“He is a much better politician than most people. He has a lot of skill.” Ian Shapiro speaks about Pedro Sánchez, but not because he sees the Spanish president as a particularly original ideological figure. On the contrary, he regards him as a fairly conventional social democrat. What interests him is his ability to recognize political opportunities and act before they vanish. With the general elections on November 29 in sight, that assessment gains special relevance.
We are in New Haven after a seminar at Yale University, where Shapiro has taught Political Science since 1984. During the session he explained why he considers the post–Cold War international order exhausted, a topic he develops in his latest book, After the Fall: From the End of History to the Crisis of Democracy, How Politicians Broke Our World. The conversation continues over dinner at Olea, a Spanish and Mediterranean restaurant located near the university.
For more than an hour we discuss Donald Trump, the left’s missteps, the rise of radical parties, immigration and the power of big tech companies. We also talk about Sánchez’s decision to call elections early. Although the topics change, much of the American political scientist’s reflections of South African origin converge on one central question: to what extent do leaders know how to seize the circumstances that allow them to alter the course of politics.
The opportunities lost after the Cold War
Shapiro began sketching some of the ideas in his book in 2019, when he delivered Yale’s DeVane Lectures, a university course also open to the public that later circulated on YouTube.
His thesis is that the end of the Cold War opened a period of extraordinary possibilities. The disappearance of the Soviet Union allowed a rethinking of international relations, reforming institutions and constructing a different political order. Yet Western leaders chose to consolidate American hegemony and extend the existing institutions. A model based on economic liberalization, globalization and faith that liberal democracy would ultimately become the dominant political system was thus imposed.
“Western leaders chose to consolidate American hegemony and extend the existing institutions.”
From that consensus there is not much left. “I think today we are in a situation similar to the end of the Cold War. The neoliberal consensus has collapsed and we still don’t know what will replace it,” explains Shapiro. The novelty this time is that the radical right has been the first to recognize the opportunities offered by the new scenario.
Donald Trump knew how to break with the conventions of the Republican Party when the conditions were favorable. Other politicians, like Pat Buchanan, had argued similar positions years earlier without succeeding in transforming the party. For Shapiro, that contrast cannot be attributed solely to each leader’s ability. Also at play is luck, a factor he considers insufficiently addressed by the Social Sciences.
A single proposal can be irrelevant for decades and then become the center of political debate. Ideas matter, but so does the context in which they arise and the ability to recognize when the moment has come to defend them.
Pedro Sánchez and the social-democracy’s errors
When I ask him about Pedro Sánchez, Shapiro rejects the image of the Spanish president as a representative of an especially radical left. “I don’t see Sánchez as an extreme-left populist. He is a center-left social democrat, quite conventional,” he says.
In his view, one of Sánchez’s main virtues has been resisting moving his positions to the right to win over the center electorate. For decades, much of Western social democracy followed exactly that path, especially from the 1990s onward. It was the triangulation strategy, used by Bill Clinton with the advice of Dick Morris: courting some of the opponent’s positions to attract their voters.
According to Shapiro, that formula worked electorally, but weakened the left in the long run. “It was a good tactic in the short term, but a terrible strategy for the left,” he summarizes. The social-democratic parties adopted a substantial portion of the conservative economic framework and contributed to shifting the boundaries of political debate. Meanwhile, the right continued advancing toward positions increasingly distant from the old consensus.
“The social-democratic parties adopted a substantial portion of the conservative economic framework and contributed to shifting the boundaries of the political debate.”
He illustrates his argument with taxes. For much of the postwar period, top marginal income tax rates reached 70% or 80% in some Western countries. Today, much more moderate fiscal proposals can provoke strong resistance. For Shapiro, that shift helps explain why the left gradually lost the ability to offer a recognizable alternative, even while it kept winning elections. “One must distinguish between tactic and strategy,” he insists.
In Europe, decades of agreements among conservatives, liberals and social democrats allowed the building and consolidation of the European Union, but also made it harder, according to Shapiro, for citizens to perceive substantial differences between the main political families.
