger than 35 and <a href="http://www.eldiario.es/piedrasdepapel/Claves-CIS-arrancar-campana_6_458864151.html">especially with first time voters</a>, and Ciudadanos occupying the top spot with voters aged between 35 and 44. </p>
<p>PSOE and PP supporters, on the other hand, are <a href="http://metroscopia.org/recurso/pp-psoe-podemos-ciudadanos-edad-genero/">significantly older</a>: the PP is in fourth place among voters under the age of 45, but shoots up to first among voters over 65, from whom it has 53% of its support. </p>
<p>This generational split will have a lasting significance well be beyond these elections. The PP depends on a base of voters much older than the rest of the electorate, while Podemos and Ciudadanos are getting a lot of support from first-time voters. That means they’re probably here to stay, since Spanish voters seem to dependably <a href="http://www.eldiario.es/piedrasdepapel/Claves-CIS-arrancar-campana_6_458864151.html">stick with the party they choose the first time they vote</a>.</p>
<h2>What the polls say</h2>
<p>All the major polls indicate a win for the PP, but <a href="http://politica.elpais.com/politica/2015/12/14/actualidad/1450082789_332163.html">by a very small margin</a>, with 41% of voters still undecided as of December 14. The range offered by the eight major polls indicate 103-128 seats for the PP, 76-94 seats for the PSOE, 52-72 seats for Ciudadanos, and 45-63 seats for Podemos. </p>
<p>The last polls that can legally be published came out on the same day as a <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/insults-fly-as-spains-sanchez-debates-with-pm-rajoy-socialists-tv-popular-party-sunday-elections/">televised debate</a> between current president Mariano Rajoy (PP) and PSOE candidate Pedro Sánchez. Post–debate feeling seemed to indicate “win” for the PSOE and a “loss” for the PP, but in the absence of hard data, it is impossible to say what effect the debate will have on the elections. </p>
<p>Whatever the outcome, it’s clear that the era of two-party rule is over, and that no party can expect to win an absolute majority. Forming a government will probably require pacts between more than two parties – and according to the <a href="http://www.eldiario.es/piedrasdepapel/Claves-CIS-arrancar-campana_6_458864151.html">CIS pre-electoral survey</a>, 58.2% of Spanish voters would be happy with that.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52545/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Cristina Flesher Fominaya received funding from Marie Sklodowska Curie Senior Fellowship Programme of the European Union. </span></em></p>Spain’s era of two-party government is coming to an end – but what exactly happens next is far from clear.Cristina Flesher Fominaya, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, University of AberdeenLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/482622015-09-28T10:39:52Z2015-09-28T10:39:52ZCatalan election: a leap into the unknown<p>Parties in favour of Catalan independence have <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34372548">obtained an overall majority in terms of seats</a> at the regional elections, which attracted an unusually <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/11894762/Catalan-election-Record-breaking-turnout-expected-in-most-important-ballot-in-generations.html">high turnout (77.44%)</a>. </p>
<p>Although the pro-independence alliance <a href="https://juntspelsi.cat/">Junts pel Sí (Together for Yes)</a> fell six seats short of the 68 needed for a majority in the 135-seat parliament, it will secure an overall majority with the addition of the ten seats won by the far-left pro-independence <a href="http://cup.cat/">Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP)</a>. </p>
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<p>Artur Mas, the regional president and key figure behind Catalonia’s shift towards independence, indicated that <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/09/28/us-spain-catalonia-idUSKCN0RQ0RN20150928">the result vindicated his strategy</a>. But even though they can now assemble a parliamentary majority, the two parties just failed to win a combined 50% of the vote, and those opposed to independence are nevertheless likely to argue that their opponents don’t have a mandate to press on with their secessionist plans. </p>
<p>They will still do so – but they face a number of challenges. </p>
<h2>Trouble ahead</h2>
