Andrew Dowling - The Rise of Catalan Independence: Spains Territorial Crisis

As recently as the mid-2000s, Catalonia was described and analysed by scholars as exhibiting a non-secessionist nationalism and was seen within Europe and beyond as a role model for successful devolution which had much to teach other parts of the world. The Spanish state seemed to be on a journey towards an authentic federal order and was generally admired. However, the new century has been marked by an ever-growing independence movement, with 47.8 per cent of Catalonia voting in favour of independence in September 2015. Pro-independence mobilization has produced a rupture in political relations with the rest of Spain leading to a sovereignty struggle with Madrid.

This book explores how an accumulation of long-, medium- and short-term factors have produced the current situation and why the Spanish territorial model has been unable or possibly, unwilling, to respond. The Catalan question is not purely a Spanish problem: it has direct implications for the traditional nation-state model, in Europe and beyond.

Andrew Dowling is a Senior Lecturer in Hispanic Studies at Cardiff University. He has previously written Catalonia since the Spanish Civil War: Reconstructing the Nation (2012), which was published in Catalan as La Reconstrucci Nacional de Catalunya, 19392012 (2013).

Series Editor: Soren Dosenrode

The end of the Cold War profoundly altered the dynamics between and within the various states in Europe and the rest of the World, resulting in a resurgence of interest in the concept of federalism. This shift in balance has been further fuelled by the increase in the number of conflicts arising from the disaffection of the diverse ethnic or religious minorities residing within these states (e.g. Sudan, Iraq). Globalisation is forcing governments not only to work together, but also to reconsider their internal roles as guarantors of economic growth, with regions playing the major part. Federalism Studies offers academics a complete and in-depth understanding of federalism and intergovernmental relations in historical, theoretical and comparative contexts. Intended to be international and interdisciplinary in scope, the books in the series are designed to build a common framework for the constructive analysis of federalism. Contributions are welcome on topics that explore federalism as a theory, as a political system and as a form of conflict management.

For a full list of titles in this series, please visit: https://www.routledge.com/Federalism-Studies/book-series/ASHSER1258

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Experiences, Debates and Prospects

Ethnicity, Ideology and Democracy in Ethiopia

Spains Territorial Crisis

Spains Territorial Crisis

First published 2018

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2018 Andrew Dowling

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ISBN: 978-1-4724-5984-8 (hbk)

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ANC, Assemblea Nacional Catalana (Catalan National Assembly) pro- independence campaigning organisation, founded 2011

Catalunya en Com (Catalonia in Common), broad left coalition founded in 2017, usually known as Comuns

CDC, Convergncia Democrtica de Catalunya (Democratic Convergence of Catalonia), nationalist party founded by Jordi Pujol, dissolved in 2016

CiU, Convergncia i Uni (Convergence and Union) centre-right nationalist coalition of CDC and UDC

Ciutadans, (Citizens), pro-Spanish nationalist Catalan party

CUP, Candidatura dUnitat Popular (Popular Unity Candidature), radical left pro-independence party

ERC, Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (Republican Left of Catalonia) centre-left Catalanist party, after 1989, pro-independence

IC-V, Iniciativa per Catalunya-Els Verds (Initiative for Catalonia-The Greens), eco-socialist party, incorporated into the Comuns in 2017

mnium Cultural, organisation founded in 1961 to defend and promote Catalan culture

Plataforma per Dret de Decidir (Platform for the Right to Decide), pro- sovereignty organisation active between 2005 and 2010

PNV, Partido Nacionalista Vasco (Basque Nationalist Party)

PP, Partido Popular (Popular Party), Spains conservative party

PSC, Partit dels Socialistes de Catalunya (Socialist Party of Catalonia), principal post-Franco social democratic party, federated to the PSOE

PSOE, Partido Socialista Obrero Espaol (Spanish Socialist Workers Party), principal Spanish social democratic party

UCD, Unin del Centro Democrtico (Union of the Democratic Centre), Spains main conservative party 19771982

UDC, Uni Democrtica de Catalunya (Democratic Union of Catalonia), historic Christian Democratic Catalanist party, dissolved in 2017

The economic crisis that began in 2008 has had a profound impact on European and other societies. Political responses have ranged from the convulsions of Greece to Britains referendum to leave the European Union. Spain has been in one sense a place that has experienced a scale of responses given its own internal dynamics and semi-federal political system. The economic crisis in Spain has greatly challenged the relatively stable political order that emerged in the mid-1970s following the transition from the Franco dictatorship. Whilst traditional class and religious cultures have declined and fragmented in contemporary Spain, conflicts over national identity remain unresolved, with the current Spanish state order subject to profound challenge by Catalan secessionists. The economic crisis has given impetus to forms of nationalist mobilisation with Scotland, Catalonia and Flanders experiencing secessionist pressures. Catalonia has been the epicentre of Spains crisis. A historically rich region with a profound sense of national and cultural identity, Catalonia has embraced secession as the potential solution to an accumulation of grievances. With the dramatic impact produced by the economic crisis, societies across Europe have sought a form of defence through the embrace of variants of nationalism, which in some cases has elided into xenophobia. All expressions of the variants of nationalist ideology have been visible: from anti-immigrant sentiment and rancid populism to the rejection of economic solidarity, for example, with Germany and the Greek bailout. Difficult economic times have combined with a profound psychological need to protect ones own (however defined) first. There has been then a nativist wave coursing through European societies, including its most mature parliamentary democracies. Social class, or traditional working-class solidarity movements have mostly been unable to compete with movements that posit the defence of the nation, of identity and the national before other variables. The north/south divide in Europe has accentuated as grievances mounted over richer areas having to bail out wasteful southerners. This north/south fracture has been mirrored to some extent between Catalonia and Andalusia.