Beyond Catalonia: pro-independence movements in Europe
August 11, 2021
Tag: European Union
Catalans Can’t Stand Up to Brussels by Themselves
August 11, 2021
The European Union requires some sort of counterbalance, which depends on states the size of Spain.
Never in its history has Europe been kinder to its little tribes clamoring for their own little desks in Brussels and at the United Nations. Mr. Rajoy was accused of harshly suppressing the illegal “referendum,” in which a minority of Catalans cast ballots in favor of independence. Nearly 900 people were injured in scuffles with police.
But if you want harsh, the Irish could tell you a thing or two about how Europe used to treat separatists. The Dutch had to war with the Spanish for 80 years to secure their independence from the Hapsburgs in the 16th and 17th centuries. A violent separatist cause and the violent counterreaction catalyzed the war that nearly destroyed Europe starting in 1914.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/catalans-cant-stand-up-to-brussels-by-themselves-1507847142?mod=e2tw
‘Against supranationalism: in defence of national sovereignty (and Brexit)’
August 11, 2021
The repercussions of the post-national ideology that (re-)emerged in the 1980s, and then became all-pervasive in the 1990s and 2000s, are still being felt today. Conventional wisdom holds that that globalisation and the internationalisation of finance has ended the era of nation-states and their capacity to pursue policies that are not in accord with the diktats of global capital. But does the evidence support the assertion that national sovereignty, which so often throughout the twentieth century has been wrongly proclaimed dead, has truly reached the end of its days?
An IB Global Politics Site 