How Spain 15-M Movement Is Redefining Politics

With the Spanish general elections just over a month, the rule of eight years of the Socialist Party is coming to an end. José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, will be expelled and the opposition leader Mariano Rajoy was finally erected in the place where he thought he deserved since 2004. As usual for Spanish politics, the normal policy of give and take 30 years between the two major parties. However, with 20% unemployment (40% among youth) and the imminent possibility that the country's finances may have to face an intervention, things in Spain these days are anything but normal.

Enter indignados or Spanish, as they are called here, the movement M-15 (protest was launched by a rally on May 15, a week before local elections). Five months after the long "Spanish Spring" of 2011, we saw how what started as a small movement inarticulate and focused on young people has evolved into what some call here the most interesting political developments since the death of Franco in 1975.

Experience original hybrid and online activism and offline to avoid the traditional ways and tired of political commitment, the M-15 was the precursor of the mass protests of the Israeli summer and Wall Street take the movement took shape in the United States .

The movement has carefully avoided committing to ideological agendas, unions and, more importantly, the professional politicians. He served as town squares, coordinated and targeted to specific topics such as online banking and electoral reform. He experimented with the network from the ground up to challenge the rigid, top to bottom, led the party system that dominated Spanish political life since 1978. City by city square square one meetings with individual meetings, thousands of citizens gathered in a network approach to politics that is fresh and appealing, since the challenges, especially the hierarchical approach favored by special interests.

Movement strategy is based on the size of the ad hoc coalitions and challenge citizens to reject the specific actions of the government, trying to figure out how to use the power of influencing policy at specific choke points, which desperately needs reform. Politicians worried about internal party politics, for re-election or special interests do not see the significance of this. He is using the power of the network to break the silos rooted and find ways to make the political process to better meet the needs of ordinary citizens.

For example, the movement has been actively involved with the associations of foreclosure advising owners in Spain. Comments made by the Spanish cities of today are groups of angry neighbors caring for the outside of buildings to prevent the judges of the notification, and therefore kick, overwhelmed by debt owners flat. Most of these actions arise spontaneously after the information is exchanged on Twitter and coordinated through the use of hashtags.

Is this a long term solution to debt problems in Spain? Of course not. However, actions like these are beginning to change the perception and the dynamics between citizens, government and economic interests. In addition, they are forcing politicians to rethink the way they take part in the process of policy development - a growing trend here is officials voluntarily disclose assets. They become a reality, the Harvard researcher Yochai Benkler prescience in 2006 called "network of the public sphere."

In August, the bond dealers were ill in Spain, and are the two main political parties met in Madrid to agree on constitutional reform, that self-imposed spending limit - did not agree on what is nearly eight years - the protest broke out a few hours after notification. Offline and online, the network started a couple of hours, and squares were full of Actuable, political activism site had collected hundreds of thousands of signatures demanding that the reform of the vote in a referendum. To quote a communication researcher, Manuel Castells, "disgust was the network."

Today, one month before the Spanish elections on November 20 general, the move is going to take to the streets once again. They coordinate a worldwide protest that will run from Wall Street to Israel and dozens of other cities along the way. The indignant been made so far to reveal a side of Spain, who thought he was little: a robust and politicized public willing to participate to change the modus operandi of the system. Of such provision in the political system, in other words, it was revealed.

The next step is to start thinking about their results. Not in the traditional sense, the elections - does not change the outcome of elections, nor should it try. He needs to redefine, objective indicators and ways to interpret and understand the responsibilities of government and political participation. It has created hope among the public, as well as the political old and tired - we still need, otherwise Spain would like Egypt or Tunisia - a new level of political participation have collectively been woven.