In a referendum where people who wanted to vote "no" didn't show up, because of fears of violence.
This just isn't a reflection of the will of the population.
People did not vote in the referendum because it was not officially recognized as such. Because the Spanish government refused to agree on the terms.
The referendum was a sad exercise of democracy, in which the voice of lots of Catalans was not heard. But it was the only one that could be organized due to the ferocious opposition of the Central Government.
I would prefer the Referendum to be repeated, in better conditions and properly organized, with all parties exposing their arguments, and all citizens interested enough to vote having their voices heard.
Sadly, this might now never happen.
The question of independence is complex enough that warrants a dedicated vote.
And therein lies the problem: 15 years ago the amount of pro-independence was relatively low, but the Central government has refused to take the demands of the Catalan government seriously.
The current political class ruling in Spain is completely overwhelmed on how to deal with a changing society, and the structure of the Spanish State is inflexible, to the point of having to argue that in order for a region to push for the changes they feel they are entitled to, first they need to reform the Constitution, something that is impossible to achieve since the reforms they want to implement are blocked by exactly the same people that would block a reform of the Constitution. Go figure.
It's more like "90% of the people who thought the referendum was legitimate are in favor of independence". There's obviously a big selection bias.
As for the question of whether the referendum was legitimate or not, the problem in my opinion is how can you consider a referendum democratic if only a tiny portion of the country's population gets to take the decision? Catalunia becoming independent would have consequences throughout the country, shouldn't everybody get to vote?
And if not, where do you draw the line? Paris and its region generate about 1/6th of the total GDP of France, what if Parisians decided to declare independence? What about the Lega Nord in Italy? And let's not even talk about the historical economic divide between eastern/western Germany or the variations of GDP between states in the USA.
What if all the rich people in Japan decided to all move to an inhabited island and declare independence with 100% of the vote? Would that be legitimate?
That's a strange argument. Should the other member states of the EU have gotten to vote on Brexit?
So while only UK citizens got to vote on brexit the legal possibility to exit the union was actually approved by all the EU members. If there was an article in the spanish constitution that allowed for a region to secede under certain conditions we wouldn't be having this discussion.
Furthermore the UK always remained a sovereign state, with its own currency, army etc... It's hardly comparable to Catalunya. The scottish referendum would be a better comparison.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_50_of_the_Treaty_on_Eu...
Authority emanates from people, not from papers.
A state constitution must offer a framework which is interesting for all of its peoples and territories: if big groups of people do not see the point of it, it looses its validity.
I hope the Catalans that voted to leave have really good reasons to do it, because if the situation isn't defused somehow, there are some tough times ahead.
It is not clear we are in a modern era.
An EU vote on Brexit would make no sense, as one or more of the countries would have to withdraw from NATO in order for a war to occur. The unlikelihood of war among NATO members is probably one of the reasons why exit procedures exist in the first place--the other notable reason being that some countries never would have joined in the first place, if they thought they would have to fight their way out.
Spain, on the other hand, has apparently never been shy about fighting Spaniards. It might be appropriate for Spain to hold a vote, but only to show Catalonia what it may be up against, and a "no" vote gives the national government a mandate to be brutal. They can, of course, be just as brutal after a "yes" vote, but the propaganda budget would be higher.
No, it might be that, if a war occurred either NATO would cease to exist as a credible alliance or one or more countries would be expelled from it and find themselves at war with it, but certainly withdrawal from NATO isn't a necessary precondition for war.
There are many examples of self determination in 20th and 21st century, and normally only region/area that wants to become independent votes. Most recent example is independence referendum in Scotland. Entire UK did not vote, only Scotland voted.
Spain is going to be left with the choice between letting Catalonia go or attempting to use force to keep them in the state. I don't think Spain is prepared to fight a civil war over this, personally, nor should it. Let them go, keep them in the EU, keep the borders open.
With the EU there, it seems like breakups like this don't need to go any worse than splitting up North and South Carolina, for example.
E.G: there is a strong racism culture among Catalonia independentists, even against other Spaniards. They even invented part of their cultural heritage to sound more credible (look up their "ancestral cultural dance" origin, it is kinda funny). If you want your independence, not alianating the rest of your neighbors for decades can be a good start.
Those events are never unfolding in an instant, but are the consequences of years of complex shenanigans.
Again, nobody is right here. They bkth screw up in many ways.
They won't be automatically in the EU, and actually, this is going to be a serious political problem - the EU will have (rightfully) troubles accepting a country with strong separatist sentiments.
On top of this, it will have very serious financial problems - Catalonia economy may look good in a Spanish context, but compared to the European countries in the mid/upper "class", it's very poor, and will be worse once it will have to pay the administrative bills for setting itself up as a country.
This isn't really a great example, as North and South Carolina weren't really ever a single entity (even when there was a Province of Carolina, North and South Carolina were separate within it). They were both original US states.
that is just false. They did not show up because they did not want the referedum to take place.