He now detects a similar phenomenon in the traditional center-right parties, especially on immigration. He cites the British Conservatives, the German Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and also Danish social democracy, which has significantly hardened its migration discourse.
“True xenophobic voters prefer the original”, he warns. His reasoning is that adopting the radical right’s proposals may yield some electoral victory, but ends up reinforcing the ideological framework of the parties one seeks to combat.
“Adopting the radical right’s proposals may yield some electoral victory, but ends up reinforcing the ideological framework of the parties one seeks to combat.”
Sánchez, in his view, has followed a different path. He has managed to maintain a recognizable social-democratic identity without embracing much of his opponents’ positions. He is not described as a revolutionary, but as a politician who understands that ideological moderation does not require abandoning one’s own convictions.
The early election and the importance of knowing when to act
Winning elections is of little use if you cannot wield the power afterward. Shapiro returns to this idea repeatedly. “There are two things to do: win an election and then use the victory,” he emphasizes.
To illustrate the failure of that second task, he cites Keir Starmer. In his view, the British prime minister won an extraordinary parliamentary majority, but hasn’t managed to translate it into a meaningful political transformation. By contrast, he sees in Sánchez and in Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, a greater ability to interpret circumstances and act accordingly. “If you have a moment, you must seize it. It won’t last forever,” he notes.
For the political scientist, electoral commitments should not become an excuse to avoid hard decisions. Governing also requires revisiting priorities, taking risks and understanding that political opportunities have a limited duration.
“Governing also requires revisiting priorities, taking risks and understanding that political opportunities have a limited duration.”
I then ask about the Spanish elections called for November 29, announced on October 5, and list the difficulties facing the president: the housing crisis, the fragility of his parliamentary majority, inflation and an international situation that could worsen the economic outlook.
Shapiro reads the call as an attempt to regain initiative before circumstances become even less favorable. “I suppose he thought there wouldn’t be better news between now and next year. So better to go now and regain the initiative,” he says. He adds: “Or perhaps it is the least bad moment.”
In politics you cannot always wait for ideal conditions to appear. Often you must decide with incomplete information, anticipate scenarios and assess whether the passage of time will help or hurt. Shapiro attributes to Sánchez a special knack for making that calculation.
“Often you have to decide with incomplete information, anticipate scenarios and assess whether the passage of time will help or hurt.”
Given the possibility that the PSOE might win without a sufficient majority to govern, he notes that polls were wrong in 2023. Regarding a possible defeat, he does not rule out that Sánchez could return later. “He would probably manage it,” he answers.
Not a prediction grounded in electoral data, but an assessment of the president’s capabilities. For Shapiro, he is less interested in predicting the November 29 result than in analyzing how Sánchez has chosen to face difficult circumstances. In his view, the call responds to a quality not all leaders possess: to know when to take a risk.
Immigration as a unifying element of the radical right
Big fortunes advocating tax cuts, conservative businessmen and workers dissatisfied with the economy form part of the same electoral coalition. For Shapiro, the far right has managed to bring together groups with very different material interests largely through opposition to immigration.
“The easiest way to keep a coalition together is to demonize those who come from outside,” he remarks.
This strategy responds to what he calls zero-sum politics, based on the perception that any improvement in another group’s conditions necessarily means a loss for one’s own. The immigrant thus becomes a common adversary for people who, in other respects, have conflicting interests.
“The immigrant thus becomes a common adversary for people who, in other respects, have conflicting interests.”
I point out some peculiarities of the Spanish case. The existence of diverse national identities makes it difficult to build a homogeneous nationalism based solely on a single ethnic identity. In addition, the weight of Latin American immigration introduces cultural and linguistic elements that differentiate Spain from other European countries.
Yet Shapiro argues that the most effective argument for immigration is not necessarily cultural. “It is better to use the economic argument. And, above all, the demographic one,” he replies.
