VOX may be on the cusp of growing its voter base, as the media campaign that led segments of the public to discard the party out of hand begins to lose its sting, in part as a result of sheer exposure to VOX’s leaders and ideas.
In this climate, the party has presented a vote of no confidence against the present government, which was led by an independent candidate not himself a member of VOX, the prominent Economics professor Ramon Tamames. The vote failed, but its intention was never to actually go through (had it succeeded, the idea was for Tamames, who would have become PM, to call for early elections).
In any case, this may well serve as a crowning moment in the normalizing of the party, cementing its proximity to a prominent, left-wing intellectual who many see as a key figure in the framing of Spanish democracy.
The speech that professor Tamames gave before the vote of no confidence highlighted the degree to which VOX’s program overlaps with the post-Franco general consensus of Spanish politics, and, therefore the degree to which the socialist party (PSOE) and its coalition allies (including separatists happy to align themselves with ETA terrorists) have abandoned this consensus. Tamames has described the current government as setting up an absorptive autocracy, whose creeping violation of judicial independence bodes badly for democracy.
The speech itself makes it harder for the center-right People’s Party (PP) not to accept a future coalition with VOX, and it may serve to encourage disenfranchised center-left voters to at least abstain from the next national elections.
Policy Proposals
Tamames’ understanding of geopolitics, social issues, and economics is more or less that of his generation’s mainstream version of pre-woke globalism. However, we do well to note that this orientation is not unalloyed, and is tempered by a lifetime of political exposure.
For our part, we should give priority to the specific policy content of the vote. To wit, the professor’s concrete proposals included:
- The creation of a special prosecutor’s office reporting to the Congress of Deputies and tasked with investigating the Executive;
- The creation of an eco-volunteer corps to mobilize the “urbanite youth” towards activities aimed at protecting Spain’s forests;
- A plan for reforestation aimed at the cultivation of two million new forest hectares, presented as the best way for Spain to meet the EU’s aims vis CO2 emission reduction;
- A new agricultural policy;
- The creation of an Ibero-American university or research center, with campuses on both sides of the Atlantic, to promote a common understanding of the history of the Spanish (and Portuguese) empire, as well as greater economic collaboration;
- The expansion of irrigation;
- Pro-business policies aimed at supporting Spanish companies and industry;
- New anti-corruption measures.
Entrepreneurs and Industry
With respect to pro-businesses policies, Tamames specifically attacked the emphasis on SMEs which the government of Spain, taking its cues from the EU, pretends are the locus of economic dynamism and wealth creation. The economics professor argued for greater economic freedom and the favoring of entrepreneurship with the understanding that the state has to contribute to setting up a robust national industry.
This is an important point requiring further development: SMEs operate downstream from large economies of scale and government investments in high-tech sectors. The EU’s ‘green transition’ and ‘digital age’ policy priorities, for example, tend to limit themselves to using SMEs as means for adapting and delivering products that are mainly bought from non-European companies, so that the lion’s share of value-added that is associated with the so-called ‘fourth industrial revolution’ does not redouble on working and middle-class Europeans. The romanticizing of SMEs is a red herring meant to distract the public.
Climate Change and Foresting
During a press conference, when asked how his support for the UN’s 2030 Agenda (according to the journalist) can possibly be made compatible with VOX, Tamames responded specifically in terms of global warming, which he considers a key issue, but which he thinks VOX will come around on, not getting into details so far as the causes of the phenomenon in question and what (non-UN recommended) recipes for dealing with it might be. He repeated this desire for VOX to make the issue of global warming part of its platform in parliament.
Just as he favors a strong national industry—because he hails from an era in which this was still an acceptable cause for European politicians to champion—and is not distracted by the SME honey-trap, Tamames’ lack of skepticism on the issue of global warming actually leads him to the very straightforward recommendation that Spain address the problem by planting more trees and inculcating rugged outdoorsmanship in its youth, rather than ruining itself economically through disastrous energy policies and dependence on foreign actors.
