Catalonia has declared its independence from Spain, at least its elected parliament has done so.
Without any doubt the Spaniards are mobilizing all available options to maintain their national integrity. While it may seem like an internal matter of Spain and that of Europe its reverberation will go far and wide.
The reason for the Split
Catalans’demand for separation got bigger with the Greeko-Spanish meltdown in 2012. The Eurozone turmoil destroyed much of Spanish economy and ushered an era of bailouts. The Catalan region, which always had a cultural identity distinct from Spain, discovered that is was them who were the most profitable province and that they were carrying weight of an entire region. Basically Barcelona thinks it subsidies Madrid, and that it can be better off without having to pay central taxes.
The nationalistic fervors attached to the movement are about the mishandling of the crisis by Madrid and can still be resolved by the diplomatic moves.
The question before Europe
Watch here the Spanish president’s response to independence declaration in Catalonia ➡️https://t.co/Lu70YsFnfp. pic.twitter.com/YqsP7AgXIp
— Catalan News (@catalannews) October 27, 2017
Normally a region cries for independence because it has been on the receiving end of exploitation. This usually gives a very clear agenda to ‘free nations’ to intervene and carve out new nations, Kosovo being a case in point.
Catalonia, however, is a different preposition. The region is among the best in all development indices with no discrimination or exploitation whatsoever from the leaders from Madrid. The logic that ‘we crave independence, we are not given, so we must have it’ is hardly acceptable to any same person, at least not without challenging the very foundation of nation states.
The Spanish will intervene in Barcelona and they will do so without any second thoughts of the progress the region has made into stability. As i write this old lessons from the Basque Insurgency are being dusted and the agencies being prepared to manage the worst.
Main measures adopted:
Removal of the President, Vicepresident & Consellers of the Generalitat de Catalunya
Elections in Catalonia on 21/12 pic.twitter.com/bsGg6oe0rl— SpainMFA 🇪🇸 (@SpainMFA) October 27, 2017
The best Europe can do is to watch a victor emerge in the conflict and hope that it does not degenerates into a bloody nightmare. It will make political sense to maintain the political integrity of Spain but the moral cost of downplaying a revolution will immense.
The next step for the Catalonia
There are none. By declaring independence the Catalans have played their last hand and all negotiable instruments are off the table. Now they await intervention from the central government and take over of local institutions. Beyond this Spain will move swiftly to ensure that the cost of the association with the movement becomes high enough and that the populace gets tired of it. At this point the movement will degenerate into a armed insurgency or will dissipate to await another leader for a revival.
At any rate this is one paraphrase in world history that was avoidable and totally unnecessary .
