People's Party (Roden)

The People's Party ( Partit popular), often abbreviated as PP, is a,  political party in Roden. It was formed by a 1993 merger between the Democratic Centre (CD) and the  Social Federation of Independents (FSI).

The PP has been continuously in power either in its current incarnation or as the CD-FSI alliance since the return of democracy in 1988 except for the 2005-2010 legislature. In addition, the PP or its predecessors have always been the largest parliamentary plurality since the first democratic election. Following the 2015 election, the PP holds 182 seats in the People's Assembly and 59 in the Senate in addition to four of the seven current directors of the Executive Council. The party also has an in 3 and a  in 9 of the 20 provincial legislatures.

The PP is tied to various organisations such as the People's Daily (Jornal del Poble) newspaper, various  organisations and  or the Union Sendecala Obrièra. The PP is the largest Rodenian party by affiliation, with 939,160 members as of 2016.

Names
The PP, due to its origins as the merger of two distinct parties, has retained certain idiosyncrasies at the provincial level, owing to the varying balance of power between the two founding parties and their internal factions at the time of the union. One of the most notorious idiosyncrasies is the varying names under which the PP runs at the provincial level. At the national level as well as in the provinces with the exception of the insular ones, the PP is known as Partit Popular (literally, 'People's Party'). In the three Occitan-speaking provinces of Oleron (Agarnagues, Crau and Grava) as well as Nugaro, the party is known as 'Social and Democratic Movement' (Movement social e democratic in, Movimentu sotziale e democraticu in , MSeD).

In the and  provinces of south-western continental Roden, the PP is known as the the 'Social Popular Party' or PSP (Partì Social Popolar in , Partii Social Popolar in ), whereas in the deeply Catholic three north-western provinces of Polexine, Puart and Pespitg, the party retains the name of one of its two founding parties, the Democratic Centre (Centro Democratego in , Centri democratic in  and Center democratic in , CD).

In the PP's electoral lists for the national legislative election held in those provinces where the party runs at the provincial level with a different name, the party labels the lists with both names.

Beginnings
After the 1990 legislative election and the dissolution of the joint opposition Democratic Convergence for Reform (CDtR) coalition, various institutions, particularly the influential,  Club Sègle XXI  called for the creation of a 'strong, centrist force' in order to prevent political  in a young, fragile democracy. Politically-speaking, after the disappointing results for the centre of the 1990, the division of the two main centrist forces - the CD and the FSI - weakened them in the four-party government of the first legislature.

On December 1991, the Democratic Centre and the Social Federation launched a negotiations' round to establish a coordination mechanism. The negotiations were led by Arnau Prats for the CD and Claudio Varoto for the FSI. Both deputies had been a part of the Constitutional commission during the Constituent Assembly and gained a reputation for their capacity to negotiate thorny issues. The negotiators' June 1992 final report recommended the merger and creation of a new party. On October and December 1992, the CD and FSI respectively held extraordinary congresses in which the majority of delegates supported the merger. However, a section of the CD opposed the merger and split from the CD, forming the Movement dels ciutadans tal cambiament (MCC).

The party was officially launched on January 1993 with a Founding Congress in which the internal posts were distributed equally between the two former parties; former CD member Adolf Marveggio was elected President whereas former FSI member Matteu Orsatt was chosen as General Secretary. The new party improve its electoral results in the 1995 election, strengthening its position in the centre-right government vis-à-vis its two liberal coalition partners - the PRD and the Liberal Union.

After 1995, the People's Party coalition with the two liberal parties would continue governing Roden, pursuing democratic consolidation and economic stimulation, maintaining high growth rates. During the 1995-2000 period, the tripartite government passed a series of organic laws provided for in the Constitution creating the Constitutional Court and granted autonomy to the Banca Nacionala while commenced a programme of of various, previously highly-protected, economic sectors, such as, s and the. The most controversial legislation piece passed during the legislature, however would be the Law 1998/185 of Economic Stimulus, later revoked by a public initiative, and which would have permitted the merger of certain capitanías industrialas with each other.

Centre-left and opposition
The controversy aroused by the Law 1998/185 of Economic Stimulus as well as certain s involving high-level PDR ministers and directly tied to Director xx resulted in a major electoral backlash for the liberal forces on the 2000 election.

Organisation
The PP is organised along lines in accordance with the Rodenian Constitution. The People's Party also exhibits a highly decentralised structure, where the national leadership rarely interferes with the provincial or local-level party sections.

The People's Party has two key executive posts, the President ( President nacional del PP) and the General Secretary ( Secretari general). The President usually deals with matters of national representation and political coordination, such as dealing with other parties or coordination the party's apparatus and the parliamentary groups. Instead, the General Secretary deals with organic issues, such as the convocation of congresses, the nomination of the party treasurer, the recognition and moderation of intra-party disputes between various factions or the draft of programmatic documents. Both the President and the General Secretary are elected every three years in the PP's National Congresses.