Patriotism and Foreign Policy
Tamames has specified that his willingness to work with Abascal’s party is owed to three key areas of agreement: 1) the defense of Spanish unity and the constitution, 2) the defense of the parliamentary monarchy, and 3) the use of national symbols.
All three factors have prompted the professor to comment on Spain’s diversity and expansiveness: Spain’s present constitution commands his loyalty, but so does the 1812 constitution, which he glossed as one that directed itself towards Spaniards on “both hemispheres” (a reference to the Americas); the monarchy is necessary as a powerful symbol that draws diverse peoples together; the present Spanish flag goes back to King Charles III, originally a symbol of the country’s navy and therefore a reminder of its connection to overseas territories.
Tamames has described Spain as a “nation of nations” and a “super-nation,” specifically identifying her with the empire, hinting at the usage of terms like “Spain” and “Spaniard” inclusively of American Spanish-speakers. When asked about this, Abascal waved away the contrast between Tamames and his party precisely by referring to the fact that Spain was, indeed, an empire (and therefore included multiple nations). In reality, the historical and conceptual distinction between Spain and the empire, and between Spaniards and non-Spanish subjects of the Spanish crown, was perfectly clear in that empire’s administrative structure.
A certain rhetorical ambiguity between ‘nation’ and ‘empire’ operates in such a way as to allow ‘nationalistic’ rhetoric, appealing to certain voters, to oscillate somewhat fluidly with a more ‘cosmopolitan’ emphasis, appealing to others. It may also serve as a dog-whistle to economic interests in need of immigrant labor, as these are given to understand that restrictions on African migration can be compensated by Latin American migrants.
In this context, during his speech in parliament, Tamames celebrated the figure of Hernán Cortés and the conquest of the Aztec empire.
Tamames’ specific recommendation on this point is so obvious as to pain any Spaniard faced with the fact of its still not having been pursued in earnest: Spain should cultivate economic ties with Latin America, promote prosperity on that continent, and set up a transatlantic center to combat the Black Legend against it and defend the imperial legacy.
Separatism and Territorial Policy
In general, Tamames emphasizes Spain’s diversity, which is essentially no greater than that of France or Germany, except owing to the fortunate historical accident of Spain having never embraced Jacobin centralization. In the past, however, this emphasis has led the professor to suggest giving greater autonomy to Catalonia, which, together with the Basque country, is already among the sub-national regions in the EU that concentrate the most competences. The idea that more autonomy would reduce separatism bespeaks a fundamental error in the analysis to which Tamames tends: namely, ascribing instability to endogamous causes alone, and ignoring the involvement of foreign interests and funding aiming at the destabilization of a country or region. This is likely the fruit of the optimism with which his political bloom met the entry of Spain into the European Economic Community, NATO, and the global community of liberal democracies.
As we will see, however, it has not completely prevented him from developing that cynical edge that the 21st century demands of Europeans. Fortunately, so far as pro-independence parties are concerned, he now recognizes the problem of a gerrymandered electoral map that over-represents separatists in parliament. He has moreover expressed his view that there is no such thing as a “right to self-determination” for regional identities that emerged within the concept of Spanish identity, and whose ancestors (even as recently as the post-Franco constitution referendum) opted to be part of Spain—a nation whose existence is the premise of those very institutions the separatists hope to appropriate.
Migration and Demographics
At one point, the professor asked parliament to reflect on why Spain suffers from both high unemployment and massive immigration. This remark has been criticized for missing the basic point that, apart from a lot of work staying ‘off the books,’ the migrant precisely works jobs that locals don’t want. Of course, this is what his naive framing seems aimed at highlighting: the exploitative aspect of migration and the economic policies resulting in low salaries.
Crucially, with respect to demographics, Tamames did not shy away from pleading that natalist policies be pursued to encourage a replacement birth rate among Spaniards.
Geopolitics and Tamames’ Ambiguous Globalism
Allegiance to the international consensus around various issues is taken for granted. The ambiguity is whether this allegiance rises above rhetoric, becoming an essential part of Tamames’ worldview, or is merely rhetorical, so that what is essential in his beliefs is what he shares with VOX.
