Transcribed from the 19 October 2026 episode of the From The Periphery Podcast and printed with permission. Edited for space and readability. Listen to the whole conversation:
These people know they are part of a global context of injustice. They’re very aware, they’re very educated, but they’re also rooted, with very specific goals. Everything is articulated around this huge issue: housing.
israa’: Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of From the Periphery Podcast. I’m here today with Leila.
Leila al-Shami: Hello everyone.
i: And we have a special guest, Leila [Nashawati], who is here to tell us a little bit more about what’s happening in Spain. Leila, want to introduce yourself?
Leila Nashawati: I am Leila Nashawati, I’m a professor at Madrid’s Carlos III University. I am based in Madrid. I am from Spain but I am also from Syria; I have a mixed background. I’m interested in communication—that’s my main topic, communication and conflict, with a focus on Syria and the Levant/Mediterranean countries.
i. Thanks so much for being with us today, Leila.
We’ve been watching videos and posts coming out of Spain—Madrid is where it seems to have started—about protests and people hitting the streets. From my limited understanding, this moment of rupture was ignited when an elderly woman was being evicted out of her home that she’d been living in for seventy-one years.
Can you set the context for us? Let us know what’s happening?
LN: It’s difficult to establish “when things started,” because the housing issue has become so dramatic—and increasingly dramatic year by year—but it’s been going on for many years. It just keeps getting worse and worse, because Spain has become a touristic destination—and not only. There is the issue of AirBnB and illegal touristic apartments, but there is also the fact that many foreign investors, including vulture funds (in Spanish we call them fondos buitres), are taking over huge amounts of properties which then become inaccessible to average people.
They are accessible to tourists, or to people who can pay a lot of money, and most people have to move from their homes of decades, having to move to the outskirts or a smaller village, because it’s dramatically increasing, the price, and people’s salaries have not increased—dramatically the opposite, over the past few years. There is still a majority of the population making a thousand or fifteen hundred euros a month while rent has gone from six hundred euros a month to two thousand, in like three-four years.
It’s unbearable. Sometimes you need one drop to—in Spanish we say “the drop that spills the glass.” It’s happened; there are thousands of men and women, especially older people, who get evicted from their houses because all of a sudden they raised it from six hundred to two thousand euros a month. They’re forced to leave.
We have several cases of older people committing suicide right after getting evicted. It’s extremely tragic, because people are also living this with shame. It’s something most people address with a feeling of shame: it’s losing your house, losing who you are, losing your status. It’s very traumatic for those who suffer this.
There’s this case, Maricarmen [Abascal], who had been living [in a place] for seventy years, benefiting from the system of old rent prices from the Franco times, a social fee for certain types of apartments. She inherited this from her father—her father died in this house fifty years ago, her mother as well. So she’s living there, at eighty-seven years old. She’s working with a lawyer who offered options to the vulture fund, but the vulture fund just wanted her to leave.
They just wanted her gone, and to turn this into a touristic promotion—again, pushing people from their cities and making cities some sort of thematic amusement park.
i: To clarify, you’re talking about venture capital buying out property that had been affordable housing for people, and turning it into luxury apartments or touristic apartments—it’s extreme gentrification, people being pushed out of homes they’ve been in for generations, being bought out by large capital. Am I getting that?
You mention cases of suicide after people being evicted. What’s happening to people once they are evicted from their home in these situations?
LN: Some people cannot take it. Some people suffer from this, especially when they’re old and they have no way to make a salary. They have what they have, their small retirement or pension, and it’s a very traumatic situation.
What we have is a strong (and getting stronger) movement against eviction. There are young men and women—but a lot of women—organizing around Sindicato de Inquilinas, a tenants union. It’s young lawyers who are ensuring that people facing eviction or threat of eviction have the best legal counsel they can have. They were the ones fighting for Maricarmen, and they are at the center of the campout in Sol, with the biggest banners and organization.
They also have a spot where they give information, and people come and ask them, This is my situation, I’m going to get evicted, or, Does my landlord have the right to kick me out under these circumstances? They have informative sessions, and they’re behind the campout, which is a big difference from previous movements, including the Indignados movement, which was more abstract; goals were not that clear or specific. We wanted a more representative government—well, what does that actually mean?
