PSOE leader Pedro Sanchez, Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias, Ciudadanos leader Albert Rivera and Vice President of the Spanish government and Partido Popular Soraya Saenz de Santamaria at a live television debate. Demotix/Oscar Fuentes. All rights reserved.Podemos is usually thought of as framed within ‘left-wing populism’. However, it is worth calling attention to an aspect of Podemos which has been commented on less frequently, and which, nonetheless, was written into its DNA from the beginning. Podemos came onto the Spanish and European political scene with the vocation of placing a bet for republican principles in the middle of the board, attempting to demonstrate to citizens on all sides that they are being betrayed and destroyed by a savage and nihilist neoliberal revolution.
It is a bet that attempts to conquer the political centre for the left, with the intention of bringing to light the fact that, now, it is not us but the rich and powerful who have moved towards anti-system positions, undermining the very foundations of common sense. It is not us but the rich and powerful who have moved towards anti-system positions, undermining the very foundations of common sense.
Since the Transition, Spain has been exposed —and this is not very different to the rest of Europe—to wave after wave of extreme right wing policies presented as being of the centre, and sometimes centre-right or centre-left. Have any of them ever advertised themselves as about to suffocate our public education or national health, or do away with our workers’ rights?
