The problem is not so much about Catalonia and Spain. There are plenty of such regions and ethnic groups in pretty much every country on the continent. If the ball starts rolling, it can mean going back a few centuries.
Or going forward? What's wrong with smaller States? What if Catalonia is recognized as it's own country, yet still decides to be an EU member State?
They gain autonomy, and they function the same way they have been. I don't see the issue at all. Let people be free. Smaller governing/sovereign regions can have huge benefits, especially in Europe since they sill have the solidarity of EU backing.
It's not like they're separating because they want to keep slavery.
I think a Europe of Regions is exactly where we should be going. The nation state has had its day; nationalism is a deeply divisive ideology, responsible for so much war.
The EU acting as a leveller and lowest common denominator between states weakens the divisions between nation states, deliberately - precisely because of the dangers of nationalism. And with a weakened nation state, regionalism is relatively more important.
As for tax, defence, etc.; IMO these will sooner or later migrate to the EU level. I don't think regionalism is either unexpected or avoidable the way the EU has been going.
Suppressing people wanting self-determination has costs too. Thousands of people are killed every month because some group wants to keep it's rule over some territory or group of other people. Millions are reduced to poverty and stripped of their former living space every year.
Good? There is a scale in play here. Either the centralization of nations is good or bad, on a case by case basis.
For union - Centralization means more bargaining power in international negotiations because your economy is just physically larger. More tax revenue means the central government can do more ambitious things. Centralization is good for business because trade barriers are lower between providences and states than between countries.
By far, however, the greatest historic argument for large countries has been for militaristic purposes. Having a nation of a hundred million men spanning half a continent could historically walk all over smaller neighbors. This historic basis for centralization of power has fallen way by the wayside in the modern era of global communication and more importantly nuclear arms. It doesn't matter if France is smaller than Germany when France has hundreds of nukes and could remove humanity from the Earth a dozen times over.
For division - Minority cultures, groups, and people who simply do not agree with the majority opinions in a country but have solidarity in their region / culture are oppressed by the central government.
The arguments basically come down to an economic rationale for big centralization or a social desire for self determination and liberty. Now of course dissidents could want secession for good or ill - Indian independence from Britain was by almost any account a moral good, but the desire to secede from the US by confederates just to persist their industry of owning human beings was not. But fundamentally we should all be able to at least agree that righteous revolutions we agree with are justified and worth the economic cost to obtain liberty.
The debate over Catalonia shouldn't be along the lines of economic consequences from seceding because if Catalan is justified in what they are doing the freedom of its citizens has to supersede economic arguments to stay without liberty. Freedom has to come first before profit, and the debate should be if the Spanish governments has been legitimately oppressive of Catalan, and if you agree they have been, and you believe in liberty and self determination, you have to support their secession no matter the economic cost.Hygiene works by attaching an invisible "syntax context" value to all identifiers. When two identifiers are compared, both the identifiers' textural names and syntax contexts must be identical for the two to be considered equal.
It is probably very romantic an ideology, but democracy has always been rooted in romanticism.
Actually when visiting Spain I was really surprised how much of a federation it is vs a single unified country. If Spain is a federation, and Europe is a federation, dies it make sense to keep both?
This federation is only an outside appearance, though. Spanish gvt has the tools (and is willing to, and already did many times) to bend the laws from any of its regions' local governments.
And the cancelled laws were not all about independence. They were about protecting the people who can't pay for energy in winter or banning bullfights, among others.
That is incorrect. It might be your impression, but Spain is actually one of the most decentralized countries in the world. Catalonia has something around 5% of their state workers depending on the central government.
To me, it doesn't matter. If the Catalan government doesn't have freedom to create their own laws, and all the money goes through the main government, it matters very little who do those 95% people work for.
They do have plenty of freedom, own embassies, own top-level domain, lots of local laws, complete control over education (that is basically the foundations of the strategy of independentist movements during at least 20 years). It is basically the money what drives all this, you are spot on. I wonder what is your reference for regional freedom exactly? I think the next step really is total independence, which is what part of the society wants there.
I'm gonna clarify that I actually want the independence of Catalonia, because I think that's the only possible resolution, but I just disagree with that. It's a fact that Spanish autonomies have a lot of freedem in how to apply even the centrally decided laws.
They gain autonomy, and they function the same way they have been. I don't see the issue at all. Let people be free. Smaller governing/sovereign regions can have huge benefits, especially in Europe since they sill have the solidarity of EU backing.
It's not like they're separating because they want to keep slavery.