The two parties in power do not represent this social mass. People are fed up with governments rescuing banks rather than helping citizens, the dictatorship of financial institutions, a system that offers them no future. They have expressed this in the demonstrations that have taken the Plaza de Sol in four different directions. On the occasion of his birthday, the M15 has returned strongly and has shown broad social support over the weekend.

But while it's important for people to go out into the street, there's a risk that movement is nothing more than a spectacular photograph, just imaginative phrases, demands that don't land anywhere. This image of speed has been offered by the main Spanish media in overcoming the astonishment caused by the May camp last year; they have spread stereotypes about the M15, such as the “perroflauta” label in Spanish: they want to reduce the protesters to the level of the pen that hits the flute on the street with their dog. On the contrary, those who offer a more benevolent image of the participation of so many people in something like this, the political parties highlight the lack of prestige they have among the Spaniards and reject the social demands that the movement has maintained since its inception, which have related them to the disturbances of the strike of 29 March, differentiating the “honest” and the “bad” protest.

The M15 has also been declared deactivated for not having carried out mass demonstrations since the demonstrations of 15 October 2011 worldwide. However, it has not stopped, but has generally addressed the particular issue. Meetings have continued to be held until winter, divided into different committees and working groups, town to village, district to district. It's not such a spectacular job, it doesn't create the initial fascination, it involves fewer people, but it's very alive. Within the movement there have been divisions, a manifestation of May 15 last year in Democracia Real Ya! What the platform has had (DRY). Some of the most well-known members, such as Fabio Gandara, who has been a spokesman, registered the DRY as an association, but most of the members of the platform have refused to go down that path because it could mimic the representative logic they attribute to the political parties. Those who registered the association are already outside the DRY; some of the participants in the M15 in Madrid consider that this was a reformist sector of the platform, the right-wing.

Why not create a party?

“I see this movement very lost in many things,” says a Madrilenian named José. It is about 50 years old and is located next to a kiosk of the Plaza del Sol; demonstrations are coming on May 12, people of the same age have on a table books, cheap editions prepared by themselves: Marx, Engels, the story of the Italian communist movement… “Nothing is specified, nothing, no political party… I have just taken the pasquins that asked for the blank vote. But what do we believe? What if we leave the empty seats in Congress will we achieve something?” In their view, they must carry a delegation to “throw away the country’s unbelievers and thieves.”

José's criticism has been repeated on several occasions by some sectors of the Left, also in the Basque Country. Since the launch of the M15, much has been discussed against and in favour of representative logic, and not just within the DRY. These are classic themes: assembly or organization based on the chain of command; making revolution on a daily basis or giving priority to taking power; autonomous social movements or arising around a political party. The M15 has clearly opted for a system that tackles in its entirety, but not with the same mechanisms as it does. The force of movement is people, the ability to build networks between people and offer alternative proposals here and now.

Strong against expropriation

The M15 and the Mortgage Affected Platform (PAH) have had a special connection. It is an association that was born in Barcelona two years ago and has spread throughout the state, driven by the force of the outraged. Outside the plazas, this branch is one of the strengths of the M15.

The meeting held at the Plaza de la Opera in Madrid has brought together some 40 people on the subject of housing. The lawyer of the Association of Victims of Terrorism (PAH), Rafael Mayoral, has spoken. For ten minutes, everyone has followed the explanation carefully. Clear ideas and direct discourse: it is not acceptable that despite the fact that in the Spanish State there are six million empty houses, the expropriation is repeated party and week, people are left homeless and houses without tenants, empty. What is happening with expropriations is a systematic violation of a human right,” he explained, and blamed the banks and the judges.

Once the assembly is over, the group is dismissing and a man has approached to ask for help. The Banco Santander has warned him that he cannot pay the mortgage he has with him and that he will be evicted. Mayoral gives you the phone – “Don’t write an e-mail, pick up hundreds” – and says they will help you. For the young lawyer, it is essential to organize a group in order to deal with expropriations. Debtors can negotiate their mortgages jointly with banks, never individually. “The person who is going to lose the house has a sense of guilt at first,” he explains, “and from there he becomes aware.” It stresses that the problem has reached public opinion thanks to the anti-expropriation movement: “We’re winning the battle of ideas, a year ago it was crazy to think we’d get it.”

