The 2004 Spanish Election: Terrorism as a Catalyst for Change?

Transcription

1 Elections in Context The 2004 Spanish Election: Terrorism as a Catalyst for Change? RAJ S. CHARI The Spanish general election of 14 March 2004 was historic, as it came only days after one of the bloodiest terrorist attacks ever experienced in Europe. This attack, referred to as 11-M, 1 consisted of ten bombs exploding within minutes of each other on three separate commuter trains in Madrid during the morning rush hour. It resulted in over 190 deaths and over 1,500 wounded. After evaluating the broad developments during the campaign and analysing the election results that saw an unexpected victory for the Socialist Party over the incumbent Popular Party, this report seeks to capture the effects of this unprecedented attack on the election. CAMPAIGN DEVELOPMENTS AND 11-M After winning the elections of 2000, the Popular Party (PP) formed contemporary Spain s first centre-right absolute majority government under the leadership of José Maria Aznar. There is little doubt that Aznar and the PP government had made their share of mistakes since One example of a negative event was the Prestige oil-tanker disaster of Here the PP was accused by many of doing little to avoid the disaster off the Galician coast (when an oil-tanker that was leaking was ordered by the authorities to leave port, only to break up later), of hiding data about the magnitude of the disaster from the public, and seeking few remedies for the unprecedented environmental disaster that ensued. Another example was the PP s decision, without parliamentary approval, to involve Spain in the Iraq War. Even though all major parties and over 85 per cent of all Spaniards were against the war, Aznar, along with Tony Blair, sought to deepen the Atlantic alliance with the USA, as opposed to developing a European position through the EU s Common Foreign and Security Policy (Heywood 2003; Chari and Cavatorta 2003). Coupled with opposition to involvement in Iraq, there were strong public reactions when one of the planes used to transport soldiers in West European Politics, Vol.27, No.5, November 2004, pp ISSN print/ online DOI: / # 2004 Taylor & Francis Ltd.

2 THE 2004 SPANISH ELECTION 955 the Afghan war a Yak 42 crashed and killed over 60 soldiers as a consequence of the aircraft s poor condition, something that the PP denied and refused to investigate further. In all three of these negative events the Prestige disaster, Iraq War participation and (lack of) investigation into the Yak 42 s downing both opposition parties and the public alike sensed complacency, arrogance and a lack of transparency in some of the PP s decisions. Despite these negative events, by the end of its tenure the PP still held a majority of public support (CIS 2004), particularly in February 2004 when it was clear that there was a forthcoming election at the end of the four-year cycle. There are several reasons for this positive evaluation. First, the economy under the PP was good. GDP had been strong throughout the previous four years, inflation was kept at bay, and Spain had enjoyed some of its lowest levels of unemployment. Second, the party was considered to be the strongest of all on terrorism, as evidenced by its tough stance and detentions of members of the Basque terrorist group ETA. Third, consistent with Aznar s promise to resign as party leader after eight years, a new leader was appointed. Although Mariano Rajoy was clearly one of Aznar s men (in fact Rajoy was personally appointed leader by Aznar in the summer of 2003), the new leader was considered by many voters to be a competent politician with a strong record in the party (having served as Interior Minister and Vice-President under Aznar), while being without the arrogance and dismissive style of other PP leaders, such as Rodrigo Rato, who headed the Ministry of Economy. A final reason for the positive evaluation of the PP at the end of its tenure is based on the idea that negative events, such as the Iraq War, seemed something of a distant past. Not many concerns were raised, for example, at the beginning of 2004 when the PP failed to justify Spanish involvement in Iraq despite the absence of weapons of mass destruction. Regardless of the high levels of PP support by the end of its tenure, within days after the campaign officially started on 27 February 2004, the opposition Socialist Workers Party (PSOE), led by José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, started to turn opinion (El País, 28 Feb. 2004: 1). There are two principal reasons for this. First, Zapatero was able to structure the party around a new generation of socialists. In so doing, he distanced the party from the perceived corrupt figures of the past who were largely responsible for the 2000 election disaster when the PSOE headed by Joaquin Almunía received its lowest vote total in 20 years. 2 Second, as evidenced in the campaign, Zapatero was able to develop policy platforms that were either innovative or reflected many citizens desires. With regard to innovative policies, Zapatero proposed the creation of a new Ministry for Housing in order to help poor or younger citizens who have historically had problems entering the Spanish property market. And with regard to policies consistent with citizens wishes,

