An extraordinary plenary session to reprimand a city councilor for throwing a bottle of water at another, and a protest in front of a party headquarters in which a doll of the government president was brutally beaten as if it were a piñata. This is how the political year has begun and there is no indication that the tension will subside this year, quite the opposite. “The climate of constant election campaigning will continue,” says political scientist Pablo Simón. “It’s a year of high tension,” agrees sociologist Cristina Monge. The calendar is full of electoral events (Galicia, Basque Country, European Parliament…) that will take on the undertones of a national referendum.
The vote to censure Vox councilor Javier Ortega Smith, who faced Más Madrid councilor Eduardo Fernández Rubiño on December 22, seemed to indicate some consensus. The PP, which governs the city council with an absolute majority, the PSOE and Más Madrid voted together and the result was a whopping 51 to 5. But the development of the almost 75-minute plenary session points in a different direction: the confrontation is leading to a stark divide between two irreconcilable blocs, which, as political scientists point out, distances people from politics.
The PP devoted only a few minutes to the reason for the call: Ortega Smith's violent behavior. Mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida described his behavior as “unacceptable” and “embarrassing” and called on him to resign from his position as city councilor because he was not “qualified” to represent the people of Madrid. But then, like Vice Mayor Inmaculada Sanz, she dedicated her speech to attacking the left. “It will not distract us from what is important,” Sanz told the Vox spokesman, “namely, countering this frontal attack on the rule of law that the Spanish government is carrying out together with its notorious partners.” In fact, the PP did not allow itself to be distracted . “The context is not for justification, but it is for understanding what happened,” the deputy mayor continued. “Everything started going wrong when the PSOE signed the infamous Tinell Pact with the independence and nationalist forces 20 years ago [en 1996, el PP de Aznar había firmado con CiU el del Majestic]; (…) With you, violence has entered politics and institutions (…) It doesn't matter how much you exaggerate, how much you make yourself a victim, there is always someone on the left, who has done much worse than those you are now denouncing,” he added, referring to the bottle launch. Almeida explained to the same bench: “The existence of Vox and the fact that Ortega Smith is here to cover up his shameful acts with philterrorists and coup plotters is great for them.” The failed student, for his part, refused to hand over his report and called Rita Maestre as “spokeswoman for Hamas Madrid”. A few months ago, last September, Socialist city councilor Daniel Viondi resigned from all his positions after punching Almeida three times in the face during another heated plenary session. The PSOE then immediately rebuked the attitude of its local council.
“What most reflects the tension,” says Monge, “is social discontent. People see politicians insulting each other and their things, and in the end it happens.” Plenary sessions of city councils and regional parliaments end up debating national pacts and amnesty laws… and not the problems that directly affect citizens in each area. In fact, Ortega Smith's intervention in which the Rubiño incident occurred was the result of an emergency request from Vox to reject the agreement between EH Bildu and the PSOE in Navarre in the Madrid City Council.
“The Eurobarometer,” adds Simón, “shows that more than 40% of Spaniards acknowledge that they never talk about national political issues with family or friends.” People are separating. Is this depoliticization neutral? I feel it punishes some more than others, those who need the mobilization the most, i.e. the left.”
Neither Simón nor Monge believe that violence in the institutions corresponds to the Left, as the PP claimed in the plenary session in the face of Ortega Smith's disapproval. “M15,” the political scientist remembers, “was due to a climate of indignation among citizens. There was tension in the streets, but they were completely peaceful demonstrations. The riots continued a little further, even to the point of intimidation, but then there was no violence in the institutions. This is being introduced by the extreme right, not only in Spain but throughout Europe: insults to MPs, to physical aggression, disqualifications, exaggerations… this is their method, their way of being perceived.”
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“It is a global syndrome,” adds Simón, although with some peculiarities in the Spanish case. “Polarization, the confusion of the traditional right, the disillusionment with politics, the collapse of information hierarchies and the emergence of fake news… all this is happening in countries like Argentina, Germany or Spain, where the wounds of the economic crisis have not yet healed of 2008. The Spanish peculiarity is that there are two axes of polarization that feed each other: the traditional one, left and right, and the territorial one, which overlaps with a dynamic of blocs in which independence, peripheral nationalism and the left exist in Package; and Centralism, Spanishism and the Right, in another. “These two engines fuel the tension dynamic for their respective clientele, although not in a symmetrical way.”
Monge shares that tensions and tensions are increasing, but points out that “the peak of emotional polarization, that is, the rejection of those who think or vote differently, was in the most difficult months of the process.” So people put up the flag the balcony of their house, not because they felt very Spanish or very Catalan, but to throw them in the face of their neighbor across the street. Today we are not there yet, but we can go back there if the amnesty debate is not well explained, if all of this is not handled well and if the independents keep challenging us.
The extreme right, which for years was contained in Spain's traditional right, the PP, is taking part in elections hand in hand with the challenge of Catalan independence. “This is another Spanish peculiarity,” says Simón. “The anomaly of Vox compared to the far right in Europe is that the enemy is not exogenous – it is not the immigrant who comes from outside, although they later incorporate that into their discourse – but endogenous. For them, the enemies lie within: there is Spain and anti-Spain. This is the central idea, the way our radical right has developed.”
Puppet simulating Pedro Sánchez, who was beaten on New Year's Eve near the PSOE headquarters on Ferraz Street in Madrid. JUAN BARBOSA
There have always been protests against the government, promoted by the opposition, because, as Simón recalls, “the one who protests is not the one who holds power” but “the fragmentation of the right, the emergence of Vox and its front organizations”. “Like Revuelta,” he adds, “has caused these protests to go beyond the institutional channel and enter a dangerous spiral.” I don't think that the symbolic beating of a Sánchez doll is a hate crime, but if it is the rival is dehumanized in this way, when the opponent is the enemy, it has serious consequences: the transaction disappears, there are no possible points of consensus and… This hatred, fostered by a kind of existential fear, the idea that one's way of life ends and Spain disappears when the other rules, can also generate the desire to imitate this symbolic violence. This is worrying and I do not think it is a problem that should be solved through the criminal code but rather through a public debate.”
