Comments on the detention of Carles Puigdemont

It is a widely accepted fact that Spain and, in general, the Spanish society takes highly into account the opinion of our European neighbours, as well as other democratic nations with solid and consolidated democratic systems. It is a natural consequence of the dream, of the far and placid horizon may I add, which democratic systems pictured, throughout the 36 years of Military Dictatorship (1939-1975) under Francisco Franco’s rule, to a nation violently deprived by its own civil conflicts of a liberal democratic regime. A nation that had embarked itself in 1812, with the third Constitution in History -after the US and France respectively-, as a pioneer in Constitutional European History, and would nonetheless be deprived of a stable Democracy for the better part of the following two centuries, due to the endless and always recurrent civil wars that would batter repeatedly its own progress. This is what Otto Von Bismark would describe as the perpetual effort of the Spanish people to destroy its own Nation, stubborn effort concerning which the very survival of Spain throughout the centuries demonstrated the Nation was, indeed, in the Iron Chancellors’ vision, the strongest of all.

Forty years now from the approval of Spanish 1978’s Constitution, there is a natural advantage in such a high consideration of other democracies’ opinions regarding internal affairs: as hesitant as it may show us Spaniards, it is a notorious stronghold against any return to pre-democratic adventures, a strong and durable vaccine against perverse twists in the Nation’s political future which other rather more self-complacent nations do not hold. It is an antibody, may I highlight, that responds to the Spanish people’s sense of responsibility regarding a democratic rule that was for long denied to us by our own History, that we have achieved and we know we must at all cost preserve. It is the very reason why xenophobic populism thrives in Europe’s major and finest democracies and finds no reflection, notwithstanding the strong impact of the economic crisis, in Spanish society. We do not blame the EU (Brexit, Cinque Stelle Movement), the immigrants (Le Pen, Alternative Für Deutschland, Trump), some other part of the country (Flemish, “Padanian”, Bavarian or Catalan nationalism) or the Mighty West (Russia) for our troubles; we do not fall into the warm embrace of nationalism as a shortcut to escape our own problems: we generally rather just blame ourselves first -sometimes unfairly-. A simple reason, thus, behind this fact: we have the memory of worse days a little too close in our past to fall into the temptation of some other political propositions, to forget the real value of Democracy.

Naturally, not everything is remarkable in this attitude towards external opinions. There is always an ugly side in the coin, which can be identified (in a way only comparable, to my own  experience, with the same attitude in an important part of Italian society) with a general lack of self assurance, a permanent “defeatism” as it regards the own capacities of our society, often accompanied by a miss value of our merits or achievements. An unfair approach to our own country which is not only easily perceivable, but also revealed repeatedly in statistics (Real Instituto Elcano’s studies permanently demonstrate the notorious breach between the external opinion upon Spain -quite good, in general- and the internal -very poor, on the contrary-). An unfair approach that, in a sort of Pigmaleon’s “sociological” effect, somewhat burdens our own future as much as it would do with the aims of a child repeatedly discouraged by others in his early years. There are, in conclusion, as we may see, both beneficial and negative aspects of the general Spanish attitude towards external opinions.

Reconciling myself, at last, with the title of this article, I have observed these days, following the detention of Carles Puigdemont in Neümunster, Germany, a wide tendency -probably healthy- to examine ourselves in the eyes of the World regarding the judicial consequences of the Independence process carried out illegally by some Catalan mandataries last Autumn.

It does not surprise me, as the story successfully spread by a part (approximately 48%) of the Catalan population, radicalized by an upgrowing nationalism, has doubtlessly gained the hearts of some persons outside our country. It is the tale of the fictional “oppression” of the totality of a distinctive people, a regional minority, subject to multiple and permanent injustices by an abusive and always mean Spanish nation, still attached to old phantoms’ habits (Franco, the Holy Inquisition, take your pick). It is, I must admit, a well knitted argument, an easy trap to fall into where no other contact with actual reality of the situation is held.

The fact that a majority of Catalan population does not support the independence unilaterally declared by the escapees, the fact that the Spanish Constitution and Catalonia’s superior law (Estatut de Cataluña) have been pulverized by a well organized minority in the Region, the fact that permanent abuses have actually been committed by the Nationalist politics (fining advertising in Spanish -in Spain-, imposing an exclusive monolingual public School system -non-bilingual, like any other European system-, condemning to ostracism any Catalan citizen’s challenge against the identarian convictions and policies) are no rivals to the romantic vision of the small but brave David against the mighty Goliath.

