Version imprimableWith a turnout of 49.2% (in 2019 it was 60.7%), the moderate upward trend of the Spanish right was confirmed: PP (34.2% and 34 seats), Vox (9.6% and 6 seats), now joined by a new political player, Alvise (which, presenting itself as the extreme expression of punitivist populism under the slogan "The party is over!", won 4.6% of the vote and 3 seats). On the other hand, Sumar and Podemos obtained 4.7% (3 seats) and 3.3% (2 seats) of the vote respectively, below the 10.1% obtained by Podemos alone in the 2019 European elections. The PSOE, with 30.2% of the vote and 32 seats, lost 2 seats compared to the last European elections, but managed to halt the decline predicted by most polls due to the erosion caused by the approval of the amnesty law for hundreds of activists who participated in the pro-Catalan process that culminated in the referendum of 1 October 2017. Lastly, non-state political forces, on both the right and the left, lost votes but maintained their presence in the European Parliament and reasserted themselves as necessary political players in the breakdown of equality between the two main blocs for the governability of the monarchical regime.
Political instability
In this context, where the cycle that began with 15M and the rise of Podemos is definitively closed, the radicalisation of the right in its questioning of the legitimacy of the coalition government - demanding early general elections - will continue alongside the leading role of the judiciary in its belligerence against the application of the amnesty law and against any concession that, in its view, threatens the "unity of Spain".
It is therefore foreseeable that political instability will continue, conditioned also by the difficulties that the Socialist Party of Catalonia (PSC) will encounter in forming a government with the support of Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC) and the Comuns, despite being the political force that won the regional elections on 12 May. The internal crisis that ERC is experiencing after its notable electoral setback and its overtaking by Junts (the political formation led by Carles Puigdemont) makes it unlikely that it will support the PSC candidate without significant political concessions from Pedro Sánchez, particularly with regard to a new regional funding model. It is therefore not out of the question that elections will be called again in Catalonia next October.
A turn to the left
On the left of the PSOE, Sumar’s electoral setback has already led to the resignation of Labour Minister Yolanda Díaz as the party’s general coordinator, and to an open debate that will probably lead to its new configuration as a coalition of parties, in which Izquierda Unida will probably play a more important role. All in all, a strategic debate is already opening up within the PSOE on what position to maintain within the PSOE government under less favourable conditions than in the past, and bearing in mind that they will also be under pressure from Podemos, which is now determined to turn left once it has left government.
Translated by International Viewpoint from l’Anticapitaliste.