<p>It’s by no means clear that CUP, which has been highly critical of Mas, will support his leadership. A far-left party, CUP has little in common with the centre-right Mas other than its desire for independence. The party has relentlessly attacked his <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19733995">economic austerity programme</a>, while criticising the numerous <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/11832001/Catalan-leaders-party-HQ-raided-by-police-in-corruption-probe.html">corruption allegations</a> which have damaged the credibility of the president’s party, <a href="http://convergents.cat/">Democratic Convergence of Catalonia</a>. </p>
<p>CUP also indicated during the campaign that it considered a majority of the popular vote a prerequisite for any formal move towards independence.</p>
<p>Negotiations within the pro-independence camp in the post-election period are therefore likely to be protracted. Even if he wins CUP’s support, Mas will have to provide some actual detail on how his independence strategy will be implemented – especially on his proposed 18-month “transition period”. Then there are the recent <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/11892227/Catalans-warn-forced-EU-exit-would-be-blow-to-European-free-movement.html">warnings from EU heads of government</a>, including Germany’s Angela Merkel and the UK’s David Cameron, that an independent Catalonia cannot expect to be automatically accepted as a new EU member state.</p>
<p>It remains to be seen whether the Spanish general election, which takes place in December, will return a government more sympathetic to the notion of Catalan independence. Although <a href="https://theconversation.com/andalusia-election-results-spell-trouble-for-spains-established-political-parties-39204">Mariano Rajoy’s People’s Party</a> is currently on course to win the election, it is unlikely that it will be able to secure a clear majority. The ascendant <a href="http://www.policy-network.net/pno_detail.aspx?ID=4875&title=Ciudadanos-A-third-way-or-a-Trojan-horse-for-the-left">centre-right party Ciudadanos (Citizens)</a> has eaten into the PP’s national vote over the last two years, and in the Catalan polls – running under its Catalan name, Ciutadans – it won more votes than any other party opposed to independence. </p>
<p>Indeed, the PP obtained less than half of the votes obtained by Ciutadans, although the PP has never been a dominant force in Catalonia due to the competition provided by centre-right Catalan nationalism. Whether the PP will be able to call on the support of Ciudadanos after the general election will be one of the key issues once the polls close.</p>
<h2>Missing out</h2>
<p>Unlike Ciudadanos, the other newcomer on the Spanish political scene, <a href="https://theconversation.com/meet-podemos-the-party-revolutionising-spanish-politics-33802">Podemos (We Can)</a> had a <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/catalan-independent-vote-separatists-win-absolute-majority-a6669756.html">disappointing</a> Catalan election. Despite the party’s attempts to emphasise its appeal beyond traditional left-right boundaries, it ended up running under the shared banner of <a href="http://www.catalannewsagency.com/politics/item/party-review-catalunya-si-que-es-pot-catalonia-yes-we-can-a-new-alternative-left-wing-coalition">Sí que es Pot</a> (Yes We Can) in alliance with the Catalan equivalent of <a href="http://www.izquierda-unida.es/">Izquierda Unida (United Left)</a> and the <a href="http://www.expatica.com/es/news/country-news/How-Outraged-protesters-took-charge-of-Spanish-capital_475931.html">environmentalists of Equo</a>. </p>
<p>Ultimately, Sí que es Pot paid the price for its ambiguous stance on Catalan independence. Describing itself as not being within the pro-independence camp while simultaneously advocating Catalans’ “right to decide”, it was unable to siphon off votes from CUP, which benefited from Sí que es Pot’s lacklustre campaign. Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias has been left to console himself with having obtained more votes than the PP.</p>
<p>Finally, the Socialist PSOE’s Catalan sister party, the <a href="http://www.catalannewsagency.com/politics/item/party-review-catalan-socialist-party-psc-is-against-catalonia-s-independence-and-declares-that-a-nation-is-not-a-state">PSC</a>, could take heart from the fact that its endorsement of the PSOE’s outright rejection of independence did not cost it even more seats. Relief, rather than satisfaction, characterised the Socialists’ response to the election – although the result hardly bodes well for the PSOE at the general election.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/48262/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Catalonia’s pro-independence parties now have the chance to assemble a parliamentary majority, but they’ll have to overcome their own differences first.Paul Kennedy, Lecturer in Spanish and European Studies, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.