WORLD WORLDWIDE EUROPE SPAIN News Journal Update - (en) Spaine, FAI: Before the elections of July 23, 2023:[For a working class with transformative political capacity] (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 The birth of the 15M presented an unprecedented crisis both in the

traditional bipartisanship present since the 2nd legislature in 1982,
and in the PSOE government of Zapatero. The assemblies and constant
mobilization gave a fresh air to the social movements, but
representative democracy was never fully questioned. Thus, there was no
shortage of climbers, demagogues and opportunists who dissolved the 15M
to renew social democracy and found Podemos, and who ran for the first
time in the European elections of May 2014. ---- Thus, first in the EU,
then in the town halls, and later in the government, they carried out
that "institutional assault" lukewarm and not very uncomfortable for the
economic powers. A lukewarmness that has kept them in power, but that
has served to disappoint, and that has demobilized and emptied of
content the struggles that once propelled them. Their way of dealing
with certain social issues has led them to put up patches that are more
marketing than real solutions to the needs of workers.

Between labor reform and business margins. Legislating against workers

On July 4, 2023, the Bank of Spain published a study in which it
detailed that business profits and profitability are higher than ever
(electric, oil, tourism, hospitality). According to the CC.OO's
interpretation of these data, business margins are higher than ever and
the companies with the greatest market power have shot up their margins,
aggravating the rise in prices, and all this to the detriment of
workers' wages. and of society as a whole. It is not surprising that the
employers' organizations have praised the management of Yolanda Díaz in
the Ministry of Labor and Social Economy.

The PSOE, in its electoral program for the 2019 General Elections,
promised to repeal the "most harmful aspects" of the PP's labor reform,
while UP sought the repeal of this reform. However, in 2021, the
coalition government has supported the labor reform: it has made up
temporary employment, maintains contracts in practice, does not restore
severance pay, reinforces subcontracting, facilitates dismissal, etc.

To shore up the discourse distributed by different media that workers'
salaries were going to increase thanks to the work of the government, an
"income pact" was signed between representatives of employers'
organizations and unions. This agreement, which looks very good in the
media and for political use, is not binding in the negotiations of
collective agreements, which is what obliges companies when it comes to
paying salaries and making increases.

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If business margins have grown thanks to inflation and the increase in
the cost of basic products, goods and services, it has been by
parasitizing production and sustaining the economy by the working class.
Despite the increase in the SMI in 2023 to EUR1,080 (spearhead of
government defenders), the purchasing power of the working class has not
increased, as reflected in the Bank of Spain study.

The exponential rise in energy prices already began in January 2021,
where the electricity oligopoly began with the rise just before the
climatic phenomenon known as "Filomena". The then PSOE-UP government
announced a rise in the price of electricity of up to 25%. Already then
from the FAI we denounced that the government showed a passive attitude
and of convenience with the electric oligopoly and that those who were
most affected were the workers and the most vulnerable population.

The war in Ukraine that began on February 24, 2022, the cut off of gas
from Russia, and the search for new routes and sources for supply have
directly affected the rise in prices of basic goods and services. , in
the impoverishment of workers and in the exponential increase in profits
and business margins. The government's response has been a series of
"light" and lax measures that do not respond to the needs of the working
class, but have directly helped to increase business margins.

Health crisis, privatization and gag law

On March 14, 2020, the PSOE-UP government declared a state of alarm for
the international health crisis caused by SARS-COV-2, colloquially known
as "coronavirus". A month later, from the FAI, through a statement, we
criticized the government's response and the authoritarian drift that it
was taking against the working class. A drift that has its roots both in
the very essence of the State and its coercive machinery, and in the
progressive dismantling of public health. This lack of resources has led
to the State being incapable of meeting the needs of the majority of the
population, favoring the first diagnoses and treatments for the rich and
high officials over the workers.

The PSOE-UP government has not repealed "Law 15/97 of April 25 on the
authorization of new forms of management of the health care system."
Neither has it attempted to reverse the dismantling and outsourcing of
the public health system in the slightest. The consequences of this law
as a gateway for private interests above public ones and the neoliberal
management of the autonomous communities that seek to implement health
models similar to the Anglo-Saxon ones have been the closure of
outpatient clinics, reduction of hospital beds, outsourcing consultation
services, or legislate in favor of private health lobbies.

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The use of health and the lack of access to its resources for the
working class and the most vulnerable population have consequences such
as increased inequality, precariousness, impoverishment, social
exclusion and increased mortality.

