Iberian Politics, Populism, and Democratic Innovations

The challenges that representative democratic regimes face have been widely noted and the Euro Crisis has further accentuated citizens’ dissatisfaction and the failure of some elected governments. Spain and Portugal were specially affected by this crisis due to their debt issues and to the economic problems they had when the crisis broke out. These countries were target of speculation, harsh international criticisms and had to make drastic cuts in expenditure on social welfare, education, health, etc. Most of the austerity measures affected mainly the middle-classes due to the substantial increase of taxes and the poorest citizens because of the decrease of subsidies intended to their subsistence. Furthermore, both countries saw their unemployment rates rise to unprecedented levels, affecting young people severely. All this caused significant social and political tensions and accentuated distrust towards the political elites and mainstream parties. Alienated by mainstream politics, many protesters gathered to assert their acquired rights and to call for radical changes. In 2010 and 2012, Portugal saw some of the most participated popular demonstrations and more than 3000 demonstrations were accounted for only in 2012. An even more pronounced protest environment was noticed in Spain, where one of the social movements (Podemos) behind many of these demonstrations is now a well-positioned political party running for national elections. Are these new populist social movements a democratic innovation or are they simply the expression of the nature of democratic politics, rule of the people, by and for the people, as Lincoln as put it in 1863? Through interviews and online content analysis (websites, social media and news stories), this paper aims at analysing these new social, populist movements in Spain and Portugal and the context in which they have appeared, while discussing their possible consequences for the further democratic development of these two countries.