3 956 WEST EUROPEAN POLITICS Zapatero promised to withdraw troops from Iraq and seek wider consensus in developing European foreign and defence policies. He also highlighted throughout the campaign the promise of transparency, efficiency and accountability in making all public policies. Further, consistent with many citizens feelings, there was a promise to work with other parties including the United Left (IU) and the regionalist parties in the Basque Country (PNV) and Cataluña (CiU and ERC) in order to attain more consensus in policy development, something lacking under the PP. Given these factors, the PSOE made significant ground throughout the campaign. According to final opinion polls that could be legally released a week before the vote, the PSOE had managed to change an almost uncontested PP majority victory perceived days earlier, into a PP minority victory (El Mundo, 8 March 2004: 1). 3 Three days before the vote, on 11 March, Madrid witnessed the deadliest terrorist attack that Europe had seen in years. Ten bombs exploded in three different commuter trains, killing over 190 people (from 14 different countries) and leaving over 1,500 wounded. After all parties agreed to suspend further campaign activity, the PP government s initial reaction was to place responsibility on the Basque terrorist group ETA. To be fair, this reaction was similar to the initial view of many Spaniards, given the history of the group s terrorist activity. Although Interior Minister Acebes did say later in the day that investigation was under way as to the possible involvement of Islamic terrorists, the PP s firm line throughout both 11 and 12 March was to continue to blame ETA (El Mundo, 13 March 2004: 1, 7). This is evidenced in Prime Minister Aznar s phone calls to every major Spanish newspaper, coupled with Minister of Foreign Affairs Palacio s advice to every embassy, stating that the main story to go out was that ETA was responsible. Nevertheless, there was increasing evidence even from the first day that pointed to ETA s non-involvement. For example, the attacks did not fit within ETA s modus operandi. ETA usually warns authorities that a bomb has been planted or calls later to accept responsibility; it is not usual for ETA to attack civilians directly, even less those from working-class districts, as were many of the victims; and, on 12 March, ETA itself actually denied responsibility. Doubts about ETA s participation were reinforced by mounting evidence of al-qaeda involvement, including an abandoned truck that was immediately found in one of the train stations with indications of Islamic terrorist involvement, discovery of explosive material that was not used by ETA, and a letter from al-qaeda claiming responsibility sent to the press in England. Indeed, while Spanish authorities were still holding ETA responsible, most other European media already suspected al-qaeda involvement. On 13 March, the day after peaceful demonstrations against the massacre saw millions take to the streets in Spain, mourning turned into anger and questions from both opposition parties and citizens, demanding transparency

4 THE 2004 SPANISH ELECTION 957 in the investigation and more answers from the PP government before the 14 March election. Did ETA really provoke 11-M as the PP continued to claim? Or was al-qaeda actually responsible for attacking Spain because of its participation in the Iraq War, despite the decision to do so being made unilaterally by the PP against popular opinion? If the latter, was the PP government manipulating this tragedy for electoral purposes, either to gain votes (by blaming ETA and representing itself as the hardest party on terrorism), or not to lose votes (by downplaying the importance of al-qaeda and therefore not facing fierce criticism because people were killed as a reaction to aggressive PP foreign policy)? Potential answers to these questions came, literally, in the final hours of 13 March: at 8 pm, Interior Minister Acebes announced the detention four hours earlier of several people associated with al-qaeda and the organisation s responsibility for 11-M. RESULTS OF THE 14 MARCH ELECTION As seen in Table 1, the PSOE won the 14 March election: it increased its support from the previous election by almost three million votes and consequently won a total of 164 of the 350 seats. The Socialists would thus be in a position to form a minority government. This had previously occurred when the winner with a plurality, but not majority, of seats subsequently governed with the legislative support (apoyo legislativo) of smaller parties in both 1993 and Losing almost seven per cent of its votes from the previous election, the PP s reign came to an end: it lost 35 of the 183 seats attained in The PP s debacle thus represented the first time that a majority government in contemporary Spain had fully lost an election. 5 Losing one per cent of its votes from the previous election, the United Left (IU) retained only five of its previous nine seats, reflecting the downhill trend of the party that, in 1996, had 21 deputies. Nevertheless, the radical left with regionalist tendencies, as represented by the ERC the Catalan Republican Party attained close to half a million votes and won seven more seats than in the previous election. This coincided with a decrease in votes for the other Catalan regional-based party, CiU, which lost five deputies. Other regional-based parties attained the same number of seats won in 2000 (PNV and CHA), lost one seat (BNG and CC) or gained representation for the first time (Na-Bai). When analysing the regional vote distribution in the autonomous communities (comunidades autónomas), one sees how the PSOE made advances in three respects. First, it was able to recover seats in traditional Socialist terrain that had otherwise supported the PP in the 2000 election. For example, in Andalucía, which is considered a Socialist stronghold, the PSOE managed one of its

