Podemos in Spain
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When protest became a political party. From Indignados to Podemos.
A few of the critics of Occupy sought the same evolution but it didn't transpire, unless in the UK, LU is cited.
Many will find this development of interest and a good counter to all the attention being based on the rise of UKIP and the right in Europe.
I intend to keep an eye on this movement. Put it on a google alert, maybe.
Perhaps Robin has more background to it.
Perhaps, too, StuartW will find it a hopeful sign for LU.
Marcos too for his Spanish language discussion lists.
We ourselves should seek to establish international links with it. This is something we could do by simply sending a selection of our Spanish literature and translating perhaps an article or two on how we maintain a structured organisation without a leadership. What would it cost us…postage stamps by snail-mail and a bit of time for our Spanish speakers to join their internet discussion groups.
Our man in Spain, Alberto, is already on to this. By co-incidence he phoned yesterday to say he had arranged to meet Pablo Iglesias and ask him why the new party only criticised corruption, etc but never mentioned capitalism. No doubt he will be reporting back. In the meantime we can contact them via their website.At first glance they seem to be similar to the Your Voice Party that stood in the South east Region in the recent Euroelections, i.e. no particular policy except that any policy should be decided democratically by the citizens through referendums and the internet (isn't that what the Pirate Party advocates too?). But immensely more succesful in terms of votes. They got 1.245.948 compared to Your Voice's 2932.
Hi AlanYes Podemos has been in all the news here. Their electoral success – 1.245.948 votos, 8% of the vote, and 5 MEPS after having only been formed 3 months ago – has left the PP and PSOE fuming and spitting bile. Pablo Iglesias, the public face of Podemos has been compared to Lenin, Chavaz and Castro as the smear machine gets into operation. My Spanish partner , Ana, voted for them in Granada, a PP dominated city, and found the people in the polling station to be most unhelpful when she enquired about the whereabouts of Podemos literature which was supposed to be on display along with the lealflets of the other parties. One assistant offered to put her voting slip in the box for her, an offer she politely turned down.I dont know an awful lot about Podemos . It seems to be a radical reform party along the lines of Alexis Tsipras’s anti-austerity Syriza party in Greece, which did extremely well in the euroelections. Both are critical of the dominance of Germany and the prospect of Spain and Greece becoming deeply indebted semi-colonies of Germany. There is a strong streak of egalitarian thinking running through Podemos. Their MEPs will not take the full pay they are entitled to – only what is necessary to live on – with the surplus going to party funds. At least thats what Ana told me and she is an avid follower of the excellent TV programme in Spain called El Intermedio on channel 6 where she gets a lot of her info fromAnd, yes, Podemos does seem to be an outgrowth from the Indignados and M15 protests. I recall reporting here that at a big outdoor meeting I attended in Granada at the town hall plaza, subsequently the site of a tent encampment , all sorts of ideas were being aired – including the idea of abolishing money! There is a long tradition of radicalism in Spain. Here's one example but there are many others http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marinaleda,_Spain
Just to relate to another thread…is the small party syndrome restricted to the UK/USA when we see such dramatic and swift breakthroughs here? Perhaps as Robbo suggests in his post…the media or at least parts of it are more sympathetic in its reporting. I did note the article refers to Iglesias being a the media face of the movement again something i touched upon in another discussion…how we tackle such potential issues.The wages seem to be more or less a typical Trot thing, after all, the SSP MSPs took reduced pay to finance the Party.And i'll be honest…travelling cattle-class instead of sweeping through check-in and having the home comforts to do work on the move, or simply recuperate from all their travelling is rather minor point in their policy.( I am reminded that Sonia Gandhi travelled tourist class a few years back with press photographing her standing in the check-in line, what was never said that was the rest of the seats on the plane were all taken by her retinue for security reasons …)Although the Pirate Party retained a seat in the Euro parliament, their vote fell elsewhere…although they did a bit better thn ourselves in the UK and in Germany 400,000+ votes half the total European vote but as one commentator said…they had done their job…to highlight and protect the internet…along with Assange and Snowdon – mission accomplished.Pirate website boosting the morale with a positive spin herehttp://piratetimes.net/all-pirate-party-votes-in-the-eu-election-800-000-votes/
Message received from Alberto in Spain:
Jose Carlos Monedero the second man after Pablo Iglesias of PODEMOS, both professors
of Political Science at the Plutense Unversity in Madrid, used to be one of the
political advisers for Chaves of Venezuela, as you all probably know this so called
Bolivian Revolution it is nothing else but followers of Leninism.
I found this article on Podemos rather perturbing.http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/10713 "Chávez made it to the presidency of Venezuela with the electoral promise of a “third way”, something no-one knew what it was. It was only a few years later that he dared to speak of socialism, socialism of the 21st century, and no-one knew what that was either. History is full of politicians who reach power by adopting left-wing stances and then abandon them, so why could the opposite not happen? To reach power with a moderate and ambiguous discourse so as then to set about deepening changes to the left. It is what happened in Venezuela, in Argentina and in Ecuador. Whilst our socialist parties do the opposite of socialism, in Latin America, without calling themselves socialists or workers, they are doing more for socialism and workers than here. Obviously, to trust that a moderate discourse should finally dare to pursue a left path requires a major dose of faith on the part of the electorate, but has experience not shown us that those who claim to be on the left also requires such a thing?"An actual advocation of deceit as a virtue and directly contrary to the Communist Manifesto that Communists "disdain to conceal their views and aims."But on a slightly positive side…i said on another thread that our campaign should not be so gentlemanly. "Iglesias surprised us all by calling Sánchez Dragó [prominent right-wing intellectual] a buffoon of the right two minutes after beginning his conversation on a radio station that has a massive audience…Every day we see our left politicians maintaining infinite composure when up against pseudo-journalists who attack them with absolute impunity on panel debates. People wanted to see other politicians giving it back to them in spades."Now if Danny had been a bit more barbed in his criticism of fellow candidates…who knows if the clip would have gone viral on the web .No more nice guys, comrades! Let's have invective filled interviews!
Alberto has already pointed out that Jose Carlos Monedero is also a supporter of Chavez and Chavism. Some stuff in English by him here:http://hiredknaves.wordpress.com/2014/05/27/podemos-left-unity-participation-and-the-right/http://cunninghiredknaves.tumblr.com/post/9919061644/run-social-democrats-runMore here on the thinking behind some of those in Podemos:https://hiredknaves.wordpress.com/2014/05/30/occupy-representation-podemos-and-the-politics-of-truth/https://hiredknaves.wordpress.com/2014/05/31/podemos-representation-and-overflow/To tell the truth I'm not too sure what they are trying to get at.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/06/pablo-iglesias-indignado-podemos-spainAn update article on Podemos…concentrating on the personality of Iglesias."If people don't do politics, others will do it for you. And when others do it for you, they can steal your rights, your democracy and your wallet." – a good quote.Seems as if the party itself is in the process of becoming more structured. Another good quote – "You can't be scared of democracy. These arguments that participation can be contradictory with efficiency is contrary to the very idea of democracy." He likened it to critics of universal suffrage who argued that it would cause chaos if everyone were able to vote. "We've seen that this isn't true."
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