Podemos. PAimages/Francisco Seco. All rights reserved.At first glance, Universidad de Podemos feels like any other rag tag left-wing meeting. People meander about in ripped jeans and trainers and sit around smoking roll-ups, the conference itself is disorganised (I got lost for a couple of hours after being sent to the wrong building), banners adorn the walls and political T-shirts are on sale at ramshackle stalls. Anyone who went to the People’s Assembly meeting in central London would feel instantly at home.
But it’s when you dig deeper that the differences reveal themselves. Universidad de Podemos is not the official party conference; it’s a gathering to educate Podemos members in politics, economy and strategy – and here is where Podemos marks itself out from other leftwing movements.
Instead of focusing on the policies needed in Spain, Podemos activists obsess over the gaps on the Spanish left that need to be filled - in this case, political education. The aim here is clearly to build a long-term movement, and Universidad de Podemos is just one strand of a wider, and remarkably focused, political project to permanently transform the Spanish left.
