The shit in Spain falls mainly in the fan

[The Larch]

I think the blame for the Cs supporting the far-right rather than being a normal liberal party (see also Macron's views on this) are with the Cs rather than the left.

For sure. Basically, what happened was that Rivera got drunk on his own Kool-aid, and after the previous elections, when PP dropped to their historical minimum, saw overcoming them as a real possibility, thus becoming the main right wing party in Spain. They then went hard to the right in some issues, dropping centrist voters along the way and being outcompeted by a resurgent PP and Vox on the right, ending up in a bit of a middle of nowhere politically. The party is now in disarray, and what they do in the next months will determine their future viability, if there's any to be had.

Ok so where did the centrist voters flee to?

In Spain centrist voters have a semi mythical status, like unicorns, in the sense that both PP and PSOE have, in the past claimed to be the only truly unique party that was moderate enough to better represent them, not like the other big party that was clearly extremist. This was supposed to change with C's, as they were the ones that were for real better suited for that niche, but as we said, they ruined it by veering hard to the right.

[The Larch]

They are done for, I think. Their liberal core was purged or left in protest long ago. Plus the Spanish electoral system is no FPTP, but still quite ruthless on minority parties (unless they are concentrated on a few provinces).

Ah. Well where is the liberal core going? I presume they are not staying home forever.

The liberal core is, supposedly, what they have left at this point.

[celedhring]

There are 1 million of Cs voters that seem unaccounted for (they lost 2,5 million and the other right wing parties increased only 1,5 million overall).

Add those to the 1,5 million they retained and that's good enough for 20-ish seats, which could swing many elections. That is the most realistic target for a centrist party in Spain. To grow past that you have to veer either left of right, and we've just seen where that leads.

[Valmy]

Well back in the 1930s it seemed like everybody in Spain was either a Communist or a Fascist. I see not much has changed 

[The Larch]

There are 1 million of Cs voters that seem unaccounted for (they lost 2,5 million and the other right wing parties increased only 1,5 million overall).

Add those to the 1,5 million they retained and that's good enough for 20-ish seats, which could swing many elections. That is the most realistic target for a centrist party in Spain. To grow past that you have to veer either left of right, and we've just seen where that leads.

And a party like that, with the ability to go right or left in coalitions depending on the situation, could become key to governance at national, regional and local level in this time and age, which is the tragedy of Cs. When they handcuffed themselves to PP they lost their purpose.

[Maximus]

Well back in the 1930s it seemed like everybody in Spain was either a Communist or a Fascist. I see not much has changed 

Things fall apart; the center cannot hold.

[Iormlund]

I think the blame for the Cs supporting the far-right rather than being a normal liberal party (see also Macron's views on this) are with the Cs rather than the left.

It's a bit more complicated than that.

Just about the only red line Cs has is separatism. That is what it was born against.

That line was first crossed by Iglesias in 2015 in order to provoke new elections by making a PSOE-Cs-podemos government impossible (he was gambling on becoming the new left replacing PSOE).
After the UDI Sánchez also crossed that line (perhaps to keep his significant amount of Catalan voters). Sánchez also tried to paint Cs as radical right, knowing perfectly well that they both split the moderate vote. Rivera gladly helped him by trying to replace PP (in a repetition of Iglesias' aforementioned failure).

The end result was that Cs could no longer look to the left for pacts. All that remained were PP+Vox. And that's where we are now.

We have very different readings of some of the events that took place. 

When did, in your opinion, Podemos and PSOE cross the red line of separatism exactly?

Podemos did so right from the start, during the 2015 election & aftermath. They put Catalonia on the table before it was cool.
Sánchez started relatively silent and supported the application of art. 155, however in a weakened state. Then gradually went softer (see his one on one with Torra). So much so he had to give Borrell a cabinet position to counter his bad PR amongst anti-nationalists.

[Iormlund]

There are 1 million of Cs voters that seem unaccounted for (they lost 2,5 million and the other right wing parties increased only 1,5 million overall).

Add those to the 1,5 million they retained and that's good enough for 20-ish seats, which could swing many elections. That is the most realistic target for a centrist party in Spain. To grow past that you have to veer either left of right, and we've just seen where that leads.

And a party like that, with the ability to go right or left in coalitions depending on the situation, could become key to governance at national, regional and local level in this time and age, which is the tragedy of Cs. When they handcuffed themselves to PP they lost their purpose.

The problem is they would have to gain something tangible every cycle, or risk the fate of the LibDems who were seen as merely Cameron's stooges.