That was nice at the beginning, because it was very open and inclusive—many people who were more drawn to rightwing ideologies also felt that the May 15 / Indignados movement spoke to them. It was very cross-cutting. But that was very problematic, because it soon became clear that you need a minimum denominator, minimum common ground, to build—and you need goals that are achievable.
The case now is that goals are very clear. They’re not all over the place, like We want a better world—that is permeating everything, because when you walk around the campout, you see Palestine banners, Palestine flags, lots of references to other injustices; these people know they are part of a global context of injustice. They’re very aware, they’re very educated, but they’re also rooted, with very specific goals. That’s something that I think is more realistic, achievable, and very needed at this point.
Everything is articulated around this huge issue, housing, which can also mobilize people more than most other issues that might be more divisive.
LS: Can you tell us a bit more about how the movement is organized? You mentioned the tenants unions, but what does it look like at the moment? Is this primarily confined in Madrid, or it’s a nationwide movement now?
LN: This is very interesting. It started with Madrid. Madrid is the hotspot for speculation, due to the rightwing government we have here in the city council and the Community of Madrid. Something important to know is that even though many of the laws related to housing are national, the ability to develop and implement specific housing issues is regional, local. So the local government in Madrid has the last say in what is implemented or not. There is always this tension between the central government and local government.
In Madrid, the local government has been particularly neoliberal, aligning with big millionaires, venture capital, and turning their back on citizens’ basic needs in terms of public education, in terms of cuts for social issues, for health. Public health is also suffering in Spain. This is all part of it: housing is presented and seen as a business by local government, not as a right. One of the big slogans is “Housing is a right, it’s not a business.” It’s not something for profit, it shouldn’t be, and it’s in the constitution that everybody has the right to housing. This article in the Spanish constitution keeps being repeated.
It started in Madrid because of the Maricarmen Effect, but then—this reminds us of the 15-M movement—it spread to other cities, and now there are hundreds of people in Valencia and Barcelona and many other cities. It’s a very Spanish issue, not restricted to Madrid. And today, just a few hours ago, the government of Pedro Sanchez has called for early elections. They were going to be next year, and they just moved to next month: November 29. I guess it’s responding to this idea or perception that maybe there will be a bigger progressive majority willing to go vote, but let’s see. Maybe it will backfire. We still don’t know.
It’s something to be hopeful about, to have such young leaders, especially at a moment where we were somehow under the impression that the majority of the young population in Spain was turning rightwing.
LS: You make the link to the Fifteenth of May movement. For listeners who don’t know, that was in 2011. There was a massive popular uprising in Spain in response to the austerity measures brought in after the 2008 global financial crisis. It was an interesting movement, because it was decentralized, it was horizontally organized, there were big public assemblies in the street.
Of course at that time it was a time of global uprising. Leila, you were affected in two ways, because there was this amazing movement happening in Spain, but also in Syria as part of the Arab Spring. What we saw was that ultimately, all those movements were crushed. In Syria we had a very brutal counterrevolution that turned into a complete bloodbath, but in Spain it was a different experience. There was the rise of Podemos, which came out of the street movement, and promised reforms that it ultimately failed to deliver on, and people put their faith in more institutionalized politics. But it had ultimately the same effect, just not in such a violent way: the street movement was demobilized.
I’m wondering what lessons have been taken from the 15-M movement, and how do you see that playing out in what’s going on in Spain today?
LN: Something that’s very different is that there’s clear leadership. The Tenants Union is one of the groups leading this, and their expertise is impressive. They know their stuff. I don’t want to say we were just idealists, because many people were very educated and ready, and connected to grassroots mobilizations, but there was this idea of utopia connected to the fact that We are horizontal, everybody has the same right to participate, there is no leadership.
I remember a slogan or mantra: The elite wants to know who our leaders are, because they want to behead our movement, but they won’t be able to do this because our movement doesn’t have a head. It was this idea of headless leadership, but that created its own set of problems. Even if there’s not an official or explicit leadership, leaderships emerge—or tensions for different forms of leadership or visions emerge.
