Fishing in Troubled Waters. Democracy, Economic System and Vote in Spain

This paper examines the impact of economic crisis on some relevant political attitudes towards democracy in Spain, and its consequences in terms of support to established and to new, emerging parties. We have selected three attitudes: democratic legitimacy or support for democracy, political and economic discontent or dissatisfaction with the way democracy works, and political disaffection. Concerning economic system, we have chosen the legitimacy, the efficacy, and the fairness of Capitalism. Democratic legitimacy and satisfaction with the performance of democracy proved to have an impact on the citizens’ disaffection from the political system, as unemployment and opinions on legitimacy, efficacy, and fairness of capitalism also had. Finally, attending to electoral consequences, the paper illustrates how, in moments of economic and political crises, dissatisfaction –but not disaffection-- is directly related to the increasing voting intention enjoyed by Podemos, a populist left-wing new party, and to the probability of a serious disruption of the Spanish party system.