Election Special - Part Two Opportunists and Intellectuals

Manel Carmona Guanyem

To  understand Guanyem, you have to go back to 2009 when the Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca was formed in Barcelona.
 It was an association for those, consumed by crisis, who were unable to pay their mortgages, were being evicted and left with the debt of those mortgages.
The association was to become linked to Movimiento 15-M, otherwise known as the “indignados”.
One of its chief spokespeople was Ada Colau, who was instrumental in publishing a manifesto on the internet last June.
It was called Guanyem Barcelona: let’s win Barcelona.
This was a social movement but also a political one.
To its ethical code and objectives came left-wing Catalonian political groups as well as the alternative parties - Podemos and the now all but forgotten Partido X.  Though Guanyem didn’t grow out of Podemos as such, it shared a number of sympathisers and supporters and there were clear connections, like 15-M, but unlike Podemos, with support broadening across the country and here in Majorca, as a political entity the name was allowed to be used.
 There are, therefore, Guanyem associations in several towns as well as a central political body, the one fighting the regional election.
Much of the thinking behind Guanyem is noble - such as with the original impetus because of the appalling suffering faced by all too many who were being evicted.
But its political shape, certainly in Majorca, has largely been moulded from an existing party - the Esquerra Unida (EU - the United Left).
Manel Carmona is its secretary-general. To the EU can be added another party, the ERC, Esquerra Republicana Catalunya. It and its leader, Joan Lladó, were booted out of the Més grouping of left-leaning parties, and part of the dispute which led to this was with the Iniciativa Verds, i.e. the Greens, a party closely associated with the EU.
I know it all gets terribly complicated, but the explanation is important because the distinct impression one has is of a certain opportunism.
The EU was a party going nowhere. The ERC was out on a limb, but it has been willing to overlook disagreements with the Greens and ideological differences with the EU in having some of its members on the candidates’ list for parliament.
The EU and the ERC have, and one cannot avoid drawing this conclusion, used the Guanyem name for their own ends.
This all said, what does Guanyem bring to the election table? Much of it is as you might expect. Dignity for those who have suffered because of the mortgage crisis is one strand.
Improved health and education provision, greater participation in the democratic process, defence of the environment, tourism that benefits all and not a few: it’s a programme that is all but indistinguishable from Més and indeed Podemos.
Latest opinion poll estimation: 0 to 2 seats (out of a total 59).

Alberto Jarabo - Podemos

If the   regional election were to be made into a film, then Alberto Jarabo would be the one to make it: making films is what he does as a day job. But what might the film contain? Who would have the say on its contents? How would these contents be decided? Podemos is the party of participation. A new type of democracy. The citizenry decides.
This, at any rate, is the theory. And theory, you might say, is where you run into the essence of Podemos.
It has been lambasted by established parties for being an experiment.
Democracy cannot be determined through experimentation, they argue.
It cannot be left to a theoretical construct for which there is little or no practical experience.
At times, Podemos has the air of an academic gathering, which reflects the fact that it has attracted those of an intellectual bent as well as an academic background.
But put a group of academics together in a room, and you will probably end up with as many arguments and differences of opinion as there are academics. That is the very nature of academia.
Ever since Podemos truly emerged with its stunning performance at last year’s Euro elections, a point that I have consistently made is that its very nature is one of its major drawbacks.
And the propensity for disagreement that an experiment, a theoretical construct gives rise to has been shown to exist.
There have been resignations at the top echelons of Podemos nationally and in the Balearics.
Like rock groups which fall out over “musical differences”, so Podemos does over political and strategic ones.
A worry might be that such differences would be carried forward into government.
How solid, how coherent would Podemos be if it were holding positions of responsibility?
Much has been said about its unknown quality, and I would argue that the greatest unknown is how it would behave in government.
As there is also the distaste for established parties, which would make coalition fraught or even hypocritical, as well as the desire for public input, how would it manage its experimentation?
Yet for all this, Podemos has a great deal of support, which has come from both left and right. It does represent something new, an attack on established values that have dragged Spain and Majorca through the mire of corruption, a voice for genuine citizen representation.
This support, though, seems to have plateaued. Ciudadanos has certainly put a brake on it. Do the C’s represent something more identifiable as a political party, something more tangible?
That the C’s can be styled as right wing on certain issues reinforces the view that Podemos support has not solely come from those holding left-wing views.
What does Podemos want? An end to the dominance of the “casta” two-party system of the PP and PSOE, yes; an end to corruption, yes; greater emphasis on innovation and technology, yes. But what else? An eco-tax? A return to Catalan language “immersion”? A fight with the hoteliers over tourism?
Though these appear to be red lines for the party, the thing is that you don’t really know for sure.
Latest opinion poll estimation: 8 to 11 seats.
Tomorrow: Biel Barceló of Més and Jaume Font of El Pi