The collaboration between the PAH and the M15 neighborhood assemblies has exponentially multiplied the forces of both groups. As a result, a total of 220 expropriations have been paralysed in the Spanish State in one year. However, according to the data provided by the Adicae association, more than 300 families are evicted each day from their homes, 2,000 per week. Most, in addition, are still awaiting payment with the bank for a lifetime.

In addition to trying to paralyze expropriations, the PAH has concrete proposals. The platform is clear about what the authorities should do to ensure that all citizens have decent housing: to create a public social charter park. In turn, he said that this would virtually eliminate the speculation that was taking place. And he adds that institutions have tools to do so: “The institutions are obliged to expropriate the empty houses that are in the hands of the banks when a road is to be built, arguing that it is in the benefit of the public service, since they have no problems expropriating the land”. They have started collecting signatures to present a legislative initiative to the Spanish Parliament, “to put on the table what the majority of citizens support.”

Combating unemployment, self-employment

Unemployment has brought many of the members of the M15 to the plaza. In the Spanish State there are more than five million people in the lead, and 50% of young people do not earn salaries, not to mention the working conditions that others suffer. Asun Villar is also unemployed. At the age of 48, members of the M15 Unemployed Assembly founded the cooperative last year. “It offers many services,” he explained, there are lawyers, masons, people who work in the field of food… Before looking at what the state does with the situation, they chose to follow the path of self-employment, without leaving aside the protest, of course. “I was tired of what we were doing until then. “Don’t you see that they don’t listen to us?” he said. Many do not think of themselves but complain, but anger does not lift people from the couch, hope does.”

That's why they've driven the time banks in the neighborhoods of Madrid. The project to create an alternative currency is also under way. “If there is work, I need someone to fix the house tubes, cut the hair… Money is what doesn’t move. Well, gentlemen, if your money does not work, we will have to do ours.” The cooperative is an assembly and many of its members are unemployed, but they are also helped by economists and lawyers who, after completing their working hours, do so voluntarily. These types of cooperation networks demonstrate every day that other economic models are possible and have advantages over the real capitalism that we know. But how do you spread it? “Unfortunately, we don’t move until they put our hand in our pocket,” says Villar. In his view, the initial work is the hardest to push forward these kinds of ideas. “But when people see that their neighbor is doing well by working like this, they also live without stress, that without always having their boss, they can make decisions about their work… By living that experience, this will start to spread more.” Anyone can enroll in the Cooperative, which in a way is the reverse of the low wages and low conditions offered by temporary work companies. An option outside society? “In a parallel society,” according to Villar.

The experiences that begin in and around Plaza del Sol and that make this parallel society a reality are easy to find. Is there disinformation about the M15? The parallel society of the assemblies has created a newspaper. That hunger is affecting more and more Madrilenians? They've set up a network that will recover food that, even if they're edible, they'll throw away and distribute it to people through social centers, offering food in exchange for time without falling into charity. Since 13 May, assemblies have been held in central Madrid on specific topics to continue searching for ways of living otherwise.

“The only force we have”

“Because I’m sick of this system, there is no democracy and nothing here,” says retired Rafael Fuentecerrato, asking why he has come to the demonstration. “Our opinion doesn’t matter, and the only strength we have is to be here,” says the young Madrid man who is making the thesis and doesn’t want to enroll. “Everything around it collapses, how can I not come here?”, young Paula Vidal. “Because we all have to unite, because what politicians are doing is piracy,” the Argentine professor at Viviana Argindegui University.

It can be said in many ways, but the opinion is similar: when the economic crisis shaken the economy of the Spanish State, there was another crisis, that of political representation. Because parties don't represent them, citizens come to the plaza to represent themselves. For the first time since the Transition, many Spaniards have questioned the functioning of the political system, the congregated in Sol have screamed: "Social peace is over." The Italian philosopher Toni Negri Rebelion.org explained on his website that in the last elections the M15 encountered a gap. The PSOE, after a deep reverence to the financial world, turned the reformist vote into an impossible option, but at the same time the movement has managed to reverse the victory of the right, according to Negri.

The M15 is stronger for those who have participated since the beginning. Since last year’s protests, proposals are being put on the table to start building that better world they claim. The human being learns from errors and makes the M15, but still knows how to channel the disagreement and anger of thousands of people. As long as it does so, whether in the big squares or in the neighborhoods, it will remain uneasy for power.