From the ‘Indignados Movement’ to power politics: a critical study of the theoretical underpinnings of ‘Podemos’
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.20919/sspt.27.2017.70Abstract
This paper was awarded the Gillian Rose Memorial Prize for Social and Political Thought 2015, awarded to the best essay produced by a candidate for the MA in Social and Political Thought at the University of Sussex. The following is a shortened version of the original dissertation.
This paper argues that the theoretical foundations of Podemos are grounded in a series of premises that do not sufficiently challenge the political logic of liberal representative democracy. This forces the party to adopt a model that presents some similarities with what is encouraged by other realist theories of democracy such as Schumpeter’s or Down’s. As a result, the party has faced serious problems in escaping the competitive, hierarchical and efficacy-driven dynamic of a conception of politics that derives from an overemphasis on the goal of electoral victory.
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