> Due to the many irregularities and to the actions taken by the national police and civil guard, the international observers, invited by the Generalitat, declared that the referendum results could not be considered valid as the process failed to meet the minimum international standards for elections.
IMO the Catalan government just lost any legitimacy they might have hoped to have by declaring independence prematurely.
Videos, not so much:
Do you have any links to specific videos?
Really? I didn't see the footage of the Mossos throwing people who weren't in favour of independence down stairs or dragging them around by their hair. Where do I find it?
Thus supporting the case that Catalonia is being dragged down by Spain - even their propaganda machines are better! :D
As presented you appear to stand firmly against democracy, is that so?
If the vote has been carried out properly then there would be a leg to stand on.
You can’t reward people for not voting, that’s just utterly insane.
Not voting in an illegal ballot seems reasonable. The rule of law is a cornerstone of democracy as too are free and fair elections.
For me, 70 out of 135 elected representatives is a more democratic mandate than the referendum. Not a fan of referendums.
Art 1.2 talks of maintaining peace amongst the nation's through respect for "equal rights and self-determination of peoples". To me that puts self-determination below democratic process, reversing them would not respect equal rights.
http://www.un.org/en/sections/un-charter/chapter-i/index.htm...
I don't see why that would be a problem. In fact, we already do that all the time. Look at the voting turnout for a large number of elections. Are you seriously suggesting that >50% of voters have to vote on something (that they may or may not be properly informed about) to make it legitimate?
I generally don't vote on my local school and education laws, because I don't have kids, and don't follow that system enough to be properly informed. My city has a low percentage of parents, so I'm assuming that a lot of other people don't either. If the choice is between everyone voting on stuff that they don't understand, or only those who care enough vote, I'll take the later every time.
Beating up people for trying to put a piece of paper into a box is not "the rule of law".
The rule of law would have been to let people put pieces of paper into boxes, then go out the next day and arrest the organizers of the referendum.
Had they voted for independence anyway, the Spanish government could then refuse to recognize it because it was unconstitutional.
I would not have ordered such action, FWIW.
No. "Police should only beat people as a last resort to keep them from causing direct, immediate bodily harm to others" is not a tough call at all.
Even if having police present was a good idea (it wasn't), they should have had the strictest orders to, you know, not hit people with sticks.
> allowing the referendum to resolve could easily foment more unrest and a greater more violent outcome
You are arguing for punishing people, by causing them physical harm, without court orders, for things others might possibly do in the future. You are arguing for the exact opposite of the rule of law.
If you were voting, supporting voters, etc., you were breaking the law, refusal to stop is contravening the law and the police should then act accordingly, using force if people refuse to stop supporting the vote.
Imagine it was an illegal march of white supremacists in USA, or National Front in UK.
It devolves into violence when people choose to ignored the rule of law and give no other option to maintain the law than to apply violence.
Unless the separatists want to negotiate then violence is literally the only recourse that Spain has to defend its constitution. Perhaps it shouldn't, but anything else is just letting an undemocratic action force an unwanted change.
My understanding is the same. Which is why I wrote above that they should have gone out and actually arrested the separatist leaders who organized all this. This could have played out in the courts (up to the Court of Justice of the European Union, I would guess).
But sending a few thousand (or tens of thousands?) police against millions of voters was not about this. Whatever they thought they were trying to do, it was not possible with these numbers. And as far as I can tell, they did not try to arrest people. They did not try to get people's personal data to get them before of a court at some other point. They did not show up in time to simply barricade the doors of polling stations. In short, they were not enforcing or upholding the law in any meaningful sense.
The people who wanted the referendum to go through were motivated to show up despite the violence. Because they believed in their cause.
So no, the "yes" voters were likely not discouraged from showing up. Or, the "soft" yes votes were discouraged.
Can we get a do-over on those?
A referendum conventionally happens country wide, surveying a % of the whole population. Not in a self-selected population subset.
Otherwise there's this icky question of what subset, what "social unit", is allowed to claim independence? Spain? Catalunya only? Barcelona only? La Rambla? Jose down the street, as an individual, in his own referendum-of-one?
This ad-absurdum may sound extreme, but there's really no fundamental difference there. The government astutely identified this as a "slippery slope", with brute power as the primary differentiator in practice.
The new Catalan government (or any other government) may find itself presented with the same question, in the future. The writing is on the wall, in this all-or-nothing, binary age (cf. libertarians).
In the recent Scottish independence referendum, resident Scottish people voted.
I'm against the violence and I think that the independence of a region is something morally right, but I don't consider that the referendum 1-O legitimizes that the Govern of Catalunya declares the independence of Catalunya in an unilateral manner. I think the Catalan Govern is cheating in its own benefit.
- no threats to non pro-spain - more time before actual vote so people had time to actually come
a rushed vote is bad
- Sure, but it's kinda hard to have an orderly vote when you have the National Guard descending on you and trying to stop it.
It's true Spain did wrong too.
This is not true.