In a parliamentary debate on Monday, Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias accused the socialists of refusing to offer his party significant positions and wanting them to be "mere decor" in the government.
"We have to talk about content, we have to talk about programmes, and not so much about who will occupy the blue seats," Sanchez retorted on Tuesday, regarding the places reserved for the cabinet in parliament.Sanchez's effort to form a government is important because the Socialists' performance in Spain's April general election was heralded as a stunning comeback for a mainstream party in the age of Brexit and Trump. As Raphael Minder notes in "Sánchez Struggles to Assemble New Government in Spain":
Mr. Sánchez’s surprisingly strong result in April was seen as a victory for Socialism in Europe. It also came as a relief to backers of the European Union, which he and his party support, at a time when the bloc is embattled by challenges from nationalists and populists, especially in Italy and Eastern Europe.
The political uncertainty in Spain will be watched closely by European partners, particularly President Emmanuel Macron of France. He has been hoping that Mr. Sánchez could prove a strong ally in his project to fortify the European Union as it prepares for Britain’s departure.At the time I interpreted that the Socialists' big win was due to Sanchez campaigning against austerity and for more social spending. Macron's embrace of Sanchez refutes any idea that the Spanish Socialist Party is going to scrap neoliberalism.
For a better understanding of the issues at stake it is worth reading an interview with Manolo Monereo, "Podemos Must Become an Anti-Establishment Force Again," which appeared last month.
Monereo goes into the rise of Podemos out the Indignados/Occupy movement and how that post-meltdown political moment seems to have lapsed.
Monereo is clear. There is nothing for Podemos in a coalition with the Socialists, other than greater irrelevance. Podemos not only lost over a third of its MPs in the April elections, but it performed even worse in regional elections held in May.
Given this, one would think Iglesias will resist and Sanchez will lose again tomorrow when a second vote is held to form a government.
Monereo ends the interview with a wonderful statement on the neoliberal/neoconservatism fin de siècle in the midst of which we are presently planted:
In Spain, the establishment might be stabilizing itself once more, but the world is heading towards an almost permanent state of chaos. That’s the key thing for me. Pablo taught geopolitics but he doesn’t seem to understand it, what’s happening in the world. The world is heading towards chaos, towards a great new transition that has already begun. We’re about to enter a period similar to the one Europe witnessed between 1875 and 1914 — which saw the failure of the first wave of globalization. Now we’re about to enter the period of failure for the second wave of globalization. This is something Podemos still doesn’t understand.