In this case it’s quite clear. There is the Sindicato de Inquilinas, the tenants union; there is also the socialist youth coordination, which is socialist groups groups that are not connected to the government, but another form of socialist organization. There are a few other groups, but it’s mostly these two. Everyone else is students joining, supporting, but the leadership is quite clear, and quite effective. There are two or three girls in their twenties who are spokespersons for Maricarmen and this movement, and they are quite impressive to listen to. They are natural leaders, but in the best sense of the word.
It’s something to be hopeful about, to have such young leaders, especially at a moment where we were somehow under the impression that the majority of the young population in Spain was turning rightwing. There was a perception that my generation was the one still defending more progressive agendas, and kids in their twenties or even younger were reactionary. We hear a lot of invoking of Franco in some circles, something that my generation would not do. Even very traditional rightwing people would consider it taboo, or ridiculous, to bring back Franco.
But this is something you do here now, among very young kids—very angry. It’s difficult to know about what, but they’re very angry, and they’re very angry with this government, and the level of hate and criminalization and dehumanization of this current president (and everyone in the government) is scary, and it’s full of Nazi connotations. It’s difficult not to think of the Nazi movement when you see these young kids.
But all of a sudden we see that young people are more than that, and there are still many young people who can actually lead, and pave the way for the rest of us to see what’s next.
i: Can you tell us a little more about the current government? Where are they on the political spectrum? You mentioned that one response has been to move the elections up from next year to next month. Have there been any other responses?
LN: Something important to keep in mind about the government is that it’s not just a Socialist government, but it’s a coalition. The government of Spain right now is a coalition of the Partido Socialista Obrero Español [PSOE], which is the majority group, with other groups like Sumar, which is made up of different leftwing groups like Izquierda Unida, Más Madrid, local and national representatives of the left wing. There’s also Podemos.
There have been tensions among the different groups, and a lack of responsibility by some, in a moment when the coalition should be united around main issues. It has not been easy to pass laws or decrees, considering that within the coalition of government there are different views of what “leftwing” means and what the best measures would be.
The government of Spain is very well seen outside of Spain, it’s popular for its decent—we cannot say amazing, outstanding, we can say decent, because the threshold is so low in the European context when it comes to supporting genocides and war criminals. That someone saying Killing children is wrong gets so much applause tells us a lot more about where the threshold is in Europe than a lot of commitment. There are still questions about Spain not completely breaking its relationships with Israel in terms of arms, weapons, commercial and diplomatic agreements. It was not one hundred percent what it should be, but it’s better than most European countries, unfortunately.
So [Sanchez] has become some sort of icon for defending democracy at a moment when we see all these enemies of humanity and enemies of democracy, starting with Netanyahu, but we also have Milei in [Argentina] and Trump in the US, and the new Colombian president—the first thing he did was recognize the sovereignty of Israel over the Syrian Golan Heights. That tells us a lot about the trend, and how Israel is also raising the threshold of impunity, and that this is something that is global. I don’t think any country is free from this trend.
In this sense, Pedro Sanchez has positioned himself as a progressive icon for the international left, and that’s something I really appreciate, I cannot lie. But I don’t think that corresponds with how people see him in Spain. There is a part of Spanish people who appreciate his efforts, but it’s very polarized. So many people hate him, so many people blame him even now for Morocco sending thousands of people to the border with Ceuta. They’re calling him a traitor for allowing Morocco to do this. The hate against him is scary—the insults in congress by the political opposition; kids at concerts randomly singing insults to him.
There’s a scary momentum of dehumanization of this man, and trials against him and his family that are opaque—it’s not clear what his brother and wife are being judged for. It’s very dark, everything is very difficult to understand. There’s some sort of lawfare, an attempt to overthrow this government. The previous president, José María Aznar, who was responsible for the war on Iraq, has this sentence that has become very popular. He said, “Whoever can do, now is the moment to do.” He was basically telling everyone in the right wing, Now is the moment to overthrow this government. They talk about overthrowing the government as though this was a dictatorship.
