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Sometimes, political events happen so fast, involve so many actors and are so confusing that it is difficult to depict them in a way that appears fair to everyone. The Catalan independence movement is one of those events.

On September of this year, the President of the Catalan government, Carles Puigdemont, called for a referendum on whether Catalonia should secede from Spain. This referendum is illegal according to both Spanish and Catalan law. Nevertheless, the referendum that took place on the 1st of October and was met with violence by the national police. The conditions under which the referendum took place had few democratic guarantees — some citizens voted up to four times — however,  the result suggested massive support for independence, with around 90% of the votes. The discussion, nonetheless, is centred around the possibility that all the voters that didn’t vote could have had their voice heard — referendum turn-out was around 42% compared to 75% in a normal regional election. Puigdemont was supposed to declare the unilateral independence of Catalonia on Tuesday, but this is where the story gets tricky.

The President of the “Generalitat” (the Catalan government) declared the independence of Catalonia and just seven seconds later said that he was suspending the effects of the declaration to engage in dialogue with Madrid about the Catalan ‘conflict’. He did not, however, elucidate the exact content of these upcoming talks; Will the main focus be on the technicalities of secession or the possibility of remaining a part of Spain? Neither did he reveal whether or not the question of the status of Catalonia as an independent state would be discussed during these talks. The result is a very confusing situation that nobody really understands. This is a “deferred independence”, something completely novel to our political landscape which has left everyone following this issue absolutely puzzled.

The leaders of the opposition parties in the Catalan parliament — who hold 47% of the seats — delegitimised the semi-declaration of independence. For example, Miquel Iceta, the leader of the Catalan socialist party, argued that 38% of pro-independence Catalans are not enough to support any declaration of independence. “A minority cannot impose over a majority”, he said.

Spain’s head of government, Mariano Rajoy, has given Puigdemont until Monday to confirm if he actually declared independence or not and, in the case that he has, until Thursday to modify his position. If Puigdemont doesn’t rectify his secessionist stance Article 155 of the Constitution will be applied and the autonomy of Catalonia will be suspended until the Spanish government calls for new regional elections. The stakes are high and both political leaders have made big speeches about the benefits of dialogue while neither seems willing to give in. Pedro Sánchez, leader of the Spanish Socialist Party, has announced that he has made a deal with Mr. Rajoy regarding the reform of the Constitution, in order to address several of the problems of the Catalan conflict. However,  unsurprisingly, nothing concrete has been said.

The result of all this is confusing and unsatisfactory for all sides. Pro-independence supporters think it is not enough and pro-union supporters that it is too much. At this point someone could ask what the logic underpinning the two main players’ strategies is. The behaviour of Spain’s central government, like it or not,  is easy to understand, they are trying to prevent a violation of the law with all mechanisms available to them, including the use of force.

Spanish police seize ballot boxes in Catalan referendum © AFP 2017/ PAU BARRENA

The more nebulous actor is the Catalan government. One possible explanation for its semi-declaration of independence is that it is truly committed to dialogue. That seems unlikely given that Puigdemont only considers one possible solution to the conflict: the independence of Catalonia. Another possibility is that the Generalitat is bluffing and that they are using their movement to get more political power from the central government. However, this also appears to be false given how far they have taken their actions. The most probable answer lies in the fact that the Catalan independence movement has enough support to pursue their aims (47% of Catalan citizens and the Generalitat), but not enough to carry out their consequences (46% of pro-union Catalans and the Spanish government against them). This leaves every clear resolution of the conflict improbable and presages a continuation of the conflict for a long time. In this view, the declaration of independence and its suspension makes sense as a way of winning time, as a “flight forwards” with unexpected consequences. There doesn’t seem to be a clear strategy among the Catalan government apart from taking advantage of the central government’s mistakes.

Without a radical change in any of the main player’s powers, the conflict will continue indefinitely. Maybe a radical action by one of the sides (real declaration of independence or the suspension of autonomy) will trigger a quicker end to the conflict. However, radical actions have not produced desirables outcomes so far and we may soon long for a return to the present situation if things get worse. And they can get far, far worse. Let us hope they do not.

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