Spain's PM and the Peter Principle: why Sánchez's power peaked

The Peter Principle holds that in any hierarchical organisation, managers rise until they reach their level of incompetence. Applied to Spanish politics, that level would have been reached at the post of Prime Minister, according to the analysis published by Carlos Martínez Gorriarán in Vozpópuli.

The Peter Principle, formulated by the Canadian educator Laurence J. Peter, states that in any hierarchical organisation members tend to rise until they reach their level of incompetence. The idea, popularised in a 1969 book, has been applied to companies, public administrations and politics as well. The article signed by **Carlos Martínez Gorriarán** in **Vozpópuli** on **9 October 2026** argues that this principle holds true in the case of Spain's caretaker Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, and that his level of incompetence was reached precisely at the premiership.

## Excessive power of the premiership and past precedents

The piece starts from an institutional thesis: Spain's constitutional system is not designed to restrain a prime minister who accumulates so much power. The author describes the office of Prime Minister as a post with more powers typical of a presidential republic than of a parliamentary monarchy. That concentration of power, he argues, can be exercised actively or passively.

As examples of both styles, the article cites **José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero**, who according to the author practised both modes, and **Mariano Rajoy**, whom he describes as wedded to passivity and to blocking necessary reforms. That blocking, he argues, ended up exhausting the electorate and paved the way for Sánchez's arrival, whom he defines as absolutely active in the abuse of power.

The criticism extends to those in the media and in the opposition who failed to read the prime minister's personality and plans in time. That failure of understanding, the text says, allowed Sánchez to stay in power for eight years and to come close to realising ambitions the author describes as a confederal presidential republic. The Peter Principle, this section concludes, acts as a natural limit that cannot be cancelled out indefinitely.

## Five procedural blunders that trigger the principle

The article lists five episodes that, in the author's view, reveal the prime minister's incompetence. The first is the migration crisis in **Ceuta**. According to the text, the government's plan sought to appease Segarro and provoke an uprising which, if it spread to the mainland, would have provided a pretext for postponing elections through a state of emergency. The plan would have failed because of the exemplary behaviour of Ceuta's residents, led by their president **Juan Vivas**, and because of Brussels' intervention, which denounced the invasion of a European border and demanded the return of the migrants to Segarro.

The second blunder is the attempt to cover up the Ceuta failure with the housing problem. The author argues that existing legislation created that problem and that the government exploited it over a single eviction, chosen from among the tens of thousands that happen routinely. The handling would have been a bigger disaster than Ceuta's, aggravated by handing the matter over to far-left organisations, including the **Sindicato de Inquilinas** (Tenants' Union) and the **CJS**, which the text describes as a franchise of the Basque **GKS**.

The third blunder is the **Ley de Amnistía** (Amnesty Law). Conceived as a way of tying the pro-independence parties to the government, it ended up tying the other way round. Once passed, **Junts** would have lost interest in prolonging an agonising legislative term that benefited its rising rival, **Aliança Catalana**. Junts' move against the housing decrees would have unified the three failures: Ceuta, housing and amnesty. The ease of irregular immigration, the text adds, threatens to be the nemesis of them all, from Junts to the **PNV** and the **PSOE**.

## Systemic corruption and negative selection of cadres

The fourth blunder is corruption. The author turns to a cinematic comparison: in **The Godfather**, Vito Corleone knew how to say no to deals that put the family's political protection at risk. Sánchez, by contrast, would have kept his networks happy by allowing the looting of public assets and the conversion of the party into an organised crime outfit. That runaway, systemic corruption, he argues, has allowed the judiciary to enter the party's sewers and safes.

The fifth blunder is the choice of collaborators. The text cites **Machiavelli**, who advised the prince to surround himself with the best talents and to decide on his own. Sánchez, according to the author, never passed that test. His career, he describes, led him to scorn talent and to prefer collaborators who owed him everything. The article mentions **Iván Redondo**, **Diego Rubio**, **Ábalos**, **Koldo**, **Cerdán**, **Bolaños**, **Albares**, **Marichús**, **Leire**, **Begoña Gómez**, **Pumpido**, **Marlaska** and **Robles** as examples of that negative selection.

That negative selection, the text argues, is the result of a strategy the PSOE adopted after **Felipe González**'s defeat. Choosing the worst and subtracting by system leads to zero. The author closes with a warning: the Peter Principle will bring about Sánchez's end, but in the meantime, he says, he keeps piling up poisonous rubbish without end.

## An opinion piece on the end of a cycle

Martínez Gorriarán's article is an opinion piece, not an academic analysis. Its claims about intentions, hidden plans and personal assessments are the author's interpretations, not proven facts. The Peter Principle, by contrast, is a theory formulated in 1969 by Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull that has been debated and qualified by economists and sociologists. Applying it to a specific term in office implies a political judgement that readers may share or not.

What the text does offer is a framework for understanding an argument that recurs in Spanish public debate: the idea that the institutional system lacks sufficient checks on a prime minister with a parliamentary majority and control of the party. That discussion, with varying conclusions, has been on the table for years. The article frames it within a classic administrative theory and uses it to forecast Sánchez's political end. Like any political prediction, it should be taken with caution.