Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez has once again made international headlines – and not in a good way, this time.
As a Spaniard outside Spain, I often bump into people who praise his foreign policy and economic track record. As I argued in a recent analysis, many international observers see him as a hero in Europe, willing to defend multilateralism, social policies, peace, and a more ethical foreign policy.
Then you open the Spanish newspapers, listen to televised debates or speak with friends and relatives back home, and the reality feels entirely different: Exhaustion and polarisation define pretty well the political climate in Spain.
Why?
Economic growth figures, diplomatic visibility with Gaza and the war in Iran, and speeches on the global stage about international law and human rights have caught the eye of an international community that is struggling daily with a world in polycrisis mode, dominated by an aggressive rhetoric of leaders such as America’s Donald Trump and Russia’s Vladimir Putin. Sánchez represents the opposite.