5 TABLE 1 ELECTIONS TO THE CONGRESS OF DEPUTIES IN SPAIN IN Seats Votes Votes Seats Votes Votes Party N (000s) (%) N (000s) (%) Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE) , , Partido Popular (PP) 148 9, , Convergéncia I Unió (CiU) Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC) Eusko alderdi Jeltzalea-Paritdo Nacionalista Vasco Izquierda Unida (IU) 5 1, , Coalición Canaria (CC) Bloque Nacionalista Galego (BNG) Chunta Aragonesista (CHA) Eusko Alkartasuna (EA) Nafarroa Bai (Na-Bai) Partido Andalucista Others 1, , Total , , Turnout (%)

6 THE 2004 SPANISH ELECTION 959 biggest turnarounds and won back eight seats, while the PP lost five; in Castilla-La Mancha, the PSOE gained one seat; and in Asturias the PSOE took one seat from the PP. Second, the PSOE penetrated areas that had traditionally exhibited centreright leanings. Particularly relevant here is Castilla-Leon (where the PSOE took the PP s three seats), Galicia ( + 4), Madrid ( + 4), La Rioja ( + 1) and Baleares ( + 2). Third, the PSOE gained seats in regions with historically strong nationalist parties and where the PP had been successful in This is seen in Cataluña (PSOE + 4, PP 4), the Basque Country (PSOE + 3, PP 3) and the Canary Islands (where the PSOE gained three seats lost by both the PP and the regionalist party CC). The election results were surprising to party leaders, citizens and observers on three fronts. The first was not only that Zapatero s PSOE won, but also that it managed it so convincingly. As discussed above, although the PSOE was narrowing the gap with the PP as the campaign continued, all indicators before the vote still pointed to a decisive (minority) PP victory. The fact that the PSOE ended up with almost 1.3 million more votes than the PP, which translated into 16 more seats, led several to label the election outcome a an unprecedented historical upset (El País, 15 March 2004: 1). The second, related, surprise was the magnitude of the PP defeat, which neither Mariano Rajoy nor José Maria Aznar envisioned. According to El País, the PP was actually preparing itself for a strong minority government given the results of final internal polls taken on the morning of 11-M (El País, 16 March 2004: 23). Losing close to 700,000 votes from the previous election, while having been defeated in several Christian democratic strongholds, surprised PP leaders who believed that the party would continue to have the backing of Spaniards interested in continued progress led by a modern right-wing party (ABC, 15 March 2004: 4 5). The third surprise of the election relates to the success of the ERC: the Catalan Republican party won eight seats, which was a remarkable achievement considering that the party previously had only a single deputy at the national level. The results thus positioned the Catalan party ahead of parties such as the PNV, IU, CC and BNG, which either lost or only retained seats from the previous election. EXPLAINING THE SOCIALIST VICTORY How can one explain the Socialist victory, especially in the context of expectations during the campaign of a PP win? A starting-point to answer this question, relying on estimates of the Spanish consulting company Sigma Dos,

