The Jerusalem Post - The Jerusalem Post Magazine
Why some national movements are more equal than others
Geopolitics – and not international law – largely determines the level of independence achieved by a given people
Tens of thousands of Spaniards partook in “white” demonstrations last weekend in protest of the independence drive of Catalonia, a semi-autonomous region in northeastern Spain. An October 1 referendum to this effect, in which some 90% of voters reportedly favored full autonomy, descended into chaos when police deployed by the Spanish government to suppress the poll clashed with supporters of the bid, resulting in injuries to nearly 1,000 people.
Madrid vehemently opposed the move by Catalonian authorities and the country’s constitutional court has done everything to block its momentum: first by banning the referendum itself and now by prohibiting the Catalan parliament from convening in order to prevent any declaration of sovereignty.
All eyes now turn to Catalan President Carles Puigdemont, who last week gave a speech amid intense international pressure from European capitals as well as from local elements that boycotted the independence vote, which they deemed to be non-inclusive. These opponents point to the fact that similar past efforts to secede from Spain never garnered the support of more than half of the region’s population.
The unfolding events are being watched closely by leaders in the Basque Country, an “autonomous community” situated on the northern coast of Spain. Like Catalonia, it too has its own language and distinct culture and has expressed a desire to hold a referendum (the territory has a history of violent separatism, with the nationalist ETA group having carried out multiple attacks prior to agreeing to a permanent cease-fire in 2011).
In nearby Italy, leaders in the Lombardy and Veneto regions are both eyeing referendums on October 22. As with Spain, Italy’s constitutional court has designated any such polls illegal.
Throughout Europe, the sovereignty of many peoples remains in limbo – from Ukraine to Scotland; from Gibraltar to Corsica; from Kosovo to Cyprus. Even Brussels, the capital of the European Union, is bitterly divided between Flemish- and French-speaking populations, with the former represented by political parties seeking the creation of an independent “Flanders.”
Worldwide, there are some 150 disputes relating to territory, and, by extension, sovereignty – from Hong Kong to Quebec; from Tibet to Chechnya; from the Western Sahara to West Papua. In Iraqi Kurdistan, the population overwhelmingly voted “yes” to independence in a referendum on September 25 in the face of near-uniform global disapproval.
One of the fundamental principles of international law is a people’s right to self-determination – to freely choose their political status without external interference. The 1933 Montevideo Convention on Statehood codified existing legal criteria for achieving independence; namely that any prospective nation would need (1) a permanent population, (2) a defined territory, (3) a functioning government and (4) the capacity to enter into relations with other countries. Notably, Article 3 of the statute provides that “The political existence of the state is independent of recognition by the other states,” whereas Article 11 prohibits the use of military force to achieve full autonomy.
While the United Nations’ founding charter further enshrined this principle, according to Eugene Kontorovich, a professor at Northwestern University School of Law and a leading expert on international legal norms, “The content of the right is very thin and so everyone understands that this only affords people some form of limited self-rule and not necessarily a country of their own.”
As such, he explained to The Media Line, the creation of a new state “is entirely a political determination. In practice,