An Independent Catalunya?

This coming Sunday, 27 September 2015, the parliamentary elections in Catalonia/Catalunya are being billed as a referendum on Catalonia's independence from Spain. The Spanish government has ruled out holding a referendum on the issue, so the parties in the parliamentary election have decided that the main issue on the agenda should be independence.

The election takes place just a year after Scotland voted not to break away from the UK, and there are similarities. Scotland and Catalonia both have their own history, their own language, their own myths and their own loyalties. The capital of Catalunya- Barcelona- was the focal point for the Republican movement during the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) and to this day the two biggest football teams in Spain are often linked, in the case of Barcelona to the Republican movement, in the case of Real Madrid to Franco and the Monarchy.

The interesting result of polls suggests that while many Catalans are fed up with distant and indifferent Madrid, and while independence has a nice ring to it, only a minority want to leave Spain and the EU, rather like those Scots for whom independence from London did not mean leaving the EU.

The vote comes at a time when the European Union is facing more internal conflict than I can remember since the UK became a member in 1973. The crisis over immigration is one factor, the poor performance of the Euro is another, while the debt-management issue in Greece and the dominance of Germany in decision-making has alienated many people who probably never gave the EU much real thought.

As with Scotland, the other theme is the 'little man against the machine' in this case a small state that doesn't want to be a district of the European or the global economy, but doesn't want to impoverish itself either. How this conumdrum can be squared with independence is no clearer in the case of Catalunya than it was -and still is- with Scotland.

Interesting times...

Links to the story are here:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...pendence-spain

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalo...election,_2015

:geek:Thanks Stavros , ancient Chinese curse ? ... 'May you live in interesting times'

Or the more challenging agenda supplied by Bob Dylan in The times they are a-changin'?

With most of the results now declared, the vote in Catalonia has proved to be inconclusive. In party terms, the Parliament may now be dominated by parties who seek independence -they have 72 seats in a chamber where 68 counts as a majority- but in terms of the percentage of the vote, the independence parties polled 47.9% of the vote, which would not have been enough in a Referendum where a minimum vote of 50% plus one seat is required for victory. This result is not so different from the referendum in Scotland in 2014 where the nationalists claim to have won the argument but not the poll, something they believe their subsequent election victory in 2015 proved.

In Catalonia, there is more than one independence party, and more than one way of dealing with this -some want an immediate declaration of independence, others think this is the wrong tactic. Madrid has said it is not going to happen, but as with London -vs-Scotland, there may be in time more concessions, on tax, for example, to dampen the independence movement.

So an inconclusive vote that maintains the tensions between Catalunya and Spain.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...-for-breakaway

It has been quite depressing to see the reports of the weekend's events in Catalunya, but I fear they were predictable. I am not sure what the nationalists think they were going to achieve with their referendum, and it remains to be seen if the violence over the weekend has won or lost them more support than they had.

The referendum itself was a flop, the 90% vote in favour of independence was won on a turn-out of 43% of the registered voters, so that numerically it remains the case that most Catalans do not want independence from Spain. The problem is that the nationalists think they can force the option and do so maximising confrontation yet the Constitution of Spain makes secession all but impossible. Moreover, when the first post-Franco Constitution was approved in 1978 90% of voters in Catalunya approved. Fair enough, that was nearly 40 years ago and since then Spain has joined the EU and life has changed. The only way Catalunya could become independent, as I see it would be through a Constitutional Amendment, designed especially for Catalunya, or more broadly for Spain, but that would offer Basque militants their own opportunity to revive their nationalist dreams, and for that reason be both unpopular and unlikely to get through Parliament.

Nationalism is a curse, it creates more trouble than it is worth, yet it is used a solution to problems that lie elsewhere -an independent Catalunya makes sense to nationalists who cannot think outside their box, yet one wonders if they are even aware of the problems mounting for the UK preparing to leave the EU, and cannot see beyond their flag to appreciate the burdens rather than the benefits of independence. Yes, there has always been a vibrant opposition to Madrid in Catalunya, a sense of difference, a glorious culture, a rebel heart. But sometimes, dare I say it, parts of a whole are 'better together' than miserable apart.

https://www.economist.com/blogs/econ...st-explains-17

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...n-independence

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Stavros

Yes, there has always been a vibrant opposition to Madrid in Catalunya, a sense of difference, a glorious culture, a rebel heart. But sometimes, dare I say it, parts of a whole are 'better together' than miserable apart.

