johnsteward

As it would take hours to complete the above view with references that support (e.g. Pujol's corruption) and reject (e.g. what motivated Franco's coup d'etat), I would like to notify any readers of the above post that it cannot be taken at face value, as it is a highly selective, and in some points plain wrong, reading of the last 200 years of Spanish history.

The democracy index for Spain has been on the free fall for some years now. Whether Spain will return to a democratic approach to resolving civic and political issues rather than the current authoritarian approach that curtails civil freedoms for all Spaniards--not just Catalans--remains to be seen.

As for Tsunami Democratic, I'm afraid news reports haven't been fair. The disorders and criminal activities--which by the way the Spanish courts are labeling as "terrorism" despite any evidence--have been, by and large, carried out by infiltrated police agents. There is plenty of video footage online demonstrating case after case of police agents dressed as demonstrators, emerging from police vans in a side alley, joining a demonstration and engaging in deplorable behavior.

Catalonia isn't the richest region of Spain anymore. The separate identity emerges from a distinct latinic language--Catalan--, and a history of past independence.

The perceived lack of respect by Spanish authorities of Catalan culture is a major issue. The fact that militarized Spanish police--the "guardia civil"--ignore Catalan law (which is part of Spanish law) when it comes to e.g. the use of rubber bullets (forbidden in Catalonia) against demonstrators isn't helping. The judiciary branch not prosecuting these illegal acts only adds further tension. And the right-wing Spaniards displaying Franco-era national flags with the black eagle--illegal in Spain--in their demonstrations, all the while taking selfies with on-duty civil guards only comes to show that the Spanish institutions, judiciary, executive, legislative and the military have already taken sides, and will ignore their own law to preserve the unity of the territory, even if that means dismantling the democratic foundations of the state.

An interesting issue in the eventual independence of Catalonia is that, by law, Spanish citizens remain Spanish even if they are also citizens of another country. Therefore Catalans would not lose their Spanish passports, and would be therefore EU members, even if Catalonia was independent from Spain. And the children of Spanish citizens are by law also Spanish citizens. The strange case of a non-EU nation with 100% EU citizens in it would be an interesting development in geopolitics.