TY - JOUR
T1 - Justifying secession in catalonia
T2 - Resolving grievances or a means to a better future?
AU - Elias, Anwen
AU - Franco‐guillén, Núria
N1 - Funding Information:
This research has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation pro‐ gramme under grant agreement no 726950. This arti‐ cle reflects only the authors’ views and the European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains.
Funding Information:
Núria Franco‐Guillén is a post‐doctoral fellow at the Department of International Politics (Aberystwyth University) and a member of the Interdisciplinary Research Group on Immigration (Universitat Pompeu Fabra). Her research has focused on immigration discourses in stateless nations, deliberative democ‐ racy, and regionalist movements’ framing of their territorial demands. Her current work focuses on grassroots engagement with debates about secession (project funded by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council).
Funding Information:
Anwen Elias is a reader in politics at the Department of International Politics, Aberystwyth University. Her research interests are comparative territorial politics and regionalist and secessionist movements in Europe. She is currently leading projects on regionalist movements’ framing of their territorial demands (funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 programme) and grassroots engagement with debates about secession (funded by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 by the authors; licensee Cogitatio (Lisbon, Portugal). This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY).
PY - 2021/12/10
Y1 - 2021/12/10
N2 - This article advances understandings of secessionist strategies by examining how and why secessionist movements make the case for creating a new sovereign state. It draws on new empirical data to examine the ways in which pro‐independence parties in Catalonia have justified their calls for the creation of an independent Catalan Republic between 2008 and 2018. The findings challenge the widespread scholarly assumption that secessionist mobilisation is underpinned by grievances— cultural, economic, and political—against the state. We find that arguments for an independent Catalonia rarely include cultural claims. Instead, independence is advocated as a way of resolving political and economic grievances and of creating a better, more democratic, and just Catalan society. Such justifications are highly influenced by the political context in which pro‐independence parties try to advance towards secession. These insights advance on extant explanations of secessionist mobilisation by highlighting the distinctive nature of, and the motives for, secessionist claims.
AB - This article advances understandings of secessionist strategies by examining how and why secessionist movements make the case for creating a new sovereign state. It draws on new empirical data to examine the ways in which pro‐independence parties in Catalonia have justified their calls for the creation of an independent Catalan Republic between 2008 and 2018. The findings challenge the widespread scholarly assumption that secessionist mobilisation is underpinned by grievances— cultural, economic, and political—against the state. We find that arguments for an independent Catalonia rarely include cultural claims. Instead, independence is advocated as a way of resolving political and economic grievances and of creating a better, more democratic, and just Catalan society. Such justifications are highly influenced by the political context in which pro‐independence parties try to advance towards secession. These insights advance on extant explanations of secessionist mobilisation by highlighting the distinctive nature of, and the motives for, secessionist claims.
KW - Catalonia
KW - Grievances
KW - Independence
KW - Pro‐independence parties
KW - Secession
KW - Sovereign state
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85121031773&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.17645/pag.v9i4.4561
DO - 10.17645/pag.v9i4.4561
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85121031773
SN - 2183-2463
VL - 9
SP - 453
EP - 464
JO - Politics and Governance
JF - Politics and Governance
IS - 4
ER -