Earlier in February, Anticapitalistas, a revolutionary socialist organization that in 2013-4 helped to found Podemos as an electoral expression of the movement of the indignados, announced its decision to withdraw from participation in Podemos’ upcoming convention, known as the State Citizens Assembly. Anticapitalistas had concluded that it could not support the Podemos leadership’s decision to enter the Spanish state’s government as a junior partner to the mainstream Socialist Party (PSOE), under Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. Here, we reprint the communiqué that Anticapitalistas issued February 16 to explain its position. It will debate its future relationship with Podemos and announce its decision on whether it will leave Podemos for good after its own meeting on March 28. The original of this statement can be found here.
To inform our readers of these important developments for the international left, the International Socialist Project plans to translate a series of articles and interviews on this debate over the next few weeks.
Anticapitalista statement to the State Citizens Assembly of Podemos
Communiqué, February 16, 2020
- The decisions made by Podemos during the last few months point in a direction that we do not share. The entry of five UP (Unidas Podemos, the electoral alliance between the Eurocommunist Izquierda Unida and Podemos) ministers into a progressive-neoliberal government dominated by the Socialist Party (PSOE)—in which that party controls the main levers of power—means that, far from weakening the current political regime, it is integrating into it and seeing its management as the only possible goal. Our proposal to vote for a PSOE government and then go into opposition to continue fighting for an alternative that would speak for the majority was cast aside by Podemos as it currently exists. Nor do we share the policy of the social compact that renounces confrontation with the great economic powers. In this sense, we note that there is an enormous difference between the objectives of the Podemos that we helped to form six years ago and its current incarnation. Podemos has gone from challenging the political class and the economic elite to becoming part of the former without touching the privileges of the latter.
- We also understand that most people on the left share a sense of relief at the formation of this government. Fear of the extreme right and exhaustion after years of mobilizations help to explain this position, which we understand and respect. However, we believe that the goals of this government lack ambition, even if confine ourselves within the margins of the system. That is why our immediate task is to try to promote a new cycle of struggle that will prevent the emptying of the streets: on March 8 to make feminist advances, to demand the repeal of anti-labor reforms, for rent control, to close internment centers imprisoning migrants, to prohibit layoffs in profitable companies, to stop evictions and to break with Article 135 of the Constitution (used in enforce austerity measures). Without organized popular pressure, there will be no progress. Without advances that are worth defending, that distribute wealth and power toward those at the bottom, a dangerous breeding ground for the far right will grow, allowing it to extend its sexist, racist, authoritarian demagogy in the service of the rich.
- Given this, and without analyzing the splits and decline that Podemos has suffered as an organization in recent years, nor having a properly prepared political discussion, the Citizens’ Assembly (i.e. the Podemos convention, scheduled for March) appears as a mere ratification of its leadership and the adopted strategy of its submission to the PSOE.
- For this reason, we at Anticapitalistas have agreed not to participate in the next State Assembly of Podemos and to focus our debates on deciding our definitive relationship with this political project that we contributed to founding and to which we have dedicated so much effort. Our internal process of debate will culminate on March 28 with a conference in which we will make our final decision known. Unreservedly, we wish the best of luck to all who decide to participate in the assembly. Rest assured that we will continue to meet and work together in many areas.
Translated for the International Socialism Project by Lance Selfa
Lance Selfa is the author of The Democrats: A Critical History (Haymarket, 2012) and editor of U.S. Politics in an Age of Uncertainty: Essays on a New Reality (Haymarket, 2017).
