In the Italian elections last autumn, the parties of the radical right obtained 35% of the votes. In France, in the first round of the last presidential elections, Le Pen obtained 23%. In Sweden, electoral support for the hard right is 21%; in Finland, 20%. In Spain, on Sunday, Vox obtained just over 12%.

Spain is one of the European countries in which this new form of conservative populism is less successful. There are several explanations for it.. One, of a moral nature, is the mostly progressive character of Spanish society, which accepts abortion (70%) or gay marriage (80%) and is comparatively little religious (40% say they are atheist or agnostic).. Another reason is historical: the revisionism in a positive key that a part of Vox makes of Francoism connects with a past that many Spaniards are not particularly proud of, or that scares them.. One last reason is electoral discipline: the PP is so deeply rooted in the territory, and has such a great capacity to square ideologically, mediatically, and electorally with conservative voters, that, here, a party to its right has a relatively low ceiling..

In all this there is some truth. But the lack of success of Vox at a time when the radical right is growing in almost all of Europe has another explanation: Vox is a party that is infinitely more clumsy and inexperienced than its European counterparts.. Above all, in the ideological. Most of these parties are increasingly focusing on a few ideological points. The main one is, by far, the rejection of immigration, especially Muslim immigration.. Second, and far behind, are moral questions.. But these, each party interprets them differently: in family matters, Brothers of Italy behaves like a true conservative party; while others, especially from the north of the continent, defend the gay flag and the new forms of family to contrast the tolerance of Christian countries with Islamic fundamentalism. Some emphasize the rural economy (Netherlands); others, in euroscepticism (Denmark) or in defense of the working classes (Le Pen).

But Vox has wanted to include in its ideological program, and in its DNA, grandiose theories in which the Spanish have no interest, such as the role of George Soros in financing progressive conspiracies, the military achievements of Spain in the 16th century and the supposed decline of the current West.. And their local charges have shown intransigent attitudes in aspects such as the literary programming of town theaters or the emphatic rejection of Gay Pride.. That makes for a wacky-looking party, or at least an unsympathetic one.. If she had focused on her three strengths—immigration, feminism, Catalonia—she could have been as successful as her European colleagues.. And, internally, it could simply be a more conservative party than the PP, with which to be able to form a parliamentary majority. But with these displays of excessive ideological ambition, which reflect the eccentricities of his intellectual environment, he has rather achieved the opposite: not only has he not been very successful, but he has also destroyed the chances of the right ruling in Spain..

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Because, right now, that is the role that Vox plays in Spanish democracy: to prevent there being an electorally viable alternative to the coalition between the left and Catalan and Basque nationalism. Of course, the merit of the electoral result is not his alone. It is also the case of a PP that came to the elections thinking that it did not need any more electoral program than repealing sanchismo and lowering taxes, that it ran a mediocre campaign and that it was not capable of transmitting a vision of Spain beyond vague Rajoyan ideas that might work in 2011, but certainly will not in 2023..

However, Vox has become so fond of scaring progressives that what it has achieved is that they mobilize, and with good reason, given the possibility that leaders like Buxadé, Ortega Smith or Abascal occupy positions of responsibility in a national government.. It has opted so much for the haughty and arrogant ways that even some liberals think twice before endorsing a coalition with a party that is as disinterested in management, and as addicted to political communication as Podemos.. In short, he has achieved that the polarization that Pedro Sánchez has placed at the center of his political strategy —approving bad laws, governing with partners contrary to the Constitution, and then having his voters forgive him because it would be worse to have Abascal as vice president— works.

The existence of a real and viable alternative to the Government in office is a measure of the quality of a democracy. It was not necessary to be a supporter of the right to think that the succession of a poorly managed pandemic, an uncomfortable coalition with Bildu, favors for ERC and the approval of badly conceived laws by Podemos could lead to a change of government. But Vox, with its effective mobilization of the leftist voter, has thwarted it. In a certain sense, this is very good news: it prevents Spain from joining the wave of governments with the presence of the radical right. And it shows how little support many of his disastrous ideas have in our society. But it is also a problem: Vox is not going to give up its ideology, let alone its existence. But as long as it exists, the PP will not govern Spain. And the lack of an alternative to the current coalition, neither for the future nor hypothetical, but real and viable, is indeed a problem.