Catalunya once more

The Catalunya affaire is still occupying a good deal of the space in the spanish press and in the conversations of individuals. I do not know where it is heading. Certainly a repetition of the policies leading to the 1/10/2017  referendum is not possible, But I still believe/hope  that a possible  good solution can be achieved. I would like to see an agreement among independence parties and the rest of parties in Catalunya and the rest of Spain. The independence parties should bind themselves to follow the law and to use only political means in the pursue for independence. It seems hard that the original idea of reaching their goals by popular force and international pressure can succeed. A new attempt would be frustrated at an earlier stage. Thus, the only way would be an explicit announcement of compliance to legal methods. In that situation the government should try to pass a law of amnesty for all politicians and civilians that  are being processed for actions related to the independence process. That is crucial.  A new start.

In this new scenario an honest set of actions and conversations would make sense. For that, an appropriate climate should be created.  Just the opposite of the policy that the independentists have carried on in the last few years: demonizing the unionists/constitutionalists forces, describing Spain as a fascist underdevelopped country. Can they expect the spanish civilians to accept this without comptempt and anger? First of all that is not true. In Spain the judges act independently. There are a bunch of politicians (including presidents of regional communities and members of the ruling party) who have been imprisoned and  have been charged of various crimes. Of course, the executive power tries to influence the judicial one in various ways, but where not? Any internationally informed citizen knows many cases of this in the US and Europe. Furthermore judges have ideologies and might also produce stupid resolutions from time to time. There are examples everywhere. I  certainly prefer the Spanish judicial system that the american one, for example, where the wealth of the prosecuted person has a lot of influence in his final status. Of course, you can continue to use the strategy of demonizing Spain and blame it for all things that do not work in Catalunya. But then you will obviously create an anticatalan  reaction  in the rest of the population, which is not the best of strategies.

Within the set of  complaints that the catalan population have about the way Spain is treating them there might be aspects which are well founded (certainly not all). These points should be addressed and I do not think that the rest of spaniards have any particular will of damaging Catalunya. But Catalunya is one of the richest regions in Spain concerning wealth and education. The point is why is Catalunya not playing a leading role in the political ruling of Spain. I believe that a very old feeling of the catalan population has been that despite their important  economical role, the political center of decision has been in Madrid. Of course, there have always been catalan ministers and also in other leading positions ( in Science for example that I know well). Nowadays there is a (non-independentist) catalan leading a party with high chances of becoming the leading spanish party. I am talking about Albert Rivera. In any case, in order to help in getting the catalan population integrated in Spain,  I  would certainly put forward a proposal of shared capital city between Madrid and Barcelona. Why not? Both cities are comparable in size and in resources. Moving some of the government offices and ministries to Barcelona makes perfect sense.  I am from Madrid and I am proposing this as a method to improve the perception of many citizens in Catalunya that feel that the political power lies elsewhere.  But of course on the part of the catalan politicians there should also be a fair play and no hidden agendas. Unfortunately I believe that this agenda existed before. The educational system in Catalunya which is now being discussed has been used to create a cultural gap which would validate the feeling of an distinct nation. I am certain that politicians know what I am talking about. By the way catalan language should be made official too. This might imply extra costs but the benefits certainly pay off.

Said all this, I cannot fail to think that common sense and good will are pretty scarce nowadays, so I am not terribly optimistic.