Monge agrees that hitting a Sánchez doll represents “a step” in the escalation of tensions and that there is some risk that it could end up being attacks on politicians in the street. “The temperature is rising and violence is starting to be no longer so extraordinary. That’s what’s worrying: that it’s becoming normal.”
A hanging doll with the face of Santiago Abascal shot in the head in María Agustina Square in Castellón, in an image broadcast by Vox.
Vox, like the rest of the European far right, is playing with it – the PSOE has just reported to the prosecutor's office the beating of Sánchez's doll in Ferraz and the statements of Santiago Abascal in which he assured that people would like to see him “hung” his Feet” – but both political scientists agree that the PP could have distanced itself much more clearly. “They want to capitalize on the dissatisfaction with the amnesty,” says Simón, “but the way they do it distances them from centrality.” The other big risk is that the PP will be in this competition with Vox is drawn into positions that impact their voters and supporters. We've seen it in the United States: Republican voters become authoritarian when their leaders embrace authoritarian positions. Here the highest representative of the state in the Community of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, spoke of Pucherazo. Alberto Núñez Feijóo, who theoretically brought a territorial sensitivity and a different vision, chose the harshest profiles [su portavoz, Miguel Tellado, llegó a decir que Sánchez debería abandonar España “en el maletero de un coche”] and he talked about election fraud.”
The PP, Monge adds, “has followed Vox completely. Given this attitude, in Ferraz they had a very good opportunity to distance themselves from the far right, much easier than on other issues, such as Catalonia. But the condemnations always come with a small mouth and add 'buts.'” Popular leaders, for their part, have accused the PSOE of “hypocrisy” for not reacting with the same indignation when the Socialist Youth pretended in a play that Mariano Rajoy should be guillotined have, and Vox, which is promoting the protests in Ferraz, has recalled that they also hung an Abascal doll in Castellón.
Meeting of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo in the House of Representatives on December 22nd. Jaime Villanueva
The news is the meeting
For days, the debate was not about whether the prime minister and the opposition leader could agree on state affairs, but whether or not they would meet. “It was very symptomatic,” says Simón. “That the news is about the meeting and not the content tells us that we live in an anomalous climate. The normal thing, assuming the legitimacy of all political actors, is that the meeting with them is not the central element of the discussion, but here because all bridges between the two major parties have been blown and because deep down no one wants to reverse that. Since 2019, there are no longer any electoral calculation alternatives: the blocks have petrified. In the end, you have to agree and do it with your partner. If the PP agrees on something with the PSOE, Vox will accuse them of whitewashing the government, and if the PSOE approaches the PP, their partners, some of whom the People's Party proposes to ban, will also put pressure on them. “It will be made very difficult for the leaders to get out of this bloc politics.” On Friday, Vox tweeted: “Feijóo has not found out or does not want to find out that the coup that Pedro Sánchez is carrying out throws him out of legality and prevents any political agreement .” Only Vox makes it clear: infinite distance from this government and its putschists, terrorists and communists.” When PP and PSOE agreed to reform the Yes-Yes law to prevent the release of sex offenders, Podemos threw the socialist “Betrayal of feminism” by asking women again “whether they had closed their legs properly.”
Mr. Feijóo has not found out or does not want to know that the coup that Pedro Sánchez is carrying out throws him out of legality and prevents any political agreement.
Only VOX is clear: infinite distance from this government and its coup partners, terrorists and… https://t.co/wXzUWWtZyV
— VOX 🇪🇸 (@vox_es) January 5, 2024
“The PP,” says Monge, “is pushing itself into a hopeless corner. It is a state party that wants to govern and will do so again at some point. So when the president calls you, you have to go. But the persecution of the aggressiveness of Vox's speech against the embodiment of all evil, Sánchez, made it very difficult for them to justify it. They caused the same chaos in their meeting with Junts. The fact that they meet to try to agree on something is a political game, the normal thing. But since their tactic is not to provide water to the enemy, they could not explain it.”
Both Monge and Simón agree that the role of certain media up to this point has been “fundamental”, such as those that appeared on the poster for the “Grapes in Ferraz” call, which marked the protest in which Sánchez took part ' Doll involved, broadcast live with hosts who called the president a “son of a bitch” and joked with the idea of an “assassination.” “It is they,” says the political scientist, “who create the ecosystem in which such events, speeches and leaders grow.” Without them, Vox would not have the supremacy it has.” These “hate professionals,” adds Simón, “ have built a climate of opinion that is crucial for mobilizations.”
Call for a protest on New Year's Eve in front of Ferraz.
Although the responsibility for the voltage level is asymmetrical, the rest will ultimately be contaminated. “The PP,” recalls Simón, “is appointing Tellado and the PSOE is appointing Óscar Puente, that is, they are choosing tough profiles that are going into confrontation to mobilize their own people, because in such a tense context it is interesting “To keep things tight.” The lines to avoid voting volatility.” Puente, Monge adds, “is not exactly the diplomatic corps. When the far right emerges, it contaminates the entire political ecosystem and ultimately creates a spiral of aggressiveness from which virtually no one is excluded. “This has happened in all countries.”
Simón recalls that “the most influential Spanish political scientist,” Juan J. Linz, analyzed in “The Bankruptcy of Democracies” how the health of the system “has a lot to do with the limits of dissent and what he called disloyal opposition The 1987 book was republished, a testament to the relevance of the challenge, to the seriousness of the moment.
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