The fact that Catalan nationalist parties are unfairly overrepresented (to the point where the majority of non-independentist votes is now a minority in the regional Parliament), the fact the same parties have for long held a critical power when deciding National Spanish Governments -in exchange, of course, of a non-intervention in identarian policies from the successive Spanish Governments-, the fact that iconic 23 years-in-a-row nationalist President of Catalonia, Jordi Pujol, and the core of the nationalist historical hegemonic party (CiU) has been discovered to have stolen and stored in Tax Heavens various hundreds of millions (discovery that, surprisingly, matched with the exact moment the independentist project is launched), the fact that Barcelona and the big Catalan cities are by far non independentist and every poll or vote concerning independence has denied a victory to the parties in support of the independence, do not generally travel as fast as the “oppression tale”. The phrase “a lie can go around the World while the truth is still lacing its shoes” is, I am afraid, quite accurate.

Nonetheless, the fictional tale of David and Goliath –recognisably, a brilliantly executed campaign of infamous misinformation- has a sure Achilles heel. It does not survive any consistent, however simple, confrontation with the objective truth. The myth of the oppression of a unified people seeking freedom, struggling before an undemocratic State which incarcerates political leaders for their political ideas may persuade well intended persons too distant to appreciate the notorious flaws of a retorted truth, only founded upon the construction of permanent lie; it does not, nevertheless, convince any sufficiently informed interlocutors.

This is, indeed, the very reason why not a single Western Government –let alone European-, nor a single European Union or European Council organ has had the slightest approach to an official declaration on the matter as to criticise the Spanish authorities’ constitutional response regarding the Catalan crisis, as opposed to severe and multiple declarations concerning internal democratic affairs in Poland, Hungary, US or Venezuela, for the matter. Where a misinformed citizen in any country may, indeed, be made to believe “the Catalans” are attached to Spain against their will, any minimally informed Institution or Government knows –last December elections official results- more than half the Catalan population rejects independence and pro-independence parties are unfairly overrepresented in the Catalan Parliament -due to the correlative overrepresentation of rural Catalonia as compared to the big urban centres in Barcelona or Tarragona, where pro-independence parties have permanently been defeated in the succesive elections-. Just the same, where a misinformed citizen in any country may be made to believe Carles Puigdemont is a person prosecuted for his ideas, any minimally informed institution or Government also knows he is the actual perpetrator of a coup to the Constitution and rule of law of a European Democracy, a Constitution which a radicalised Catalan nationalist minority has not had the majorities to change but decided to substitute by their own legal alternative order. A crime that, objectively,  Adolf Hitler himself committed twice against Weimar Constitution which finally substituted by the Third Reich. A crime only conceivable in a XXI Century western European country by the perverse, poisoning influence of nationalism and its natural tendency towards radicalisation, a civil religion of which its expansion caused the largest and more painful disasters of modern European History in the last century –mainly, WWI, WWII and Balkan War- but, nonetheless, resists to disappear. Nationalism is, indeed, war, as Manuel Vals recently but firmly declared in his frontal rejection of the Catalan secession process; another Catalan international personality which now is a public enemy for Catalan nationalists as Joan Manuel Serrat before.

Catalan nationalists lately declare the European Union and all European Nations’ public support to Spanish Institutions concerning the Catalan matter is indeed the proof of a democratic reversion in the Continent: a treason to European democratic basic principles, to the core of Democracy itself. As the mad man that refuses to recognise his own madness, but prefers to declare the rest of the World’s madness, Catalan nationalists are utterly wrong. It is precisely the basic democratic principles which Spanish Institutions –Government, Judiciary and Constitutional Court- have upheld in the recent crisis: the Rule of Law, separation of powers and, utmostly, constitutional supremacy. The right to live under a Democratic regime without the abuse of authorities above the law, the right of a people to decide its own fate in accordance to the majorities established in the Constitution. The right of the majority of the Catalans -the “bad Catalans”, in the view of the nationalist leaders- to live under the Rule of Law and 1978’s Spanish Constitution without being ripped of unilaterally from their fellow countrymen in the rest of Spain by a blindfolded nationalist minority of Catalans.

The high acceptance of the Spanish people concerning external opinions must, thus, not make us forget to discern serious and solid opinions on the matter from misinformed opinions and table talk. It is in the trench of Democracy we now stand, supported by our European colleagues; it is where we must always remain.