The EU’S imperialism encourages separatists

The secessionists’ paradox is that they want to break from Spain’s government and yet stay in the EU

The crisis in Spain over Catalonia’s bid for independence is about to come to a head, with a stand-off between Barcelona and Madrid threatening to tear the country apart. The imposition of direct rule by the central government of Mariano Rajoy could precipitate a declaration of independence by Catalonia as early as tomorrow.

Three weeks ago, a referendum deemed illegal by Madrid showed 90 per cent in favour of secession on a turnout of 43 per cent. Were the Catalans to declare independence, it would be the first time an EU state has lost part of its territory and Spain would be the first Eurozone member to crack apart. The financial consequences of losing its richest province are impossible to calculate, which is why Madrid is determined to stop it.

There is a school of thought that the potential fragmentation of Europe spells doom for the EU and the Catalans are being egged on by those who would like to see it collapse. Yet the opposite may be true. For potential statelets such as Catalonia, the EU offers an over-arching form of governance able to accommodate their distinct cultural and linguistic characteristics outside of an artificially constructed nation state.

Herein lies the secessionists’ paradox. They want to break away from what they regard as an alien form of governance yet stay in the EU. Brussels, in turn, seeks to obstruct these separatist movements under a doctrine set out by Romano Prodi, former President of the European Commission. This asserts, though without any legal basis, that a region breaking away from an EU member will automatically be ejected from the club and have to reapply for membership, a protracted process that could take years. In the meantime, the pariah state would be cut off from the rest of the EU, unable to trade easily and forced to use a different currency. This is why Madrid is calling Catalonia’s bluff: it holds all the cards and the impact on the new country’s economy of leaving the EU without agreement would be huge, even if it does generate much of Spain’s wealth.

For those who believe in the efficacy of the nation state these are difficult issues. When we look at what is going on from a British position, and especially from an English one, we are anxious to preserve the integrity of the nation. We would not countenance, say, the independence of Yorkshire, or of London for that matter. Yet we recognise that Scotland was until 1603 a separate kingdom and until 1707 had a separate parliament that pooled its sovereignty with England to form a union. It has the right to break that arrangement should it choose to, and in 2014 it chose not to.

But most European countries do not have a thousand years of nationhood to keep them glued together. Germany was not a nation until unification under Bismarck in 1871 and then again under Kohl in 1990, nor Italy until Risorgimento led by Garibaldi in 1861. Modern Germany encompasses previously powerful states in their own right such as Bavaria and Prussia, though its federal structure and high degree of autonomy keep separatist pressures at bay.

But in Italy the centrifugal forces continue to be felt. Last weekend, two former independent states, Lombardy and the Veneto, held referendums to press for greater autonomy from Rome. Both are run by the Northern League, which objects to subsidising the poorer south. Will Italy still be in one piece 30 years from now?

Arguably, the existence of the EU as a default form of supra-national governance encourages secession movements. The Prodi doctrine is aimed at countering them, but history is against it. For centuries much of continental Europe functioned under imperial suzerainty, either through the Holy Roman Empire centred on Germany, Austro-hungary, Russia or the Ottomans. Living in a country such as ours, whose borders have been pretty well set for 800 years, it is often hard to appreciate the fluidity of European statehood, though recent events should remind us.

Thirty years ago, the old EEC comprised just 12 member states – Spain and Portugal, both dictatorships until the mid-seventies, had just joined. Today it numbers 28 (soon to be 27), a direct result of the implosion of the old communist empire centred on the Soviet Union. Its unravelling freed the eastern bloc nations, formerly satellites of Moscow, to go their own way. It also triggered the dismantling of Yugoslavia and the recreation through conflict of the old territories that had once been under the Ottomans or Austro-hungary. Few outside Serbia and Russia opposed the right of the Kosovans to break away from the rule of Belgrade and were, indeed, prepared to wage war to allow it. Its secession was judged legal under the concept of self-determination of peoples enshrined in Article One of the UN Charter.

Countries that suppress the legitimate desires of their citizens to be separate political entities are in breach of that provision. So why is Catalonia any different? And yet, if the Spanish army takes to the streets of Barcelona to impose rule from Madrid, the rest of Europe will back the central government against the separatists.

Here lies another paradox. The more starry-eyed Europhiles have always wanted the Union to supplant nations. That was one purpose of Maastricht

– to create a European identity and citizenship that would transcend statehood and accommodate every ethnicity and expression of cultural exceptionalism. That is what would-be breakaway nations such as Catalonia want. They don’t seek its destruction.

Perhaps the EU’S destiny is to become an expanded version of the Holy Roman Empire, ruling over scores of nations, autonomous statelets and ethnic groupings. The old empire collapsed after its defeat by Napoleon at Austerlitz in 1805 and was often derided as unwieldy, feudal and inefficient. Voltaire sniffily dismissed it as not holy, not Roman and not an empire, though it did last 800 years.

Unlike the EU, the nation states that rose from the imperial ashes provide a direct connection between the people and the expression of their democratic will. But what happens when that bond is broken and loyalty to the nation breaks down among a large part of its population? Spain is about to find out.