Flickr/UweHiksch. Some rights reserved.
For the first time since the financial crisis of 2007-8, there are now signs of an awakening of popular opposition from the left in Europe – the electoral success of Syriza in Greece and the rise of Podemos in Spain being the most obvious examples.
For very a long time, despite an epochal economic crisis, the left has looked weak. Across Europe, social democratic parties have become part of the establishment. They have accepted the idea that there is only one – neoliberal – way of running the economy: that economics is a technical matter, outside politics. The Greek social democrats of Pasok have now paid the price for their government’s support for neoliberal solutions to the financial crisis brought about by neoliberalism. Spain’s socialists may face a similar fate at the end of the year.
