A protest movement that shook Spain earlier this year is seeking new vigour, as concern grows over the spread of poverty. It is going to be a "hot autumn" filled with protests, said Odill, a spokeswoman for Youth Without Future, which forms part of the wider movement known as 15-M (May 15).
Five months after it launched nation-wide protests against unemployment and the power of financial markets over politics, the movement wants to mobilise like-minded groups and extend its rallies all over the world this Saturday. Demonstrations have been called in 60 Spanish cities and more than 80 other countries, ranging from Mexico and the United States to South Africa and China.
Protests taking place in Germany, echoing the "Occupy Wall Street" movement in the United States, formed part of the same current, 15-M spokesman Jon Aguirre told dpa. Activism in Spain slackened in the recent summer months, but 15-M - also known as The Indignant Ones - is again seeking a prominent role as discontent grows over the austerity policies of central and regional authorities and the deterioration of social benefits.
"A new world is being born, in which the poorest are getting poorer still," warned Sebastian Mora, secretary-general of the Catholic charity Caritas. "We want to relaunch neighbourhood assemblies," Aguirre said of the meetings that discussed proposals to change society, but have become less active in recent months. The 15-M movement was formed in reaction to Spain's jobless rate of 21 percent - the EU's highest - and a sense among young people that they were being robbed of their future while vast sums of money were being channelled into ailing banks in the wake of the global crisis.
The crisis hit Spain particularly hard, as it brought down the country's construction sector, which had been one of its main economic engines. The movement brought tens of thousands to the streets, and made headlines for weeks by maintaining protest camps at city squares around the country.
15-M was slammed as too idealistic and heterogeneous, but soon began influencing the political discourse, with leftist politicians in particular trying to appeal to its supporters ahead of parliamentary elections on November 20. The latest weekend protests will come amid growing concern over Spain's future solvency, after the rating agency Standard & Poor's downgraded the country's credit rating on Thursday.
Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's government has maintained that Spain does not need an international bailout, and has dissipated such concerns by cutting spending and reforming the labour market and pension system. The government is trying to trim the budget deficit to 6 percent this year, from 9.2 percent in 2010. However, the austerity policies, combined with the high unemployment, have had a considerable social cost.
The public social assistance network "has been eroded and diminished," said Mora, whose organisation assisted nearly a million people lacking food and other basic necessities in 2010. That was 15 percent more than in 2009. Caritas said it received 6.5 million requests for different kinds of aid last year.
Basic social services such as education and health care are suffering largely because of the indebtedness of Spain's semi-autonomous regions and municipalities. Regional debt stands at a record of more than 133 billion euros (182 billion dollars), making up 18 percent of Spain's total public debt. In the north-eastern region of Catalonia, thousands have marched against the closure of entire hospital floors, while Madrid teachers have staged a string of strikes against job cuts.
Some of the spending cuts hit those most in need of help, such as the handicapped or widows living on minimal pensions. Nation-wide demonstrations have also been held against cuts affecting education, and over expulsions of people unable to pay mortgages. "Political leaders do not hesitate to undermine basic rights, while retaining their own astronomical salaries," said Jose, a 50-year-old Madrid engineer, echoing a common complaint.