Spain’s “indignant Ones”: Exit Rubalcaba

THE indignados are back. The spontaneous movement of the “indignant ones” found a new mouthpiece in Podemos (“We Can”), an internet-savvy leftist party founded four months ago, which stormed past older opposition groups to become Spain’s fourth most-voted-for party. In cities like Madrid it came third behind the Socialist Party and the People’s Party (PP), beating the traditional, communist-led United Left (IU) and its coalition allies.After years of high unemployment and austerity Spanish voters are angry, though more with their own politicians than with Europe. As a result Spain has its own equivalent of Greece’s far-left party, Syriza, a future partner in the European Parliament. Podemos is both deeply serious with its anti-EU austerity and anti-globalisation creed and fiercely radical. One of its new MEPs hails from a group called Anticapitalist Left. The party’s pony-tailed, telegenic leader, Pablo Iglesias, a 35-year-old university lecturer, promises to return from Brussels to lead Podemos into a general election that is due within 20 months.Podemos took 8% of the vote, which set off two political shocks. The duopoly of the two big parties was broken, as the Socialists and PP jointly sank below the 50% mark for the first time in three decades. And Podemos helped to destroy the position of Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, the Socialist leader, who…

The Economist: Europe