48 (out of 75) MPs voted in favor of a declaration that states the right of Euskal Herria (Basque Country, Basque Nation and/or Basque People) to self-determination.
The bill states that Basques are fully entitled to decide their "political, economic, social and cultural status, either establishing their own political frame or sharing, totally or partially, their sovereignty with other peoples".
The bill was voted for by both independentist groups (EAJ-PNV and EH Bildu) and against by the three unionist parties (PSOE, PP and UPyD). The nearly 2/3 majority enjoyed by the independentists is negatively slanted by the equal representation of the three regions (provinces) that favors Araba, the least populated one but also where the unionists get their best results. In any case, the unionist parties have been performing extremely poorly in the last European elections and therefore it is expected by all that the independentist majority will grow in the 2015-16 elections, not just in the Western Basque Country but also in Navarre, where a turnover is almost certain to happen as soon as there are elections because people are totally fed-up with the unionist corruption and sell-off of public properties to banksters and the Catholic Church.
The main obstacle to actual self-determination is the legal and military opposition of the occupant power, Spain, as well as the calculated ambiguity of the conservative EAJ-PNV, which talks of independence but does nothing about it.
Source: Naiz Info.
I'm curious - is there any discussion/consensus on what the terms of a referendum would be? And what the what the terms of secession would be?
ReplyDeleteNo. Because the residual empire is not going to allow the secession. So far it's just posturing: demonstrating that the votes say that we have that right. I guess that as the Spanish post-Franco system disintegrates, as will surely happen within half a decade or so, as Navarre experiences the unavoidable political change, as Catalonia moves in their own path of self-determination, as most likely self-rule demands also grow in other nations with somewhat less clearly defined personality like Andalusia, Galicia and Aragon, as a new generation of Left wing leaders and activists replace the old mummies from the Franco and Stalin era... the whole state will be revamped into a federation Yugoslavia style, with formal recognition of the right to self-determination.
DeleteThen much will depend on how the health of the US Empire is because neither Washington nor its European satellites are probably willing to see a federative Red Spain nor a disintegrated one either. Spain is still strategically relevant for the USA (Rota, Morón, Canary Is.), France and Britain.
The game is European and it is admittedly unlikely that an Iberian Revolution will happen easily, unless a European one is also going on simultaneously.
So complicated. But this side of the border it looks much more hopeful than North of the Bidasoa, where the Nazis are threatening the very essence of European identity: freedom.
It's a bit surprising from my standpoint as all federal and provincial parties in Quebec agree on some basic level on self-determination. There are disagreements on the specifics of course. You'd think unionists would want to peel away "soft" nationalist votes.
DeleteIn Britain too: domesticate a conflict before it escalates and what better way than accepting the essence of the demands, in order to fight or manage them through the social fabric.
DeleteBut Spain is of the French school of state as many other states of Europe and beyond. And in these systems no nation is recognized other than the one of the state. Spain or Italy, and even France in cases like Corsica, allow some limited self-rule to "nationalities" (stateless nations) but in essence they are as uniform, "rational" and authoritarian as the Napoleonic system that inspired all them. L'êtat c'est... l'êtat même.
There's no peaceful way to divide them according to the will of its subject peoples. The right to self-determination (not just as independence but in general terms of self-rule that satisfies the peoples' needs at all levels) is the difference between a subject nation and a citizen nation. Any command must emanate and be controlled from below, only that way societies can be as harmonic as possible through continuous participative micro-adjustments.
Democracy = flexibility = long term survival.
Hence authoritarian centralist states as Spain are doomed to be unstable and therefore weak. As I mentioned some time: does Britain fear for Gibraltar or the USA for Morón and Rota? Just arm all the would-be-rebels out there and defeat Madrid without effort.
Spain is a failed state just awaiting its collapse. It depends 200% of its "allies": France, Britain and very especially the USA. It is a vassal because it is internally weak in many fronts, not just the ethno-political one but socio-economically too: too much caciquismo, corruption, discredit of the state itself, growing poverty, the poor paying for the rich... all with the blessing of the EU and the IMF.
It will explode, although not sure when and how will it peak, I'd say it is already exploding at low speed. It's like a volcano with a rocky top that slows its eruption, so when it finally comes it is catastrophic. In many senses this applies to all EU. And the process of breakup and collapse will come together with that of EU (and surely NATO and its European militarist imperial order).
It's a little bit ironic for Britain to take the moral position now after failing to take it in so many other instances in its history as an empire, and given their status as a highly centralized unitary state. Better late than never.
DeleteAgreed completely re: self determination being important to the long-term survival of the state. I deeply believe that it's in everyone's interests to find a way for multi-ethnic and multi-national states to work to everyone's satisfaction, but that's only going to happen if those states are based on mutual consent and mutual respect, not force or the threat of force.
I would hope that the decline of the Parti Québécois and Bloc Québécois suggest that Canada has been moving in the right direction on making the country work for everyone, though I suspect that a lot of that decline in support has as much to do with sheer incompetence on the part of the PQ and Bloc as anything else. The Bloc just picked a new leader, and in his first speech he managed to attack all the leaders that came before him before quoting the motto of the FLQ. They (like their PQ cousins) have fallen to third even among Francophones, and they're at or below 4% among non-Francophones. And they deserve it. Frankly I think René Lévesque, as someone who was present at the liberation of Dachau, would be appalled at the direction the party he founded has turned with respect to immigrants and ethnic and religious minorities.