[Sheilbh]

It's a bit more complicated than that.

Just about the only red line Cs has is separatism. That is what it was born against.[...]

The end result was that Cs could no longer look to the left for pacts. All that remained were PP+Vox. And that's where we are now.

I mean they have agency. They could choose for example to not associate with the far right or the left and just vote on matters as they come (abstain on the initial confidence vote). They made a choice to work with Vox and share stages with Abascal and, as Macron always argued, you can't be a centrist, pro-European force at the European level and work with the far-right at home.

This is the sort of reason why Farage won't work with Le Pen and the Tories (historically) wouldn't work with Farage.

Ok so where did the centrist voters flee to?

Some surely will have gone to Vox. If your defining issue is centralism/anti-separatism then it's a bit like anti-immigration politics. If that's the defining issue the far-right will always be able to outflank you. If you add that to a signal from the sort-of party elite then, a chunk of voters who are primarily concerned about centralism/anti-separatism, or anti-immigration politics in other countries, will decide they'd rather the red in tooth and claw version of that politics.

The problem is they would have to gain something tangible every cycle, or risk the fate of the LibDems who were seen as merely Cameron's stooges.

I think the Lib Dem issue was slightly different. As a party they always saw themselves as centrist - they had a liberal wing (the Orange bookers) and a social democratic wing. That was fundamentally different from the perception voters had of them. They achieved their success as an anti-Tory party who attacked Labour over things like making students pay tuition fees and the Iraq war.

They were a centrist party with an anti-establishment, left-wing base. In 2015 their vote collapsed because their centre-right wing basically decided they might as well vote Tory which was run by that nice, broadly liberal Mr Cameron (they've now gone back to the Lib Dems) and anti-Tory voters who also don't want to vote for Labour when they're in power (who've gone to Labour or in some cases the Greens - but on the Remain fringes may have gone back).

The Lib Dems got policy wins though they weren't great at selling them. But the real issue they had was their voters and their party understood "Lib Demness" in a profoundly different way.

[Iormlund]

I mean they have agency. They could choose for example to not associate with the far right or the left and just vote on matters as they come (abstain on the initial confidence vote). They made a choice to work with Vox and share stages with Abascal and, as Macron always argued, you can't be a centrist, pro-European force at the European level and work with the far-right at home.

They made a choice to work with Vox, yes. Which is why I stopped voted for them.
But the socialists also made the choice to work with separatists. So I can't really vote for them either.

The only difference Vox and separatists is that Vox has yet to stage a coup d'etat (ERC) or been the political arm of a terrorist organization (Bildu).

And that's where I suspect most centrists are right now.

[The Larch]

I mean they have agency. They could choose for example to not associate with the far right or the left and just vote on matters as they come (abstain on the initial confidence vote). They made a choice to work with Vox and share stages with Abascal and, as Macron always argued, you can't be a centrist, pro-European force at the European level and work with the far-right at home.

They made a choice to work with Vox, yes. Which is why I stopped voted for them.
But the socialists also made the choice to work with separatists. So I can't really vote for them either.

The only difference Vox and separatists is that Vox has yet to stage a coup d'etat (ERC) or been the political arm of a terrorist organization (Bildu).

And that's where I suspect most centrists are right now.

The degrees of "working with" are wildly different, though.

[celedhring]

Vote share for Spanish parties in the past election according to rent (in centiles)



So the far right (light green bar) does pretty well among the working class, but gets its best results among the top 10-1%. In Barcelona they got their best results in both the poorest and richest districts. Interesting phenomenon.

[The Larch]

That's from "El Diario", right? A good point they make about Vox's good results amongst lower rent groups is that some of their best results were in Murcia and Andalucía, which are both well below the Spanish average.

[Maladict]

Vote share for Spanish parties in the past election according to rent (in centiles)


So the far right (light green bar) does pretty well among the working class, but gets its best results among the top 10-1%. In Barcelona they got their best results in both the poorest and richest districts. Interesting phenomenon.

That grey line looked interesting, I almost asked what kind of party "otros" is. 

[celedhring]

Vote share for Spanish parties in the past election according to rent (in centiles)


So the far right (light green bar) does pretty well among the working class, but gets its best results among the top 10-1%. In Barcelona they got their best results in both the poorest and richest districts. Interesting phenomenon.

That grey line looked interesting, I almost asked what kind of party "otros" is. 

Most of the parties in the "others" category are regional parties, with a predominance of basque/catalan nationalists. Those do traditionally get a larger share of the vote among upper middle class.