The Catalan independence movement is still facing unresolved strategic questions regarding the balance between popular mobilisation and institutional politics, according to an analysis published by VilaWeb. These issues, first identified by the Catalan National Assembly (ANC) in 2014, remain critical for the movement's future direction.
Months before the 9-N consultation in 2014, the ANC's second general assembly in Tarragona outlined four scenarios concerning the relationship between the independence movement and institutions. These scenarios explored different approaches to achieving a binding referendum and responding to potential state opposition.
Two of the scenarios, described as 'radical', involved holding a binding referendum. One option was a more or less tolerated referendum, ensuring stability and reliability for all voters, which implied a balance between institutions and the street. The other was a unilateral referendum, anticipated due to state opposition, which would make guaranteeing free and universal voting difficult. In this unilateral scenario, the analysis states, the balance clearly favoured the autonomy of the popular independence movement through direct mobilisation and self-organisation by groups like the ANC, civil and cultural entities, and trade unions.
Scenarios of Resignation and Institutional Control
The remaining two scenarios, termed 'resignation', assumed a referendum could not be held. This might be because the Catalan government deemed the situation unfeasible or because the Catalan Parliament and government were intervened by the Spanish state. In both these cases, the analysis notes, the organised public's political insubordination was not considered a response to institutional renunciation or Spanish refusal to allow a referendum.
Instead, the popular independence movement would lose initiative to institutions or yield to state power. The first 'resignation' case involved accepting early plebiscitary elections, replacing direct public expression within a Spanish legal framework. The second left a unilateral declaration of independence to elected representatives, such as dissolved parliament members, Catalan deputies in the Spanish Congress, and mayors supporting the process, without a popular resistance plan to support the new power from the street.
The strategic discussion of the ANC's roadmap at the time required choosing between the autonomy of the popular independence movement or subordination to institutional politics. A grassroots unity policy, the analysis suggests, would favour the former, involving a political revolt against Spanish legality to defend the right to self-determination. This approach would have led to a crisis in Catalonia's party system, marginalised hesitant positions, and demanded new political structures aligned with the street movement.
Consequences of Indecision and Future Paths
The lack of clarity and decision in choosing a path, both before and after the 1 October 2017 referendum, is seen as the root of the compromises and detours that have led to the current situation. The analysis argues that the question of recovering an independence majority in institutions is far from resolved or even re-evaluated, and this needs urgent attention to set priorities and control the pace of the movement.
If the movement again trusts that institutional control will restart progress, it will remain within the framework of institutional politics' hegemony, denying the necessary autonomy of the movement. This would lead to a rush to reoccupy power spaces, which, the analysis reminds us, originate from the Spanish constitution and are thus under its legal and political control. The unresolved question would resurface: even with the most passionate and honest parliamentary representatives proclaiming independence, how would it be defended, with what forces, and what forms of struggle?
The analysis suggests that defence would not come from an anonymous mass called upon by leaders, led by voluntaristic activism, and defenceless against state repression. Instead, it would require people specifically organised for the mission, spread across the country, capable of directing actions and creating organisation. Actions initiated from above are characterised by haste, calculations before acting, and hesitation when resisting. Actions from below, however, are paced by the movement's pulse, its intervention capacity, and its deployment across the territory. While this might take longer to achieve its purpose, the gains would be firm and defended by mobilised people.
An alliance between autonomous institutions and the independence movement seems unlikely, according to the analysis. If the street does not take the initiative, autonomous institutions will remain under the state's shadow and will not restart a second phase of the process on their own. Reoccupying parliament without an organised, mobilised, and self-defending street movement would be futile. Conversely, it asks if recovering an independence majority in parliament is imaginable without a long period of fierce struggle against the state and its 'autonomist lackeys'. The conflict is between the movement and the state, and anything that stands in the way is destined for capitulation or irrelevance.
The Broader Catalan Nation and Language Defence
A significant aspect not addressed by the ANC in that 2014 assembly was the concept of the Països Catalans, or Catalan Countries. This omission was consistent with the options studied, which ultimately depended too much on Spain's position. Consequently, both the ANC and institutions implicitly considered the situation in the rest of the Catalan Countries to fall within Spanish legality, expecting them to manage on their own.
This stance, the analysis states, ignored that the state's strategy towards the Catalan nation was, and is, singular, using colonial strangulation and linguistic genocide as weapons. What happened in the Balearic Islands, the Valencian Country, and La Franja was a warning of what was starting to burn in Catalonia with Spanish in schools. This 'ostrich-like' attitude, the analysis suggests, raised fears of tactical weaknesses that could end in strategic surrenders, such as the 'democratic' death of the language decided by new 'independent' institutions to avoid 'social fracture'. This is where the movement stands now, with the Catalan government becoming an accomplice before becoming a definitive victim.
Furthermore, this lack of definition regarding the entire nation ignored that the widespread struggles for language and schools were not, and are not, desperate acts of resistance. Instead, they are conclusive examples of sustained mobilisation and self-organisation. As seen in Valencia's streets last week, these actions create vulnerabilities in the state's domination structures. This demonstrates that language, defended everywhere, is not merely an instrument, pretext, means, subject, or part of an integration programme, but shows the persistence of the entire nation in the consciousness of the working classes.
