The Spanish government insists that the vote is unconstitutional and that it's willing to negotiate on anything other than independence. It's also opened up investigations against 712 Catalan mayors for supporting the referendum. This hasn't stopped some of the population from proudly showing their support for the vote, however, as tens of thousands of people have rallied across the region for it to be held. It was only about three years ago that Catalonia had its last independence referendum where 80% of voters opted to separate from Spain, though bearing in mind that this only represented an estimated 37-41% of the population.
Catalonia's political leaders have channeled their region's sense of identity separateness in the direction of independence in recent years, capitalizing on the populist appeal to economic nationalism in arguing that their disproportionate contribution to the national budget is unjust and therefore legitimate grounds for splitting from Spain. The economic situation in the nominal Kingdom has been in the doldrums for some time already, and though reports indicate that it's finally begun to recover from the global recession, it probably wouldn't be able to withstand the systemic shock of losing nearly a fifth of its GDP if Catalonia leaves. Moreover, Spain has been struggling to contain separatist sentiment in other parts of the country too, and Catalonia's potential secession could trigger a chain reaction from other regions to go their own way as well, especially if they're convinced that they could do better on their own than remaining within the floundering state.
The so-called "Balkanization" of the Iberian Peninsula could therefore lead to unpredictable consequences in that part of Europe and beyond, but Catalonia is more of a symptom than a cause of this fragmentation trend. Whether it's sub-state separatism such as what Scotland's been trying to pull off with the UK and some forces in Northern Italy have historically advocated for, or superstate separatism such as Brexit and the earlier proposal for a Grexit, European unity is fraying like never before, and Catalonia's upcoming vote might just prove to be the catalyst which reinvigorates this continental trend with a new inertia.
Miquel Puertas, Lecturer and blogger from Barcelona working at Donetsk National Technical University, and Enrique R. Acedo, Spanish-based geopolitical observer, from history to leadership, and writer for Geopolitica.Ru, join the discussion.
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