Friday’s developments in Spain represent the biggest political upheaval the country has seen since its return to democracy in the late 1970s. The Catalan parliament’s approval of a unilateral declaration of independence is a threat to Spain’s territorial unity; and the senate’s backing of article 155 of the constitution immediately afterwards allows Madrid to take control of a devolved administration for the first time ever, but carries with it significant risk.
Despite the drama that those two steps imply, both have been slowly unfolding before Spaniards’ eyes in recent months, even if few expected them ever to become reality.
At the beginning of this year, the use of article 155 was talked about as a mechanism to prevent the Catalan government from staging an independence referendum. But instead, Rajoy trusted in the judiciary and the police to stop that vote, which he and the constitutional court deemed illegal. They failed, a referendum of sorts took place on October 1st, and the police violence of that day became a potent new PR weapon for the independence cause.
After that, the pressure on the prime minister to use the controversial article mounted. Factions within his own Popular Party (PP) and the stridently unionist Ciudadanos kept it alive as an option, as did increasingly shrill headlines in the Madrid press. The morning after the referendum, graffiti appeared on the headquarters of Rajoy’s governing Popular Party (PP), saying “155 now, you traitors”, reflecting the desire for a tough line among many voters.
Direct rule
Never a bold politician or one to defy mainstream opinion among his colleagues and voters, Rajoy saw direct rule as unavoidable. But characteristically, he waited until the last moment to use it.
Yet, on Thursday, there had been a brief moment when the two sides appeared to have engineered a temporary reprieve, as Catalonia leader Carles Puigdemont mulled calling elections instead of declaring independence. With the Spanish government planning to do the same itself, it would have been the first genuinely conciliatory step by either side in months of brinkmanship.
But an angry response from many of Puigdemont’s supporters and allies to the election option appeared to help change his mind, and instead he allowed the Catalan parliament to issue the declaration of independence. That decision appeases the two million or so Catalans who voted for independence on October 1st and most of Puigdemont’s political partners. For him, and many others, breaking away from Spain is a lifelong dream.
External factors
Puigdemont has struggled over the last month to weigh up those pressures coming from his own camp with other considerations, such as the exodus of companies from Catalonia, or appeals for him to pull back from independence from outside parties, such as European Council president Donald Tusk.
European institutions and member states have pointedly refused to back the independence cause and the Spanish state is now moving in to take control of Catalonia’s devolved powers.
With that task looking anything but straightforward for the Rajoy government, there is reason to think both sides might soon be ruing their failure to seek an alternative way out of this crisis.