Izquierda Unida

Izquierda Unida is the left-wing political party through which Irene holds the mayoralty of San Esteban, and its role in the novel is shown chiefly through her local government. The party’s identity is tested less by abstract ideology than by the practical stakes of her biomass-power project: electoral support and promises of progress give way to public controversy, media scrutiny, and a decisive split among her own councilors.

Local identity and electoral support

Izquierda Unida is identified with Irene’s politics, but her rise to office rests on more than party affiliation. She is described as a forceful, practical organizer who takes action wherever she sees a problem, even when she intervenes in matters that do not require her. That instinct for leadership, already prominent within her family, has carried into municipal government.

Her electoral appeal also draws on the standing of her mother, whose empathy and service to people in the town have made her widely loved. Irene benefits from that goodwill when she runs for mayor, then works intensely to prove that the support was deserved. The party’s local authority therefore emerges from a combination of its own political identity, Irene’s personal drive, and a family reputation already rooted in the community.

Irene’s mayoralty and public image

Irene’s campaign turns an unlikely object into a political emblem: a Loewe handbag given to her by her former husband. At a rally she promises that it will be the only such gift she permits herself if elected, and her declaration that she will arrive with a Loewe and leave with a Loewe becomes widely repeated in local cartoons and television discussions. Figures from Izquierda Unida in Madrid dislike the spectacle, but her absolute-majority victory silences their objections.

The episode establishes a tension between the party’s political image and Irene’s deliberately visible personal style. She argues that a woman in a prosperous Cantabrian town cannot afford to appear badly dressed, even as a left-wing mayor. Her self-presentation becomes a public joke and a recognizable campaign image, while her substantial local mandate gives her room to define what political credibility looks like in practice.

The biomass project and political controversy

Irene makes the biomass power plant the central undertaking of her government. She defends it as a source of green, clean, efficient energy that could generate electricity for fifty thousand people, create work, reduce reliance on fossil fuels, and make the town a pioneer in Spain. In her view, protecting trees and developing energy infrastructure need not be incompatible; the project represents a route to local progress rather than a choice between the environment and employment.

That position draws intense criticism. Opponents accuse Irene of betraying Cantabria by failing to protect the trees, while she dismisses some of the objections as concern for scrub and overgrown vegetation that can contribute to fires or pests. The dispute becomes a test of her claim to govern for the town: she sees herself as advancing energy independence, while her critics question both the environmental costs and the alliances required to build the plant.

A television interview sharpens the political challenge. The presenter questions the energy’s environmental credentials, including the fossil fuels used to transport biomass, the emissions produced by burning it, the handling of residue, the scale of forest required to supply a plant, and the viability of the jobs and subsidies promised elsewhere. She then moves from policy to allegations of political favoritism, portraying Irene as authoritarian and willing to favor the powerful timber businessman. These accusations are presented as part of a hostile media attack, not as established findings; nevertheless, they leave Irene struggling to defend both the project and the manner in which it was pursued.

Party division and loss of office

The conflict becomes an internal crisis when Irene’s family is implicated in resistance to the project. She fears that a public scandal involving her own relatives could undo two years of work persuading people to support the plant, damage her standing, and give the opposition and her former husband an opening against her. Her mayoralty and the project have become so closely joined that private conflict threatens to undermine her entire governing case.

A mass demonstration in San Esteban draws a crowd so large that Bea cannot approach the starting point from six hundred metres away. The protest and its extensive television coverage keep the plant controversy in the news. Bea’s confrontation with the presenter attracts tabloid attention, but it does not displace the demonstration’s message; Emerge consequently breaks its contract with the Andrada family and chooses another power plant, a decision that threatens Diego’s finances.

The final institutional break comes in a no-confidence vote. Five councilors from Irene’s party vote with the opposition, and she loses the mayoralty by a decisive margin. The novel does not describe a detailed party structure or the councilors’ individual motives; it shows instead how the local party’s support, once sufficient to deliver an absolute majority, fails under the strain of the biomass dispute and its political aftermath. Izquierda Unida’s local presence is thus associated with both Irene’s ambitious program of progress and the withdrawal of the support that had enabled her to govern.