In terms of housing, many people from progressive circles say [Sanchez] could have and should have done more, regulating the market, regulating prices. I don’t think he’s an interventionist president in that sense, and he has defined himself against intervention in this type of issue. So many are now blaming him—even if the competences are local and regional, the central government having a housing law could have done much more to prevent this vulnerability of people.
But recently they proposed decrees to prevent evictions, to renew rent automatically, and a few other points, but they were tombadas, they were not passed by a majority, because the rightwing groups opposed. By a small percentage, the two decrees that were meant to protect victims of speculation and evictions—they’re still under threat. And now, because these two decrees were not passed, two days later the government has called for early elections to try to use this momentum.
There’s a certain vibe that is more politically aligned, clear, and explicit than what we had [in 2011]. I don’t think anyone has any doubt that feminism is there, and it feels like they have more expertise than we did, and they have clear goals. It’s something to be proud of.
i: You talked about encampments being put up in Sol right now. Can you tell us more about those encampments and if they’re popping up in other spaces?
LN: Yeah. It’s in the main squares. It’s symbolic, it’s the exact same places as the May 15 movement, and it’s very inspired by the Arab Spring. The camp—the tents are very well-organized. It’s almost like a city. It’s like a very well-designed refugee camp. People seem to have more expertise in how to protect themselves from the rain—because rainy season is starting and there have been some storms. They were very ready for the storms. Also if you go and take a walk there it is very clean, very well-organized. They have different corridors and ways, and parts where people need their privacy so you cannot walk that way, but you can walk this other way, some sort of road. One section of the encampment is called Rafah Square, where they’re making the Gaza connection; there are all sorts of flags—Palestinian flags.
The vibe is very clearly progressive, leftwing. There’s a certain vibe that I think is more politically aligned, clear, and explicit than what we had [in 2011], which was, It’s okay, right or left, we can all fit in here, we want the same, it’s not about rightwing and leftwing, it’s about finding common ground—that is not something you can see here.
There are some common grounds that are very clear. I also remember the 15-M movement had issues because a few people started talking about feminism and how feminism should be at the heart of what is done, and one of the groups said, This is not the moment for feminism, and there was huge tension—I don’t think this is happening now. I don’t think anyone has any doubt that feminism is there, and it feels like they have more expertise than we did, and they have clear goals.
It’s something to be proud of. And it’s being replicated in every main square in every city. Let’s see what happens in the coming days.
LS: Have you seen the return of popular assemblies? How are decisions being made?
LN: There are assemblies where they decide specific issues, but they’re very specific: There are twenty evictions planned for tomorrow, what is the agenda? There is this decree being passed, what are we okay with? What are the minimums? Also pressuring different parties to find a common ground and stop the division within the coalition. But there are no existential discussions like the ones we had [in 2011]. It’s very specific and very agenda-oriented decisionmaking.
LS: You mentioned the obvious display of solidarity with Palestine, and renaming one of the squares Rafah Square, which is a very beautiful act. But I’m also wondering whether there’s any connections being made with what’s happening in France at the moment. There’s also a massive popular uprising of students against the education system in France, and I’m wondering if we’re seeing any connections being built between those two movements, or displays of support or solidarity.
LN: I’m not sure. I’m visiting the encampment, but I’m not at the core. People working there, people doing things, are under thirty years old. I’m following along, and I’m supporting and I’m solidarity. I’m not sure of the internal dynamics. I would say they’re connected to other countries; I saw some banners in other languages, in Arabic and French and English. I wouldn’t be surprised that they’re well-connected, because there seems to be an awareness that what we are witnessing is not only local or national but part of the rightwing international in laws and reactionary agendas.
They seem to be very clear, there seems to be an awareness of that, but I don’t know how much there is a connection, because this is very grounded, local. What I would like to see is how other countries maybe take inspiration in this movement, because housing is one of the main issues for most countries, right?
i: Can you share with us—you say a difference between the Indignados movement and today is that there’s clear political lines and common ground, and less trying to fit everyone into one shape. Can you share more about what these shared political grounds are and what the red lines are?
