From the AVE to the Abyss

What has happened to Spain? How did the country so recently synonymous with exemplary public healthcare, efficient high-speed trains, and democratic stability become so disfigured in such a short span of time? When did we start to resemble less a model to be emulated and more a cautionary tale?

For years, Spain was seen as a respected middle-power that, having overcome dictatorship and executed an enviable democratic transition, had consolidated itself with pride. Its public health system was a point of national pride. Its AVE high-speed rail network was a European benchmark. Immigration arrived largely from sister countries — Spanish-speaking, with shared roots and a desire to integrate. There were problems, of course, but there was also a common idea of a future worth building.

But that Spain now feels like a distant memory. In barely a decade, once-powerful symbols have been hollowed out and social consensuses shattered. Politics has radicalised, the state has become dysfunctional, institutional respect has evaporated, and international standing has withered. Spain has, quite simply, stopped being what it was.

This is not an exaggeration or an exercise in nostalgia. It is a diagnosis shared by millions of citizens who feel the country has entered a cycle of degradation, disorder, and a loss of common sense. While the causes are multiple, one name crystallises this turn: Pedro Sánchez.

Sánchez is not solely responsible, but he is the principal catalyst. His mode of politics has rewritten the institutional rulebook — governing without limits, without genuine alliances, and without shame. He has struck deals with those who declared independence for part of Spanish territory. He has legitimised heirs of terrorism. He has normalised the use of decrees for structural matters and pushed through an amnesty law that blows apart the very idea of justice.

Meanwhile, the country sinks further into confusion. Government finances — there are technically no valid budgets — limp on European aid: that lifeblood flowing from Germany or France that allows the Spanish state to continue fattening its clientelist structure. They give money, deepen debt at will, and yet — they are not foolish; they buy votes. There will always be support in Brussels. But that rope is not eternal. The patience of the North is wearing thin.

Internationally, Spain no longer counts. It has lost weight, prestige, and leadership. Major European decisions are taken without consulting it. The president’s strategic alliances now point in other directions: Maduro, Xi Jinping, Mohamed VI. The Ibero-American bloc to which Spain belongs has become a club of elegant autocrats — and Sánchez, far from resisting, applauds. He feels at home; he speaks the language.

Yet the president will not take the hint. He has shown he can weather electoral storms, judicial accusations, and massive protests and carry on as if nothing has happened. His lone compass is power. And so long as there is no unassailable judicial encirclement or irreparable internal wear, Sánchez will continue. The institutional decay will accelerate at the speed of light.

This Saturday, tens of thousands will mobilise. It will be a massive demonstration. But be under no illusions: the president will not take the message to heart. He has demonstrated that resilience. Institutions will continue their downward tilt until they are unrecognisable. What is urgently needed in Spain are early general elections — not because the calendar demands it, but because democracy has ceased to represent the will of the people.

What could force early elections? Three factors above all: first, a judicial front that becomes a dead end for Sánchez — formal charges, direct investigations, and loss of allies within institutional apparatus. Second, the Socialist Party starts to see Sánchez not as an asset, but as a burden. No party can indefinitely endure bleeding support, a polarising president, and a base that shrinks with every poll. Third, social pressure — protests, polling shifts, media reaction — overflows the narrative banks and compels retreat. Sánchez is resilient, yes. But he is not invulnerable.

“All things must come to an end,” as they say. Some endings require a push. The only institutional path left for Spain, if it wants to avert becoming a caricature of itself, is to listen to its citizens again. Because democracy does not rest on endurance at all costs — it rests on genuine representation. Winston Churchill captured it best: “A politician becomes a statesman when he begins to think of the next generation, not the next election.” Spain needs statesmen. Urgently.