The National Congresses (Congrès nacional del PP) are held every three years. In the National Congress, the PP membership elects the various directly-elected executive posts as well as the 61 members of the Permanent Conference (Conferença permanenta) and vote on the various programmatic and organisational proposals put forward by individual party members, factions and the party leadership. The Permanent Conference is a elected by the rank-and-file that chooses the Executive Board (Comission executiva), the party's executive. The Board is formed by the President, the General Secretary and seven other members, usually including the PP's current parliamentary leaders as well as the PP's current directors. The People's Party is unique amongst Rodenian parties in that the members of the Executive Council play a major role in the internal politics of their party.

Currently, the Executive Board is formed by Francesch Verneng (President), Anna-Maria Barthes (General Secretary), Inricch Franscitt (Assembly leader), Emanuel Giràud (Senate leader), Nicolau Gasquet, Vincenç Auriol, Josepina Cazenave, Cecilia Vazoler (Directors) and Antonia Pozobon (Minister).

Support base
The PP's electoral strongholds are located across the western Roden. In the provinces of Polexine and Puart especially, the party outdid the national vote share by 16.6 and 14.4 percentage points respectively. Across western Roden, with the sole exception of Roe, the party improved on the national average in the 2015 election. The other major stronghold for the PP is located in the Oleron Island and in Nugaro, where the PP benefits from the pre-existing developed after independence.

In western Roden, PP voters are drawn from the countryside and small and medium-size cities, particularly with a strong - the party does noticeably worse amongst Protestants, whereas in the larger cities, PP support is drawn from the urban,   and particularly from a larger segment of  as well as the, from where the PP also draws a large number of its personnel.

The People's Party support in eastern Roden is narrower, given its poorer results. With the exception of Brageiragues, where the party obtains the majority share of civil servants' votes, the PP support is more closely linked to the existence of practising Catholics as well as to the degree of urbanisation - the PP routinely does better in the Catholic countryside and in smaller cities. Party supporters are more likely to be Rodenian-born, practising Catholic, state employees and more likely to be above the national, particularly the.

Ideology
The People's Party, as the descendant of the merger of a party and a technocratic one exposes both ideological currents as key ideological tenets, albeit secularised. The People's Party defines itself as inspired by Christianity but in a non-denominational manner. Instead, the PP underpins its ideological precepts on 's and 's doctrine of  as well as. The PP rejects as well as  in favour of 'a society where people can blossom' based on the "defence of democratic liberties, promotion of families, the value of private enterprise and social solidarity" as well as so-called  and social harmony. The party also rejects, instead defend inter-class collaboration where the state plays a leading role through in order to pursue. Since the 2000s, the party has shifted towards defending a, by reducing the role of the State in the economy.

The nature of the PP however means that within the party, there are factions that diverge considerably from the party's core precepts, such as  and the  or  on the right. Foreign and domestic observers alike generally place the party on the centre of the political spectrum as a result of the PP's combination of interventionist economic policies combined with.

Economic policy
Economically-speaking, the People's Party is usually characterised as a centrist force, located roughly in between the of the Liberal Democratic Union and the  of the PST. The PP advocates for social cooperation and rejects the concept of in line with. Instead, it advocates for an economy run through a harmonious relationship between the State, workers and employers in order to maximise social well-being over specific class interests. The economic policy of the People's Party is generally considered to be a direct continuation, albeit in a more democratic direction, of that of the FNR regime, particularly in the light of large degree of continuation of personnel between the FNR and the FSI, one the founding parties of the PP.

In practice, the pursued by the PP means that the party simultaneously defends  and the  as mutually reinforcing and as elements for societal cohesion. The PP defends higher social spending on as well as, the  and it is particularly well-known for its defence of 'security' with subsidies which are not conditioned to employability.

The PP also defends a strong collaborative relationship between the State, the major companies, particularly the and the  through  or  and other forms of. The PP's corporatism is also reflected in its defence of between the government,  and the  covering a vast array of economic and political issues.

The People's Party's statutes reflect the party's belief in that the role of the state in the economy is not secondary, by neutralising negative externalities or limiting inequality. Instead, the populars defend policies in which the government plans and sets and collective goals to be achieved by the private sector in order to further the economic development of the country. In order to do so, the PP has, since 1995, created a series of organisms, like the Economic Planning Board that permit this kind of economic supervision.

Regional policy
Amongst the four main political parties in Roden, the PP is the most favourable to the decentralised administrative structure of Roden, despite the existence of a centralist faction formed by a remnant of traditional technocrats from the party's right-wing. In its statutes and on electoral platforms, the PP argues for a system of on the basis of the 's  principle as well as the  principle of. In a society ruled by these principles, power is delegated to the level closest to citizens provided it is feasible. Subsidiarity also calls for the cooperation of national, regional and local level authorities.

