Self-determination and national identities within plurinational states
“All peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development”
Article 1 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)
Self-determination is the right people have to determine its own destiny. In particular the principle allows a people to choose its own political status and to determine its own form of economic, cultural and social development. Exercise of this right can result in a variety of different outcomes ranging from political independence through the full integration within a state.
(In this text we used the definition of UNPO, the Unrepresented Nations and People Organization.)
On the last years we have been seeing the rise and the development of several self-determination movements, particularly in Europe (in this text we will focus only on these). These movements happen for different reasons and in different regions of Europe but they have a curious coincidence. The majority of these movements is that they are happening in some of the most powerful European States, like the UK, Spain or Italy, countries that many thought were strongly unified nations. This happens because nations in Spain, Italy and even in the UK were discriminated and marginalized during a period of their recent history, like in the dictatorships of Francisco Franco in Spain and Benito Mussolini in Italy. Unlike giving up their culture to integrate themselves in the dominant culture of that specific culture, they united and kept their culture alive (language, dances or sports among other things) even when it meant facing jail because of that. Unfortunately, even in the democratic-era those people still have their culture under threat, with their languages being spoken only by a minority of people (like it happens in the Basque Country, Northern Ireland and in some regions of Italy) and deliberate attacks from some politicians from national parties towards these people and their culture (like it happens in Spain with the Popular Party).
What is in the root of the problem in this case is the existence of plurinational states. A plurinational state is a political and geopolitical entity that congregates several nations within itself. Due to that fact, tensions may arise between some nations and regions, especially if there is an imposition of the culture of the dominant nation in the nations of that country like it happened in Italy and Spain (and to a certain extent still happen). This is not a phenomenon exclusive to Europe and its problems arise even more if we analyze other parts of the world, like in Africa in which colonization by Europeans created artificial countries with several nations among them. Afterwards with the independence of those countries more often than not, some ethnic-cultural groups became at war with others leading to horrific events like the Rwandan Genocide, the Isaaq Genocide in Somalia and several long and brutal Civil Wars in countries like Congo, Angola or Mozambique. There is, of course, a big difference between the reality in Africa and the reality in Europe, however plurinational states in European Union are still able to contribute to violent conflicts and numerous deaths as the conflict in the Basque Country and Northern Ireland show. The Balkan war for some supporters of the plurinational state idea may present the argument of the immigrants also having their culture replaced by the dominant culture but they are moving abroad, so they should adapt themselves to the culture of that place, while the inhabitants of those nations are living in their land, sometimes with their culture as minority.
Solutions
After identifying the problem, we need to find solutions in order to help these nations keeping their cultures alive. It is clear that centralization of power and decision-making institutions are a problem in plurinational states so we will name a few more decentralized forms of self-governance that can protect these nations.
- Autonomous administrative region
A possible solution to protect these nations is to integrate them in an autonomous administrative region enabling them to have a regional government and parliament and also a regional budget that can be spent only in that autonomous region as well as some specific laws like the tax rate. This autonomy could also help some regions to have specific laws that protect their culture with measures such as having classes in the specific language of that region like it happens in Galicia, Catalonia and Basque Country autonomous regions in Spain. This model has the advantage of giving these nations some autonomy about the policies they may adopt and enhance their national identity by using among other things their language and other cultural specificities. Still this model has the disadvantage of not giving enough policy making to the autonomous regions, at least in economic and social terms and in most of the cases they still have to transfer the regions fiscal earnings to the central government that may redistribute it in a way that those autonomous regions consider unfair because they give to the central government more than they receive. An autonomous region with fiscal autonomy like the Basque Country and Navarre can partially calm down the independence movement but as the Basque case shows it is unlikely to end the nationalist sentiment.
Federal region
Federalism is a mode of government that combines a general government with regional governments in a single political system. The most well-known example of a federalist country is the United States of America (a state in which the dominant culture actually destroyed the others). A federalist is not very popular in Europe although it’s applied in Germany, Austria and Bosnia Herzegovina.
It’s not easy to highlight the positive and negative aspects of federalism but in most of the cases it gives a possibility to some regions of having laws that are better suited to their specific context, more powers to conduct policies and more fiscal autonomy that enables a better usage of citizens taxes. A negative aspect is the fact that sometimes there are minority cultures within those specific nations that may feel they are being forgotten, especially in cultural aspects. Besides, sometimes the inhabitants of that specific federal region may consider that a federal region state is not enough and they would desire to have the possibility to advance into a fully independent state (by exercising their right to vote in a referendum like in Scotland).
- Independence
The most extreme solution regarding plurinational states is the independence of a region that belongs to a specific nation that feels that it is being mistreated by the central government of that country. This is actually the proposal of several European nations that feel they are suffering an unfair treatment by the central government of their countries, like Catalonia, Scotland or Flanders. Being the most extreme solution this has both positive and negative aspects.
The biggest positive aspect is perhaps a complete freedom to protect and promote the national country, including language, traditional dances or sports. Another aspect that can be also very important is a complete independence regarding public finances that means that region doesn’t need to make monetary transfers to other poorer regions. Being an independent state they could also start making new partnerships in several areas that could be positive for the new born country.
There are two main negative aspects that can stop the independence process. One of them is the fact that the independence of those regions could lead to an exiting process both from the Euro and from the European Union. This is not certain (a process like this never happened in the European Union) but if this happened some economic instability could follow with the rise of the public debt spread and maybe the delocalization of some multinational companies that could increase unemployment and lead to an economic crisis as well as some tensions with the non-independent population.
More power for the regions?
Besides the problematic of the plurinational states there is some authors that argue that regions and counties should have more power than they actually have in order to have a better contact with its inhabitants. Many people feel abandoned and dethatched from the central government that they feel as a too big and bureaucratic entity that doesn’t care about them or about that specific region, but only about the rich or about the ones that live in the biggest cities (to give an example). This leads to high abstention rates in elections and a lack of civic participation. So decentralizing the decision make process, giving more power to counties or autonomous regional governments may be not only important ,when we talk about a national identity, but also in regular nation-states.
This is not a return to the Greek city-state era but some changes could be done in order to fulfill people’s needs. Some sectors in which this could be done are the education sector, the health sector and even in the redistributive sector and also promoting to a certain extent direct democracy.
In any circumstance decentralizing the power may be the right way forward.
About the author: Pedro Diogo, undergraduate degree in Economics.
Disclaimer: This article reflects the author’s opinion it might not reflect the whole group’s opinion
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Bibliography
UNPO
Forbes
Debating Europe