7 960 WEST EUROPEAN POLITICS considers where the approximately three million votes that the PSOE gained from the previous election came from (El Mundo, 19 March 2004: 14). First, approximately 1.6 million of the almost three million new votes gained by the PSOE came from voters who had abstained in the 2000 election. This is reflected in the 2004 turnout that increased over seven per cent from the previous election and represents the third highest turnout since Second, approximately 530,000 of the votes came from first-time younger voters. This figure represents about one-half of the new votes cast in Third, over ten per cent of the votes (or approximately 300,000 voters) came from those that would have otherwise voted for the United Left (which is representative of the communist vote). And, fourth, over 450,000 voters are those that would have otherwise voted for the PP, but who transferred their votes to the PSOE in A majority of these voters were found in three comunidades autonomas: Andalucia, Cataluña and the Basque Country. Given this breakdown, one can reasonably argue that support from four types of voters was crucial in order to understand the PSOE victory abstainers, first-time voters, communist voters, and disgruntled Christian democrats. The first three types are representative of over 80 per cent of the approximate three million gained by the Socialists between the 2000 and 2004 elections. Why did these types of essential voters either participate at all or vote as they did? Although more investigation is required, such as further opinion polls and in-depth focus group research, two tentative hypotheses can be offered by linking ideas raised in the previous two sections. The first highlights the significance of 11-M and the PP government s reaction to it, while the second pays more attention to developments in Spanish regional politics. First, in order to explain why abstainers, first-time voters and communists voted for the PSOE, it is not unreasonable to hypothesise that the effects of 11-M and the government s poor handling of the situation are significant, although the impact of the tragedy and events thereafter may have motivated the different types of voters in different ways. Abstainers in Spanish electoral politics have historically consisted of those with centre-left predispositions: as previously noted in the 2000 election, the PSOE does worse than expected when turnout is relatively low (or, when abstention is high), and better than expected when turnout is relatively high (or, when abstention is low) (Chari 2000: 213). One may argue that public anger towards the attack itself, the perceived lack of transparency in the PP s reaction to 11-M (in line with decisions taken by the government such as Spain s involvement in Iraq, the Prestige disaster, as well as the Yak-42 crisis), and general feelings among all voters that democrats must express themselves peacefully in the ballot box, ultimately influenced those who would have otherwise abstained to cast their ballot for the PSOE.

8 THE 2004 SPANISH ELECTION 961 When turning to the first-time voters, support for the Socialists could have reasonably stemmed from their opposition to the Iraq War. Interestingly, in the 2000 election, a majority of younger voters either abstained or voted for the PP (The Economist, 18 March 2004). However, the last four years witnessed increased political activity of younger voters, including protests against the PP s reaction to the Prestige oil-tanker disaster and, more significantly, mass demonstrations in March 2003 against Spain s participation in the Iraq War. Although Spanish foreign policy itself did not play a large part in the campaign, the collective memory especially of these voters may have been triggered when it became clear that 11-M was a consequence of a foreign policy to which most younger people were opposed. With regard to the Communist voters, all of whom were critical of PP foreign, social and economic policies over the previous eight years, one may argue that 11-M forced a dilemma that would have not otherwise been so salient without the attacks: either to vote for the United Left (IU), with the potential consequence that a split vote between the left might allow the PP to maintain power, or to vote strategically for PSOE in order to defeat the PP. Given that IU lost four of its seats from the 2000 election, while the PSOE gained 300,000 IU votes, it is reasonable to suggest that the latter option was strategically pursued by communists with a view to toppling the PP. From this perspective, one may argue that while abstainers and first-time voters probably desired a PSOE win, the communists voted strategically in order for the PP to lose, even if went against their first preferences. In order to explain why the fourth set of voters the disgruntled Christian democrats primarily from Cataluña, the Basque Country and Andalucía switched to the PSOE, however, it is not unreasonable to hypothesise that the impact of 11-M must also be supplemented with that of developments in regional politics that were manifest well before the bombings. With regard to the Basque Country and Cataluña, one may argue that there was increasing hostility among citizens in these regions towards the PP s anti-nationalist and centralising posture in recent years. For example, the PP accused the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) of implicitly supporting ETA terrorist activities, and the ERC in Cataluña for having talked with and conspired with ETA (El Mundo, 19 Feb. 2004). 6 The anger created by this PP provoked confrontation may have had two cumulative effects, where the latter directly benefited the PSOE. The first effect was to maintain or increase the vote of nationalist parties, respectively seen in maintenance of PNV s seven seats and the unprecedented rise of ERC. A second effect, already captured in voting trends measured before 11-M, was to provoke many soft PP voters in these regions (who preferred not to vote for nationalist-based parties, but who were still in favour of increasing