With respect to his independence of opinion, it is particularly worth noting that Tamames broke with the relatively Atlanticist orientation of VOX when, at one point during his speech, he referred to the U.S. as having brought about the war in Ukraine. He added that the American empire’s destructive policies will not be resolved by those of the Chinese empire, and that the EU is incapable of articulating its own geopolitics.
Tamames made a point of condemning the government’s dereliction of duties with respect to the western Sahara, constituting a baleful subordination to U.S.-Moroccan interests, and emphasized the need to retake the British colony of Gibraltar. He also took the opportunity to remind the parliament that the present uses of imperial legacies are a function of memory, and memory is a function of propaganda, by taking a jab at the British empire in general, and Churchill’s denial of food to Bengalis during the war in particular.
Finally, focusing on Europe, and in the context of the Spanish government’s assault on judicial independence and the separation of powers, Tamames informed the parliament that, for all the criticism to which Poland and Hungary are subjected by Brussels, those countries have not abused the rule of law in the way in which Spain’s leftist coalition has. Of course, he also took the opportunity to condemn the biased laws that seek to open old wounds and pretend that the nationalists were the only side that committed terrible acts during Spain’s civil war, reminding the parliament that the second Republic and Popular Front that led up to that war were a shamble of poor government and revolutionary violence.
Normalizing VOX and the Perils of a New Populism
Abascal has said that VOX is precisely presenting Tamames as head of the vote of no confidence because the professor is an independent, and can represent Spaniards who do not feel themselves identified with VOX. In this context, he referred to the fact that, in those areas where VOX and Tamames disagree, Tamames agrees with the People’s Party (PP), and so, the center-right ought to support this vote of no confidence.
Rather than directly turning the VOX brand into a politically transversal one, Abascal is opting for using the party as part of a larger coalition-building effort in which the centrist voices of the PP and Tamames are allowed to be dominant. This poses several questions, namely:
Whether this is a short-term strategy, or the definitive role VOX sees itself as playing;
And, assuming the former is the case, whether VOX can become dominant in Spanish politics once the present crisis (i.e. the unambiguously disastrous leftist coalition’s present government) has passed and the party itself has become identified with mainstream coalition building.
In terms of the last point, VOX’s criticisms of ‘globalism’ may begin to ring hollow after it repeatedly paves the way for ‘globalists’ to govern, just as appeals to old school working class politics might do likewise after the party has repeatedly aligned with various shades of liberal economics.
Tamames mainly appeals to people who remember him in his prime, and these folks are old enough to have been voting for the same party for decades, for which reason they are difficult to make inroads with, which is not to imply such an effort is to be sniffed at. VOX could benefit hugely from associating with the aura of Transition-era politicians and intellectuals (many of whom did their utmost to fend for their country). Indeed, the Spanish public, especially the young, who have received a truncated and politically perverse public education, can also benefit from being exposed to the worldview of people like Tamames.
However, VOX should keep its eye on up-and-coming parties describable as an ‘anti-woke’ Left, as such a brand would appeal to the young and working class vote VOX should be trying to court. The threat of a new populism mining young and radical voters even as the party normalizes itself in the eyes of the mainstream is already over the horizon, as in the case of ‘Formacion Obrera,’ whose star is rising.
The vote of no confidence presents VOX as a bridge-builder and an active force that, at the very least, does not remain inactive in the face of what it describes as dire circumstances.
Perhaps the aim of this vote of no confidence could have been accomplished by convincing the professor to hold a few press conferences with the party’s leader, and by spreading his positive statements about VOX far and wide, getting a few old-media figures to keep the story in the news cycle for a while. But this would not have elicited the interest which the whole process seems to have done.
As an aside, the fact that the leader of the PP absented himself from the parliamentary session may come back to hurt him.
All the same, how the vote of no confidence is perceived depends on how it is framed and on what it accomplishes, both of which, in turn, depend on VOX.
