Secession is dynamite. And the
Catalonian separatists are playing with fire. Other Spanish regions
may want to take on the challenge to go it alone, and not only the
Basque country. In France there is the Catalonian region of
Languedoc, just across the border from Spanish Catalonia. There is
unrest in Corsica. Italy struggles with numerous calls for a
referendum on devolution. Several other European countries have
latent nationalisms to cope with, the Belgian case possibly
beyond repair. All have the potential to shake the present European
interstate order, which rests on the assumption that borders are
sacred and not to be altered, except by negotiation and mutual
agreement. That is why the separation of Czechia and Slovakia was no
problem, nor was the Scottish case, since that referendum was
previously agreed with the UK government. Northern Ireland and former
Yugoslavia illustrate the complexities.
The Catalonian parliament unilaterally
declared independence for Catalonia in late October. Early regional
elections for Catalonia are now taking place on December 21, ordered
by the central government in Madrid as part of their response to the
Catalonian rebellion. The central government has taken a moderate
approach, after the unfortunate turn of events on October 1st.
Although court cases are underway against the leaders of that
movement, the independence parties will participate in the elections
again this time around. After three weeks of campaigning, with some
of the leading figures in jail, others in self-imposed exile, the two
sides, pro- and anti-secession, appear – incredibly - to be as
before, neck and neck. Note that I am not counting the illegal
referendum results, which were utterly unreliable, since voters knew
far ahead of time that they would be breaking the law by trying to
vote, and the conditions surrounding the vote were marked by unruly
mobs and nervous police. The results to compare with are rather those
of the regional elections in Catalonia in 2015, when the separatist
parties gained 47% of the vote and got the slimmest of majorities
(just one seat) in the parliament. On that shaky basis they formed
the government which forged ahead to create an independent state,
with or without the blessing of Madrid.
At this very sensitive moment, the
first hurdle once the polls close is to have the results verified and
legitimated. Any reduced support for the separatists will meet
another test in the streets, with demands that votes be recounted by
"neutral parties", in other words not by Madrid.
The second hurdle is to establish a
government with a majority in parliament. Should the unionists win,
their problem will be how to reintegrate the region, psychologically,
socially and emotionally. Years of indoctrination by nationalists,
entering all corners of daily life, will make this a chore more for
generations than for electoral periods. Should the separatists win,
we must brace ourselves for a continuation of the previous process of
demanding independence. Some smartness might help the secessionists
if they refrain from going it alone and open the door for dialogue.
Madrid's most difficult challenge in this case will be to talk them
back from the ultimate move and settle for something less. Use of
force is not always avoidable in Spain, but the government in Madrid
appear to have understood the seriousness of international reactions
to October 1st, regardless of how ill informed those
reactions may have been.
That leads me to the third challenge,
which is for all of the media observers to learn more about the
basics of the Catalonian conflict and not jump to conclusions about
who is to blame. The level of tendentious reporting in
leading western news media outside Spain this fall has been baffling.
Several international media have apparently decided to side with the
rebels. The Guardian has had several very biased stories, but
rectified that with a few recent inputs, excellent among them Peter
Preston's lament on the difficulty of reporting fairly. (Peter Preston, the Guardian Dec. 10, 2017) The New York Times ran an editorial that fell for the claimed 92% for
independence in the October 1st illegal referendum,
arguing that with such support one would have to take the separatists
seriously, thus forgetting the other half of the electorate who did
not vote. The Washington Post more recently published an op-ed with a
poisonous rendering of the role of Madrid. Politico gave the jailed
vice president of the defunct government, Oriol Junqueras, a front
page article with a blazing headline (in politico.eu, the European
edition of the US web journal Politico). Screaming at the
reader, the imprisoned vice-president signals his approach to
democracy: “We can’t trust Madrid to oversee Catalonia’s
election — the EU must step in”.
In assessing this situation, some
degree of reasonableness needs to enter into the evaluation. I close
by recommending a rare and concise assessment by Quartz Media.
No, Catalonia won't go away just yet.
And secession is not a "right". (See my previous blogs.)