LN: I have something here that someone sent me. The Sindicato de Inquilinas shared this statement, I have a few points here.
It’s basically related to rent, making contracts renewable by default, and there has to be a strong justification if contracts are not renewed; the landlord may need the apartment for himself or his children. Unless that is the case, the rent will be automatically renewed. There is a point that is about evictions, stopping evictions unless there is an alternative, unless another house is provided. Most people are being evicted with absolutely no alternatives; people are being left homeless. That’s something specific that this movement wants to impose. And freezing rent prices, because every year it’s like two or three hundred more euros for rent—you cannot raise the rent for your tenants. Then other things like temporary rent are also addressed.
In general there is a longer term goal of lowering housing prices by fifty percent and forbidding these vulture funds, this venture capital—the most famous one is Sareb, a terrible speculation agent—from the Spanish market, and strong regulation or prohibition of touristic apartments in many places, especially in what we call “tensioned” areas of tourism in Barcelona, or Santiago de Compostela. They are also considering calling for a general strike.
I guess it’s a work in progress, but it’s basically different approaches to addressing the housing crisis.
i: You’re describing a moment, but in everything you’re describing, this is the most visible moment but it’s clear there’s been work. Like you said, there’s a different level of expertise happening at the encampment that you didn’t see before: the specificity of the demands, and how people are organizing, is driving the strategy within the encampments and how the protests are being developed. And you mentioned the Tenants Union as a core power space in molding and forming the resistance against these venture capitalists and the housing crisis.
I’m very curious about the leadup to this moment, the organizing work. What has the Tenants Union been doing over the last years to get to this point? Why is it that feminism isn’t being questioned the way it was in past movements? Do you have any insights around this?
LN: Both the Tenants Union and the Plataforma Antidesahucios, the Platform Against Evictions, are mostly led by women who have been working for over a decade, reacting to evictions and gathering hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people to protect the person who’s being evicted; and tried to create social awareness of what is happening, so these people aren’t evicted in silence, but she’s evicted surrounded by people who are telling her, You are not alone.
This created media momentum. Years ago, when someone was evicted, nobody would even know. But coinciding with the May 15 movement and all those processes, the Anti-Eviction Platform was born, and had lots of mobilizations around every single eviction, to prevent them, to inform people of their rights. They have been working for over a decade or fifteen years, and they are very well-organized. They know the laws, and they know which laws are not actually up to the task for what is needed at this point.
I don’t think we would have what we have now without this huge Platform Against Evictions becoming very strong and outspoken, and vocal in the media.
LS: What are the ways people outside Spain can support what’s happening?
LN: They can work on their own housing situations, and try to build something similar. This is far from a Spanish problem alone. Maybe it can inspire others, especially because we tend to think every time someone goes to their landlord and tells them, I cannot pay what you’re asking for, why are you raising this thirty percent? the answer is, But it’s the market!—what the F is the market? My salary is the same. Your salary, probably, too. What is this thing, “the market,” that is forcing you to make even more money from rent? How is this justified?
Facing the absurdity of this, of “The market is forcing me to charge you more”—once you see how absurd it is, once other countries wake up to this absurdity, I think it can have an infectious effect in others. I would hope that this is a turning point for people’s right to have a decent home without spending ninety percent of their salaries on paying rent.
i: Thanks, Leila. Is there anything else you want to share with us?
LN: I was telling some friends yesterday that with history, there are no spoilers. You cannot anticipate what’s going to happen. We’ve become so [engulfed] in this atmosphere that things are getting worse and worse, that we forget positive things can also happen. For me that was the case in December 2024 when the Syrian dictator was overthrown—or rather, he escaped, ran away like the little rat he is. When you least expected it, or when you dared dream no more, suddenly history surprises you.
So let’s hang on to the possibility that history may surprise us also positively. We need hope and energy to keep going, just like we need oxygen. Let’s breathe from each other’s little and not-so-little victories, and keep building on them.
Featured image source: Sindicato de Inquilinas
