Podemos – Spain’s Joker in the Pack

If there was an enduring legacy of the Spanish Civil War, it was that whatever its outcome, Spain was fated for decades subsequently to be divided between winners and losers-and Franco imposed his victory, brutally, with little sense of reconciliation.
Seen against this historical background , perhaps the best thing that can be said about Spain’s general election is that there were no clear winners or losers, at least not to the extent of any one party being able to claim the moral authority to impose its governance unilaterally.
Indeed two common themes emerged from the post-election speeches of all four main party leaders with each striking an optimistic note. The first- a need for dialogue-was shared by Marian Rajoy and Pedro Sanchez, the leaders of the two most voted parties. The second – from Podemos’s Pablo Iglesias ad Ciudadanos Albert Rivera-was the conviction that the old ways of doing politics -cronyism, corruption, imposition-as characterised by a succession of Spanish democratic governments in the post-Franco era was over and would now give way to a period of fundamental reform and regeneration.
Taken individually and analysed in more detail, the speeches were in themselves less worthy of finding an honoured place in future history books. Rajoy struggled to convey any sense of statesmanship which undoubtedly will be required if any stable government is to emerge in the coming weeks; Pedro Sanchez showed at least a measure of democratic sensibility by conceding ng that the PP as the most voted party should be the first to try and form a government-while hardly coming across with either the vision or the charisma of an alternative president in waiting.
As for the alternatives, Rivera did his reputation no good by speaking as if he had won an election when in fact Ciudadanos’ result were way below what he and other party strategists had hoped for, leaving his claim to be the anointed power broker somewhat diminished.
Which leaves Podemos still far from gaining the kind of electoral support that would legitimise it ruling Spain unilaterally but nonetheless delighted with a result which Iglesias and his followers will celebrate as a step towards power in the future.
This joker in the pack –less we forget it – believes in radical democracy built on difference and dissent and the assumption that liberal democracy is essentially oppressive and needs to be re-negotiated and altered.
Podemos has stirred grass-roots politics throughout Spain- but its capacity to stoirr up a hornest’s nest is greatest in in Catalunya with its support for a referendum on independence . So far neither it nor parties who oppose such a referendum have yet to make a convincing argument as to how their positions can serve the common good. The Catalan question and how other parties choose to resolve it will provide the real test of whether Spain’s democracy has matured and become more consensual or simply deviated into a new battleground.