Neither widespread popular disaffection with the government nor equally widespread disenchantment with thhave helped Vox advance in the polls. Spain is among the western European countries hardest hit by the corona virus. By mid-May, the country had more than 270,000 COVID-19 infections, and more than 27,000 dead from the disease. Madrid metropolitan area accounted for… Continue reading “Spain’s radical right party might need some recovery from the coronavirus”
In this article I intend to combine two concepts: the extreme right and the squatters’ movement. Initially, they both seem like incompatible concepts since we might think that squatters are better linked to anarchism and social movements of the extreme left. This may be so, but the practice of squatting is not exclusive to a… Continue reading “The squatters’ movement in the extreme right: the case of Hogar Social Madrid (I)”
Introduction On March 8 2020, thousands of Spaniards were summoned to join two radically different mass gatherings in Madrid: a demonstration to celebrate International Women’s Day, and a VOX meeting in which Santiago Abascal was going to be re-elected as the president of the radical right political force for the next few years. The party’s… Continue reading “The Spanish radical right, COVID-19 and the “socio-communism””
In Spain, two sides have emerged: traitors vs. patriots. This division is the last thing the country needs right now. The arrival of Podemos and VOX on the Spanish political scene not only meant that voters had new electoral options. It also led to a new, groundbreaking style that was a change from the stereotypical,… Continue reading “The Tale of the Two Spains”
“Police confirms: Mallorca thugs are Leipzig hooligans“: This headline – caused by two henchmen of the extreme right hooligan scene of the Leipzig-based club 1. FC Lokomotive Leipzig (Lok Leipzig) – was the most recent one to cause massive repercussions in public and media. Both men attacked a Senegalese bouncer during a disco attendance at… Continue reading ““A past still present?”: Lokomotive Leipzig and its fan scene”
Education is being used as a dividing instrument as various political coalitions seek to distort curriculums to fit their agendas. Last 5th September, on the eve of the beginning of the school year in Spain, the executive director of the Federation of Guilds of Editors of Spain, Antonio María Ávila, reported publicly the amount of pressures schoolbooks… Continue reading “In Spain, A Perversion Of Textbooks To Fit Political Objectives”
The far-right party’s behaviour has been very controversial, to say the least, in many aspects concerning women’s issues. On the 3rd of September, 2019 a political delegation from Iran visited the Spanish congress. The Iranian protocol dictated that men could not shake hands with women. Because of these requirements, the far-right party VOX announced that they… Continue reading “VOX and the rhetoric of gender violence”
Last Sunday’s elections saw far-right party Vox doubling its seats to become the third largest political force in the Spanish parliament, in line with other European far-right parties. Catalonia, immigration and Franco are some of the reasons why. Spain seems to be experiencing a déjà vu, as socialist party PSOE has won the elections but… Continue reading “The end of Spanish exceptionalism”
Those who defend statues meant to assert dominance have yet to learn the lessons of the past. In 1975, on a satirical newscast on the American television show Saturday Night Live, mock reporter Chevy Chase announced Spanish dictator Francisco Franco’s death for the better part of a year, reminding audiences that the dictator was ‘still… Continue reading “The memory of Generalisimo Francisco Franco is still alive”
Flags are one of the most recognisable cultural artefacts that identify any community since they confer social cohesion to the group (Reichl 2004, Knowlton 2012,Leone 2018). The semiotic relevance of flags is evident, as they become an expression of a collective experience therefore constructing communities and eliciting multiple emotional and pragmatic responses. Flags construct a… Continue reading “On inclusive and exclusive flags”