During the state of alarm, in addition to the drastic reduction in
rights and freedoms, he highlighted the politics of fear, and police
abuse and brutality. And police violence and impunity worsened even more
as a result of the segregation of Madrid neighborhoods promoted by both
the City Council and the Community of Madrid. This violence was directed
especially against migrants and the most vulnerable people. Segregation
especially affected humble and working-class neighborhoods, which have a
structural context where living in small apartments predominates,
difficult to ventilate, with overcrowded families, poorly conditioned
and many without elevators (an obstacle that further limits access to
mobility and services for the elderly and people with reduced mobility).

And while the repression was raging in the humble neighborhoods, in
Madrid districts such as Salamanca, wealthy people formed their own 15M
on Núñez de Balboa street with the approval of the State and the police.

We do not understand, when talking about "regression of freedoms" as a
vote argument, what exactly they mean, when the PSOE-UP government has
not repealed law 4/2015 of March 30 for the protection of citizen
security (the " gag law"). The repeal of this law was in their electoral
programs for the 2019 elections. And not only have they not repealed it,
but they have tried to reform it and have been applying it during the
pandemic and afterwards. And it is that the State needs a beautiful and
adequate legislative framework in order to justify police actions
against everything that intends to criticize the State, denounce the
exercise of violence by the police or simply demonstrate.

NATO and militarism. the ukrainian war

Despite the slight whispers within UP against sending arms and soldiers
to Ukraine or supporting the Ukrainian army, the PSOE-UP government has
complied with NATO's demands and has supported the war.

The main beneficiary of the war is undoubtedly the military industry.
Businessmen, executives, etc., who directly or indirectly depend on the
armed conflict are earning millions of profits supplying war material
with direct and indirect financing from the State. The increase in
defense spending to 2% of GDP has triggered growth projections at the
cost of hundreds of thousands of Russian and Ukrainian military and
workers who have been sent to die for the economic and geostrategic
benefit of Russia, Ukraine, NATO and the EU.

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Spain is a great power in the field of the arms industry and in the
export of arms and other types of war materiel, which each year fuels
various armed conflicts in the world such as that of Saudi Arabia
against Yemen or that of Israel against Palestine.

Anarchists are against war and the economic interests of those who
benefit from it, and we work to promote international struggles to
overthrow the imperialist factions.

Delegitimization and active abstention

Those who have benefited from the government have been the religious
sects. The government, instead of advancing towards a secular position
(which could be expected from a "left and progressive" government) has
applied tax benefits to sects such as Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons,
etc., which are now exempt from paying the IBI, like the Catholic Church.

Nor has the housing law met the expectations of social organizations
that work with tenants or try to prevent evictions. Every year 30,000
evictions are carried out in Spain at the hands of the police, due to
the lack of policies and State guarantees towards the most vulnerable
people. Legislation continues to benefit "vulture funds" and large
property owners. Thus, there are still millions of empty flats and
thousands of people on the street or at risk of exclusion while housing
is considered one more market good with which to speculate.

It is possible that we leave more issues unanswered: the borders, the
massacre at the Melilla fence, collaboration with fascist organizations,
the constant rhetoric of fear, the systematic repression against
organized workers, the privatization and worsening of public health
services. RENFE-Cercanías, the police infiltrated the social movements, etc.

Representative democracy revolves around the concept of legitimacy. The
elections and the ballot box legitimize the exercise of the powers of
the State, and the monopoly of coercion and violence. And it is the
recognition of the legitimacy to govern where the battle begins in the
political arena. A party with a majority of seats over the others does
not really represent a real majority of people. If the participation in
some elections is 70%, subtracting blank votes, null votes and votes for
minority parties, the big parties that are the backbone of the game of
representative democracy will each have around 25-30% support from the
electorate as a whole . The ruling party always does so in a minority.
For this reason we see that abstention is important, because it
delegitimizes them to exercise power. And that is why abstention is so
demonized, and attempts are made to make the electoral discourse as
hegemonic as possible.

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We anarchists advocate active abstention so as not to delegate our
responsibility, and we advocate for an independent working class with
its own political capacity outside of political parties, the State and
economic powers. Given that social problems such as inequalities and
structures of power and authority are structural and intrinsic to the
capitalist economic system and the State, we do not believe that
narcissistic, self-centered, ambitious politicians with delusions of
grandeur are going to solve the real problems of the class. worker.

We anarchists advocate organizing ourselves through solidarity and
mutual support, characteristic and intrinsic values of the human being
that have made us evolve and adapt as a species. And it is through
struggle, solidarity and mutual support that improvements in the working
and living conditions of the workers have been achieved. It is necessary
to organize ourselves, build organizations that have an impact on what
affects us, that excite us, that serve us to stop the abuses of
employers and job insecurity, as well as stop evictions, repression and
any attack by political and economic powers towards our interests and
the struggle of the working class.

for lawlessness

Earth Group

https://federacionanarquistaiberica.wordpress.com/2023/07/20/ante-las-elecciones-del-23-de-julio-de-2023/#more-1354
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