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It may not be rational for small regions to be independent, but most people are not ruled by reason alone and it is often better to find reasonable ways to accommodate strong emotions rather than to stubbornly resist them. From what I've read it looks like the central government has been excessively heavy-handed in its response. Presumably a reasonable compromise might be to allow greater regional autonomy, similar to Scotland.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by filghy2

It may not be rational for small regions to be independent, but most people are not ruled by reason alone and it is often better to find reasonable ways to accommodate strong emotions rather than to stubbornly resist them. From what I've read it looks like the central government has been excessively heavy-handed in its response. Presumably a reasonable compromise might be to allow greater regional autonomy, similar to Scotland.

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I agree, as the government in Madrid could have just let the referendum go ahead and ignored it, as it has no legal standing, so they did not come out of this looking good. The analogy with Scotland is a difficult one, because the Act of Union in 1707 preserved elements of Scotland's separate identity that continue to this day, such as a separate legal and education system, and the right to print its own currency (though the value of the Scottish Pound is the same as the Pound Sterling and banknotes can be legally used both sides of the border). The Act of Union also did not ban the use of either Scots or Scottish Gaelic, whereas Franco banned Catalan. The relationship between Catalunya and the 'rest of Spain' or perhaps more potently the Monarchy-Dictatorship-Government in Madrid has been more problematic and toxic than Scotland's relationship with England. By contrast, Catalunya has its own education system, and its own police force, but does not have a separate legal system. It has its own Parliament, but cannot pass laws that violate the Spanish Constitution, even though that is precisely what the nationalists have been trying to do. My feeling is that Catalans enjoy the fact that they are 'different' from the rest of Spain (but Spain has regional differences anyway), but the majority want to leave it at that and not go it alone, but who knows how this will develop, or deteriorate over the next 5 years? Sometimes it is a weakness in central government and its (mis-)management of the economy that provokes change.

Carles Puigdemont will be making a statement in the Catalan Parliament tomorrow (Tuesday 10/10/2017) at 6pm local time. There had been speculation that Puigdemont would take Span and Catalonia to the brink by making a unilateral declaration of independence, but it may not be a 'symbolic' utterance as Puigdemot comes under pressure from his own party-

The Catalan president is being urged by senior party colleagues to back down from making a unilateral declaration of independence on Tuesday, as regional companies and the international community call for efforts to ease tensions with Madrid after the secession referendum.
https://www.ft.com/content/ae1fca4c-...1e130?mhq5j=e7

It is still possible the nationalists could go over the line, so tomorrow could be a day of destiny for Catalonia and Spain, but would not resolve the problematic relationship. One assumes that an agreement to enter 'negotiations' with Madrid could follow, even if it is not clear what they would talk about, given that Constitutional reform requires the agreement of all of Spain's regions which blocks the very constitutional change that Catalunya seeks.

Carles Puigdemont has conceded the need for talks with the Spanish government, and not declared independence. I don't know if this is pragmatism, a humiliating climbdown, or just a temporary pause in the nationalist campaign. But it does reduce the tension for the time being and is a welcome development.

As Harold Wilson said, A week is a long time in politics, and by refusing to withdraw Catalunya's claim to be an independent state, the Spanish government has decided this is a threat to the integrity of Spain, is illegal, and has moved to replace the Catalan provincial government with direct rule from Madrid, a decision that Spain's Senate must make this week. This will undoubtedly create more tensions and it is not clear how effective direct rule will be, but amidst all the talk of both sides deciding on the edge of a cliff to jump and then see what happens when they crash to the ground there is the intriguing point made by the Irish writer Colm Toibin on the BBC this lunchtime -it may just be a ruse by Puigdemont to force Madrid to negotiate more autonomy for the province, in return for which he will retain independence as 'an aspiration' rather than an urgent item on the agenda, much as Nicola Sturgeon in Scotland retains the long-term ambition to break way from the UK while doing nothing about it.

Mariano Rajoy, however, is not famous for compromising on principles, and he has the backing of most of Spain. His preferred option are regional elections to undermine the authority of Catalan nationalists, a gamble if the confrontational antics of the Spanish government increases their vote. On the other hand with banks and businesses indicating they would abandon Catalunya, with tourism down, it may be that even if Puigdemont gets his increased autonomy -and that is not certain- it will have been secured at a high price.