9 962 WEST EUROPEAN POLITICS decentralisation) to transfer their votes from the (centralising) PP to the (historically decentralising) PSOE (El Mundo, 4 March 2004: 10 11). In Andalucía, the regional dynamics at play were different from Cataluña and the Basque Country: PP voters may have switched to the PSOE because of the effects of the simultaneously held regional election. Having a long history of regional governments led by the Socialists, the re-election of the incumbent PSOE government under Manuel Chaves had been expected for some time. This, coupled with the lack of desire by the PP to develop fully an institutional structure in Andalucía (where PP leaders including Teófila Martínez were criticised throughout the campaign as being weak), may have created a bandwagon effect that influenced those who would have otherwise opted for the PP to support the PSOE at the national level, even in the absence of 11-M. To summarise: the 2004 Spanish election suggests that a deadly terrorist attack, as a reaction to a policy pursued by the party in power, coupled with the perceived manipulation of the situation by the government, served as a catalyst to influence those who would have otherwise abstained, younger voters, as well as others who sought to vote strategically in order to help remove the government. The election also offers evidence suggesting that, beyond the tragedy, the party in power was defeated in part as a reaction to stances that it took towards some regions during its tenure. With these points in mind, the main lesson to be learned from the Spanish 2004 election, which may be of interest to other European leaders facing election soon, is that what parties in power do and how they are perceived to do it matters. In the end, and perhaps a welcome surprise to those disillusioned with the democratic process, people do have the final say. NOTES The author thanks Billie Crosbie (Trinity College Dublin), José Elguero (CSIC, Madrid), M. Aranzazu Gómez (TCD), Tomas Herraiz (CSIC, Madrid), Sylvia Kritzinger (Institute for Advanced Studies, Vienna), Isabel Rozas (TCD) and the editors for comments and constructive criticism. 1. Some international press (e.g., Time Magazine, 22 March 2004: 20) has referred to the train bombings as 3/11. However, because Spaniards refer to the attack as 11-M (for 11 de marzo, or 11 March 2004), this term will be used in this account. 2. For discussion of political scandals in Spain between 1990 and 1996 see Jiménez 1998: According to Spanish law, results of polls taken less than a week before the election cannot be released to the public; parties can still take polls for internal use before the vote, but the results of such polls (which are not usually available to the public even after the election) cannot be revealed. 4. Legislative support refers to the idea of informal agreement between the minority government (such as the PSOE in 1993 and the PP in 1996) and smaller parties (such as CiU and PNV) that held the balance of power in the House, where the latter offer support on all bills in exchange for some input in certain policy decisions to be taken by the government during its tenure. It is

10 THE 2004 SPANISH ELECTION 963 significant to note that this is not a coalition government where members of the executive come from other parties. On election night, several of the smaller parties offered legislative support to the Socialists and in April the Socialist government was officially sworn in with support from IU, ERC, CC and CHA. 5. The other majority governments (led by Socialists) occurred in 1982, 1986 and When the PSOE lost the elections in 1996 to Aznar s PP, they were in a minority government position. 6. Before the election campaign began, in February 2004 Aznar held Carod (the leader of ERC) responsible for ETA s announcement of a ceasefire in Cataluña (even though the group promised to continue with attacks in the rest of Spain) given previous talks between the ERC leader and members of ETA the month before. As such, the PP accused the ERC of collaborating with terrorists and, moreover, heavily criticised the PSOE given the existence of a coalition government at the Catalan regional government level between the PSOE, ERC and IU. REFERENCES Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas CIS (2004). Estimación de Voto, Estudio No Enero-Febrero. Chari R.S. (2000). The March 2000 Spanish Election: A Critical Election?, West European Politics, 23:3 (July), Chari R.S., and F. Cavatorta (2003). The Iraq War: Killing Dreams of a Unified EU, European Political Science, 3:1 (Autumn), Heywood, P. (2003). Desperately Seeking Influence: Spain and the War in Iraq, European Political Science, 3:1 (Autumn), Jiménez, F. (1998). Political Scandals and Political Responsibility in Spain, West European Politics, 21:4 (October),