Keeping dissent alive under the Great Recession: no- radicalisation and protest in Spain after the eventful 15M/indignados campaign (original) (raw)
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Partecipazione & Conflitto, 2016
Based on theories of cycles of collective behavior, this piece establishes a periodiza-tion of the cycle of anti-austerity and anti-political status quo protests in the shadow of the Great Recession that Spain faced, 2007-2015. More specifically, it tries to explain why the peak of protests persisted for long: radicalization was contained, institutionalization postponed and protesters' divisions avoided. The crucial argument here, an innovation with regards to the classic theories of cycles, is that the high standards of mobilization persisted for a long time as the result of the issue specialization of a more general anti-austerity fight and the strategic alliances ––with varying degrees of formality–– that new civil organizations forged with the unions. For illustrating the longitudinal dynamics of the cycle of protest, we use original protest event data.
Debats, 2022
This article aimed to determine how the structure of political opportunities in Spain has changed in connection to the cycles of protest associated with the 15-M anti-austerity movement and Catalan independence process between 2011 and 2017. To do this, we compared both episodes of conflict based on an analytical model developed through theories of the political process. In addition, we used evidence from the analysis of statistical records, barometers of public opinion, newspapers, and research carried out by other authors. This article discusses the similarities and differences between both episodes in relation to the different variables making up the structure of political opportunities. We end by identifying the impacts of both episodes on these structures as well as the state responses when trying to manage the challenges launched by them. Finally, the institutionalisation dynamics followed by both movements were compared and we also examined their conclusions in two different outputs: transformation of the party system in the case of the Spanish 15-M movement and repression and imprisonment of the pro-independence leaders in the Catalan one. To conclude, it is made clear that the chances of social co-mobilisation success increase when political opportunities are broadened, when the existence of allies is proven, and when the opponents' weakness are made evident. However, we also expound how, when faced with intensified protests, government forces and the state apparatus may respond with reform or repression, or with a complex combination of both.
The Evolution of Contention in Spain (2000-2017): An Analysis of Protest Cycles
Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas, 2022
This article provides an overview of contentious politics in 21st century Spain using Protest Event Analysis (PEA) based on a large new database (n = 4,062). The analysis identifies different cycles of protest and discusses how they have changed and been continued in the action taken by social movements. While protest before the Great Recession often revolved around global conflicts, since then it has tended to be concentrated at the national and local level in terms of spaces, demands, and objectives. While political parties and trade unions are still important, their actions run in parallel to the emergence of new actors and the revitalisation of others in a movement/counter-movement dynamic. The article analyses these and other characteristics of protest cycles.
Since May 2010, with the Socialist Party turn over in its government policies and a year later the appearance of the Spanish 15M/Indignados movement, various waves of mobilization constitute what may be understood as a cycle of protest. First, mobilizations took place during the radical shift in Socialist Government’s speech and action in the context of the financial and economic crisis in Spain. And later, after the parliamentary elections of November 2011, mobilization addressed against the strategy adopted by the right wing Government to fight the crisis: cuts in the budget of social services combined with an ultraconservative agenda, social rights cuts. The results of the Europarliamentary elections of May 2014 brought to Spanish political scene the surprising emergence of a new party, Podemos, which got 5 seats in the Eurocamera. The aim of this paper focuses on the link between protest actions and the emergence of a new party. We’ll try to show that protest actions reflect a growing separation between citizenry and the political class; this separation causes an ideological reconfiguration of the electorate, reflected on the electoral success of Podemos in the Eurocamera. With the process of its constitution as a new electoral force in foreseen campaigns, the complete political scenario is moving and, the rest of political parties, from left to right, are obliged to find a place in scene, not just because of Podemos, but as a result of the ideological and political reconfiguration. More Info: Co-Authors: María Luisa Revilla; Ignacio Martínez; Carlos Molina; Herico More; Karen Rodríguez
Social Movement Studies
Social movement research has shed light on the relationship between processes of alliance building and multiple factors related to political opportunities, framing, identities, networks and resource mobilization. However, less is known about the impact of eventful protests on coalition building dynamics. Drawing on a paired comparison between the Portuguese and Spanish cycles of protest under the Great Recession, we aim at accounting for social movement alliances over time. While these countries present parallel protest dynamics until 2011, after that point two eventful protests lead each country into different trajectories. While the cycle in Portugal was marked by intermittent large protest events dominated by institutional actors, in Spain the peak of mobilization was consistently high between 2011 and 2013. When comparing these cases two factors stand out: the mobilization capacity and the autonomy of new emerging actors vis-à-vis institutional ones. Eventful protests were a key factor in articulating these elements. In Spain, the strength and autonomy of 15M assemblies and anti-austerity actors facilitated the formation of strategic alliances with trade unions. In Portugal, transversal initiatives and sustained alliances did not follow after the Geração à Rasca events. These emerged only later in the cycle, however were nonetheless hampered by overlapping membership and a lack of autonomy from institutional actors. Two original protest event analysis datasets are used to illustrate these arguments.
Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas
Este artículo explora la evolución de la contienda política en la España del siglo xxi a través de un análisis de acontecimientos de protesta (Protest Event Analysis) basado en una nueva y amplia base de datos (n = 4.062). El análisis permite distinguir diversos ciclos de protesta y discutir cambios y continuidades en la acción de los movimientos sociales. Mientras la protesta anterior a la Gran Recesión gira en torno a conflictos en muchos casos globales, a partir de entonces tiende a concentrarse en el nivel nacional y local en cuanto a espacios, demandas y objetivos. Partidos y sindicatos se muestran todavía relevantes al mismo tiempo que surgen nuevos actores y se revitalizan otros en una dinámica de movimiento/contramovimiento. El artículo analiza estas y otras características de los ciclos de protesta.
Revista Internacional de Sociología, 2019
This article seeks to understand the trajectory of radicalization in the Catalan 'procés'. Regardless of their formal legal standing, referendum campaigns are distinct political opportunities which also generate further opportunities. Contrary to what some theories of protest would predict, when political opportunities are closed down at national level, and repression toughens, violent escalation leading to fragmentation and ultimately demobilization does not necessarily ensue, at least in the short term. As the Catalan 'procés' illustrates between the mid-2000s and late-2018, the combination of mechanisms such as appropriation of opportunities, downward scale shift and movement convergence can mitigate escalation processes. A dense network of local and grassroots assemblies displaced the previously dominant, major civil society organizations that led mass protests, especially during the 2012-2015 'diadas'. These grassroots actors prioritized the organization of dissent through more direct, more disruptive, but mostly peaceful forms of action. This in turn facilitated movement convergence, based upon solidarization, as it opened up local spaces where the activists from across the spectrum could mobilize together, preempting a clear violent escalation and the emergence of violent splinter groups till late 2018.
¡Indígnate!: The 2011 popular protests and the limits to democracy in Spain
Capital & Class, 2012
From its origins in a network of activists utilising new social media to coordinate a series of protest marches in cities across Spain, the ‘15-M’ movement has since staged camp-outs in several main city squares, and in the space of a month again mobilised 40,000 protestors in Madrid and 80,000 in Barcelona to march against high unemployment, the policies and conduct of Spain’s political class, and to demand ‘real democracy NOW!’. As an important case of potential interest to Capital & Class readers in its own right, but also as one example of contemporary European mass movements like that of the aganaktismenoi in Greece, this report explains the motives and actions of los indignados, while also contextualising it within a critical materialist analysis of the political economy of Spain since the mid-twentieth century. It concludes with some open questions about the limits to the movement itself and its demands for real democracy and systemic change.
Debunking Spontaneity: Spain's 15-M/Indignados as Autonomous Movement.
Social Movement Studies, 2014
The Spanish 15-M/Indignados have drawn global attention for the strength and longevity of their anti-austerity mobilizations. Two features have been highlighted as particularly noteworthy: (1) Their refusal to allow institutional left actors to participate in or represent the movement, framed as a movement of ‘ordinary citizens’ and (2) their insistence on the use of deliberative democratic practices in large public assemblies as a central organizing principle. As with many emergent cycles of protest, many scholars, observers and participants attribute the mobilizations with spontaneity and ‘newness’. I argue that the ability of the 15-M/Indignados to sustain mobilization based on deliberative democratic practices is not spontaneous, but the result of the evolution of an autonomous collective identity predicated on deliberative movement culture in Spain since the early 1980s. My discussion contributes to the literature on social movement continuity and highlights the need for historically grounded analyses that pay close attention to the maintenance and evolution of collective identities and movement cultures in periods of latency or abeyance in order to better understand the rapid mobilization of networks in new episodes of contention. KEY WORDS: Anti-austerity protests, global justice movement, Indignados/15-M, Spain, deliberative democracy, collective identity, autonomous movements, spontaneity, movement continuity, movement culture, genealogy