His main concern is the aging of European societies. How will they fund pension systems, public services and their economies if the working-age population continues to shrink? In his view, ignoring the problem can exacerbate the distributive conflict between young and old. “The alternative is a generation-by-generation class war,” he warns.
Shapiro also does not overlook the integration challenges. Pressure on housing, education or health services requires public policies capable of responding to population growth. If governments do not invest enough in these areas, immigration can be perceived as competition for scarce resources, a reading that favors the far-right discourse.
“If governments do not invest enough in these areas, immigration can be perceived as competition for scarce resources, a reading that favors the far-right discourse.”
Defending immigration, therefore, requires explaining its economic and demographic contribution, but also ensuring that public services meet the population’s needs. Otherwise, material tensions may end up fueling the political divisions that radical parties use to broaden their support.
Big corporations and the new social contract
Toward the end of the dinner, we address the power of large tech companies. How can democracies regain decision-making capacity in the face of firms that concentrate vast amounts of economic resources?
Shapiro acknowledges the magnitude of the problem, though he rejects that money wholly determines political outcomes. He recalls Linda McMahon’s two Senate campaigns in Connecticut, in which the businesswoman spent tens of millions of her own wealth without winning. He also wonders whether new technologies could eventually offer opportunities to smaller players, just as relatively cheap drones have altered the balance of power in military conflicts.
He does not offer a definitive answer on how the power of big firms will evolve, but he does defend the need to rebuild the social contract. Digital markets, he explains, promote dynamics in which a handful of firms capture a disproportionate share of profits. Therefore he argues that the traditional antitrust tools are insufficient.
“Digital markets, he explains, promote dynamics in which a few firms capture a disproportionate share of the profits.”
“We can accept that they succeed, but we have to tax those profits,” he argues. The revenues should fund investments in education, health care, housing and worker training.
I ask him how to persuade large corporations to accept greater obligations. His answer is pragmatic: because it is in their interest as well. Companies need skilled workers, institutional stability, open markets and societies with sufficient purchasing power. The growth of authoritarian and nationalist movements threatens some of those conditions.
He then recalls European businesspeople who in the 1930s believed they could politically instrumentalize Hitler or Mussolini for their own benefit. The consequences ended up exceeding their calculations.
In his view, a weakened democracy also becomes a problem for businesses. Hence his call for a new agreement between the business world, workers and governments that allows to distribute the gains from economic growth more evenly and reduce material insecurity.
A chance to change course
Before parting, Shapiro talks about his upcoming project, a book on South Africa during the 1960s and 1970s, before the end of apartheid. It is a country he knows well: he was born there, in a family that had been settled on its soil for three generations. He left in 1972, lived in the United Kingdom and arrived in the United States in 1978, where he could continue his graduate studies.
His biography helps explain his attention to historical circumstances and the margin of action of individuals. It is also a central concern of After the Fall, where he examines the decisions that carried the West from post–Berlin Wall optimism to today’s crisis of its democracies.
For Shapiro, that outcome was not inevitable. Western leaders made decisions that contributed to weakening trust in institutions and to the rise of political forces opposed to the liberal consensus. He also argues that present conditions offer new possibilities, though so far the radical right has known how to seize them better than its opponents.
“Western leaders made decisions that contributed to weakening trust in institutions and to the rise of political forces opposed to the liberal consensus.”
Of Sánchez, he values that he has not abandoned his social-democratic positions to compete with the right. He also does not attribute to him special ideological originality: what interests him is his ability to make decisions when circumstances demand it. Other center-left leaders, he believes, have spent too much time chasing their opponents in the field they had chosen.
As we leave the restaurant, I am left with one thought repeated by Shapiro during the dinner: winning elections is not enough; afterward you must know how to use power. And to govern, you also must recognize when taking a risk is worth it.
The November 29 election will test whether Sánchez’s electoral calculus has been right. What happens next, should he manage to govern, will depend on that second capacity Shapiro emphasized during the conversation: to use power while it is available.
