Breaking the two-party model

[luzribeiro.livejournal.com]

"The governing People's Party (PP) in Spain has suffered heavy losses in regional and local elections. In what was seen as a test before parliamentary elections expected in November, left-wing groups opposed to austerity made strong gains. Six months before national elections, the ruling PP has gained the most votes, beating the Socialist party who came second with 25%. But the two traditional parties fell short of overall majorities in most areas. They both lost a significant number of votes to emerging groups Ciudadanos and Podemos."

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Spain has ended up with a totally different political landscape, after the voters decided to break the two-party model at Sunday's local elections, ushering Spanish politics into a new phase. Both the leftist media (like El Pais) and the rightist ones (like El Mundo) are arguing that the result indicates a "deep change" for the country. Over 30 million people were eligible for voting in the weekend, and they were electing the governments of 13 out of the 17 regions of the country.

It looks like the regional and local elections are only part of an upcoming series of turmoils in Spain, which will likely see the dominant People's Party losing its hegemony. Mariano Rajoy's conservative party still retains its first position, but 27% is a very poor result. It has lost its absolute majority in the 8 regions that it used to dominate, and it could lose the hold on power in the capital city of Madrid that it has held for the last 20 years. There's just half a year remaining before the parliamentary election, and the PP and the main opposition force, the Socialist Party have taken 52% of the vote combined. That's a drastic slump from those 65% that they had four years ago.

The big winners are the center-right movement Ciudadanos (The Citizens), and the anti-status-quo and anti-austerity leftist Podemos movement (We Can). Ada Colau, Podemos' candidate in Barcelona, has won the mayoral vote, plus 11 out of the 41 seats in the local parliament, and if she makes a coalition government, she'd become the first female mayor of the Catalan capital. That result is largely viewed as a David vs Goliath victory.

In Madrid, the conservative candidate Esperanza Aguirre won with 21 seats, closely followed by former judge and communist Manuela Carmena from Podemos (20 seats). As a consequence of the result, Spain's main stocks index has dropped with 1.5% on Monday morning, and then lost some further 1.75% by the end of the day.

Of course, the prime minister has blamed austerity (plus the recent scandals in his party) for the result. Undoubtedly, PP is the big loser here. Ciudadanos did manage to steal some populist votes away from Podemos, but the People's Party suffered heavy blows all across the board: two of the "blue" fortresses have collapsed (Madrid and Valencia). And that's just the beginning of the end for a party that's been marred by corruption scandals that have caused the shit to hit the fan in a spectacularly messy fashion (which they did try to clean up through a massive anti-corruption operation that saw more than 50 PP mayors being detained, but evidently that's been too little too late at this point). All in all, Spain is bracing itself for some turbulent times that could echo throughout the rest of the EU, what with Syriza having taken over Greece a few months ago.

Comments

[mahnmut.livejournal.com]

The anti-austerity backlash is coming even sooner than most had expected - but it inevitably is.

The disconnected elites have to realize that tightening the belts tends to reflect most painfully on the poorest, while simultaneously squeezing the last remaining air out of the economy - and that's bound to backfire.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

Corruption erodes democracy, and something must fill the vacuum that this leaves gaping. It's usually populist factors with "good intentions" and poor implementation that tend to thrive in such situations, with dire consequences.