The slow, costly and calculated battle of Sumar and Podemos to substantiate a new electoral offer from the “true left” emerges, not so much as a political achievement, but from the collapse of some ideals. Many of its voters remember May 15, 2011, a lost time when slogans such as: “We are not merchandise in the hands of politicians and bankers” could be read in public squares.
The manifestos of Democracia Real Ya, Toma la Plaza or Juventud sin Futuro, when the energies were directed to change Spain, are now greening again before the nostalgic eyes of former Podemos voters. Twelve years later, Podemos, the party in which many had placed their hopes of social transformation, of breaking all ties with the elites and the only one with the capacity to impose a revolutionary aesthetic that permeates all public debate and deliberation, collapses.
The agreement reached between both formations to attend the generals shows that there has been a change in objective, by substituting the cause of the people for the cause of preserving power.
To understand the magnitude of the collapse of the UP, it is good to remember the observation of the historian Edgar Quinet, when referring in his case to the failure of the French revolution: “Revolutionaries are afraid of the revolution.” Quinet offered the image of a revolution that collapsed, as we can now, because it succumbed due to the lack of audacity of its promoters and the fear they had when they saw the abyss before them, caused by the results of their actions and policies.
The commitment of the “true left” and Podemos to support the leadership of Yolanda Díaz should be interpreted as the end of the 15-M movement, as the launching of a new Raft of the Medusa, in which 15 left-wing parties hope to save themselves. drifting
Now that the defense of new social rights promoted by UP is perceived by a part of public opinion as political errors, the process of demystifying the purple formation begins, which is no longer seen as a political space for social transformation and acquires the role of hinge party to maintain bipartisanship.
