Democracy Reloaded: Inside Spain's Political Laboratory from 15-M to Podemos

by Cristina Flesher Fominaya

In Democracy Reloaded , Cristina Flesher Fominaya tells the story of one of the most influential social movements of recent Spain's "Indignados" or "15-M" movement that took to the streets of Spain on May 15, 2011 with the rallying cry "Real Democracy Now! We are not commodities in the hands of bankers and politicians!" Based on access to key participants in the 15-M movement and Podemos and extensive participant observation, Flesher Fominaya tells a provocative and original story of this remarkable movement, its emergence, evolution, and impact. In so doing, she argues that in times of global economic and democratic crisis, movements organized around autonomous network logics can build and sustain strong movements in the absence of formal organizations, strong professionalized leadership, and the ability to attract external resources. Further, she challenges explanations for success that rest on the mobilizing power of social media. Through in-depth analysis of the month
long occupation of Madrid's Puerta del Sol, and subsequent 15-M mobilization, Democracy Reloaded shows how the experience of the protest camp revitalized pre-existing networks, forged bonds of solidarity, and gave birth to a new movement that went on to influence public debate and the political agenda, in Spain and beyond.

368 pages, Hardcover

Published May 14, 2020

About the author

Cristina Flesher Fominaya has a PhD in Sociology from UC Berkeley and works at the University of Aberdeen. She is a founding co-editor of the journal Interface.

Reviews

[Jack · Rating 5 out of 5]

„Carlos draws on Gramsci to explain the strategy developed in Juventud sin Futuro and later expressed in 15-M:

If we want to transform common sense, we need to understand that we can’t go in guns-a-blazing (a saco), that we need to generate mechanisms of seduction. [. . .] There is this phrase by Gramsci that’s used incorrectly now to talk about institutional politics: “you have to have one foot in the streets and another in the institutions.” Gramsci actually said that you have to have one foot in common sense and the other in rupture. If you have both feet in common sense you aren’t transformative, but if you have both feet in rupture then you’re just a fucking ghetto and you won’t change anything. [. . .] You have got to permanently play with this unstable balance and ambivalence.

“