That during the 19C there was much more semi-democracy with strong authoritarian governments in Europe, cracking down on what we would call democracy (1816,1848 etc)
The point was that it is fairly easy to slip back.
First of all a country's constitution is sacrosanct and that constitution not only gives the people their power to vote, but also says that the country's territory is indivisible.
If the Catalan people want to change that, then the referendum should involve all of Spain's citizens, having as much rights at this point over Catalonia, as the people living there.
I've said it repeatedly here, so here it is again: I'm getting the feeling that people don't know what a democracy is.
A democracy isn't only about the freedom to vote. What happened in Turkey for example isn't democracy, even if a majority is in support of the current administration. The right to vote means nothing without liberal freedoms or without the indivisibility of the territory.
In other words, you can't have an "independence" referendum without involving all the citizens. That's not democracy, but a war declaration.
The Spanish constitution recognizes the right to self-determination inasmuch as it explicitly enshrines the international treaties that define it.
Spain has always defended that this right to self-determination is confined to colonies because it would otherwise conflict with the also very important principle of territorial integrity. However, the International Court of Justice explained in its Advisory Opinion of 22 July 2010 regarding the case of Kosovo that “the scope of the principle of territorial integrity is confined to the sphere of relations between States”. Thus, even unilateral declarations of independence do not conflict with the aforementioned principle: “general international law contains no applicable prohibition of declarations of independence“.
In this case, the right for self-determination is for Spain, not for a part of Spain.
The political parties promoting independence represent less citizens than the political parties that want Catalonia to be part of Spain.
Woah now, that's an absolutely insane statement you just made. Actually, it's two absolutely insane statements.
There is nothing that says you have to have one particular set of rights before it counts as "democracy". The EU goes nowhere near as far as the US on some "liberal freedoms" (try supporting the Nazi Party in Germany and see where it gets you - being the most obvious example). They go much farther than the US does on some other ones. Which one of us is not a democracy in this situation?
Also, there's nothing that says a territory must necessarily be indivisible. Scotland independence, Puerto Rico independence (or statehood), and Catalan independence are all perennial issues. Hell, we literally just had the whole Brexit vote a year ago. There is no reason that any particular unit of government has a self-evident right to exist. They exist to serve their people! And in fact it would probably be better if we rearranged them more often - the US states are very unbalanced in many respects and it might be better if we rearranged them into equal populations and geographies that made a little more sense (this will never happen of course).
Legitimacy derives from the consent of the governed, and nothing else. If it doesn't work, there should absolutely be a right to dissolve it and reform another government. Or in other words: "when in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another..."
Fan-bloody-tastic
You are just saying that if Catalonia wants independence they have to go to war and win it, because the Constitutions says the country is indivisible. Maybe you want the USA reintegrated into the UK, because british citizens didn't vote for the secession.
> The right to vote means nothing without liberal freedoms or without the indivisibility of the territory.
I see the point of liberal freedoms, but care to explain, why the right to vote means nothing, if there is independence?
And if so, why is the Guardia Civil not in Western Sahara, if indivisibility such a supreme good?
At the time that was warned to be a dangerous precedent, and here we are.
On a purely practical level, by cracking down on the vote, they only ensure its outcome. See if it passes and then strike down the resulting legal structure in a higher court, at the very least. The constitution of every divided country has measures to deal with these, and the first step is never "cracking skulls."
The value of freedom of speech is very weak in spain...
Indeed.
https://twitter.com/CataloniaHelp2/status/914131859654639616
What do you mean with it, in this context?
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/canary_in_a_coal_mine
> What do you mean with it, in this context?
The pouplar reason given for the anti-success taxation, is that its fair. Because they agreed to the social contract. But its highly disputed by those taxpayers. Such disputes are canary/early-signs of fair/subjective contracts. Catalonians vs Spaniards is the other.
I am not really a good writer. I hope that clears it up. If not just ask.