Besides the philosophical underpinning, the People's Party's staunch defence of autonomy and even advocacy for a federal system, is partially the result of the party's strength in western and northern Roden, where Insubrian autonomist feelings are socially and politically ingrained, as well as the various experiences in governing in coalition with regionalist forces like the Autonomist Movement.

Social policy
The People's Party is the most conservative major political party in Roden. The PP's social policies are drawn from and  as well as from  adapted to Western Yoju's different cultural environment. All three ideological traditions that constitute the basis of the PP's social policies stress social harmony and collaboration, as well as  as important elements in guaranteeing social harmony. As a result, the People's Party is a party that has historically been apathetic to the socially liberalising trends in Rodenian society.

The PP is opposed to and voted against the s law proposed by xx in 2006. However after coming back to power in 2010, the party has not attempted to revoke the law. Although the People's Party is opposed to the criminalisation of, the party has historically sought legislative manners to reduce public visibility, as it considers the so-called 'homosexual way of life' as contrary to the socially harmonious community's values that the PP seeks.

Similarly, the People's Party has sought to restrict to cases of maternal life, mental health, health, rape, and/or fetal defects and instead offering alternatives to abortion, such as  of unwanted babies. The People's Party is strongly in order to fight against Roden's low fertility rates since the mid-1980s. The PP is opposed to.

The PP's social policies do not have the unanimous support of the party, and certain currents within, particularly the Nòu Estat are considerably more  than the party as a whole and have occasionally broken party discipline on important social issues like the 2006 s law or the 2009 law on the legalisation of, which only passed thanks to the technoliberal revolt.

Factions
As a formed from the merger of two parties that has governed almost uninterruptedly Roden since 1988, the PP has experienced the growth of powerful internal currents or factions, known as zones (airal, airals in plural) that characterise the party's internal life. The party's factions are officially recognised by the party and are assigned a percentage of the party's income. They ran against each other in the National Congresses and the party's organic posts are divided on the basis of their internal strength.

Since the 2016 Congress, the PP's officially-recognised factions are the Airal popular, Nòu estat, Renovament popular, Autonomistes, Airal social and Marquistes


 * Airal popular is a faction, considered to be on the moderate right-wing of the party. Popular Area was created in 1998 and is the oldest, structured faction in the party. Airal Popular was created by Ambroeus Tanz and Arnau Prats and other figures linked to the influential Club Sègle XXI foundation, which acts as the group's . Currently, the area is led by Ilaria Bordignon and several important party figures, like the general secretary Anna-Maria Barthes are affiliated with Popular Area. Other important party figures belonging to the faction include Inricch Franscitt, Sabina Puech and Gabriel Pognant Airass.


 * Nòu estat is the main current within the PP. Nòu Estat (New State in ) was created in 2003 after the division of the former unified, technocratic current, the 'Independent Group' between the technoliberal majority and the  led by Marc Teisseire known as marquistes. New State is generally considered to be a centre-left current, espousing  views, although the party is generally at odds with the Christian democratic corporatism, defending instead,  and  that place the current on the party's left. New State is led by Roger Raspail, and includes other important party figures such as Manon Gavaldan, Emanuel Giràud and Maria Cadeddu.


 * Reforma populara ( 'Popular Reform') also known as Franceses after leader Francés Valat, is a middle-sized  current created in 2008 by Francés Valat and several other deputies formerly belonging to Nòu Estat. Popular Reform is considered to be in-between Airal Popular and Nòu Estat, as it shares the  views of the former, but the economic outlook of Nòu estat, albeit from a more  perspective. Important party leaders belonging to Reforma populara include Joan-Maria Rossèl and Maurici Couderc.


 * Autonomistes is a small faction broadly located on the centre of the party. Autonomistes, as it names indicates is formed by small group of deputies and senators, as well as Insubrian party members that hold or  views and argue for the absolute autonomy of provincial party branches. Autonomistes generally warns against the possible growth of the various regionalist forces in western Roden and the danger to the PP's strongholds in the region. As a result, of its small size, lack of a clear ideological position beyond being pro-devolution, the current usually holds the balance of power between the two main currents. The current leader and PP president is Francesch Verneng, a member of Olonees' Provincial Board.


 * Airal social ( 'Social Area') represents the party's . Airal social was created in 2001 from the previous informal Vignetistes faction after the death of Dumini 'Meco' Vignet. Airal social espouses positions typical of the, such as . The faction is the closest to the PP's affiliated , USO and important USO leaders, like its Secretary Antonio Muraro are also members of Airal Social. Within the party itself, important members of the faction include Nigola Pusceddu and Emilia Volpato.


 * Marquistes is a current formed in 2003 by the followers of Marc Teisseire. Maquistes is considered the most right-wing faction of the party. Members of marquistes espouse positions similar to those of the former National Renovation party, such as, , or.

Leadership

 * President: Francesch Verneng (2013-present)
 * General Secretary: Anna-Maria Barthes (2010-present)
 * People's Assembly leader: Inricch Franscitt (2015-present)
 * Senate leader: Emanuel Giràud (2005-present)