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In the mid-1980s, around 9 per cent of the people in Catalonia stated their ‘exclusive identity’. After all these years, the percentage of ‘exclusivity’ in Scotland has remained rather stable with a slight increase. In this survey, 39 per cent of respondents considered themselves to be ‘only Scottish’ without any identity sharing with Britain. In 1986, a survey was carried out in Scotland addressing for the first time what was later termed ‘The Moreno Question’. Arguably, a majority of people identifying themselves ‘exclusively’ can be regarded as the sound sociological basis for political independence. In the last 30 years, Catalans have reiterated a lesser degree of being ‘exclusive’ (‘I am only Catalan, not Spanish’) than the Scots. The fact that Catalans have expressed a high degree of duality in self-identification (Catalan and Spanish) is somewhat overlooked in such claims. Nationalist elites insist that Catalonia is not Spain and does not want to belong to it. Until now, the debate on independence in Catalonia has mainly revolved around identity politics.
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It could well be that a majority of Scots oppose independence because arguments against the “Yes” vote prevail in the year ahead (there has been, however, a substantial increase in support for independence among young voters aged between 18 and 24). Early surveys indicated that two thirds of the population were against independence, but the final referendum produced a margin of only 77,000 votes in favour of staying a part of Canada (from an electorate of around 5 million voters). Let us remember the case of the Quebec Referendum in 1995. In the period closer to the referendum day, transfers of votes between the two camps could be important and even decisive. Greater volatility is to be expected as the date of the referendum approaches. Figures have fluctuated in the last months, but have persistently shown a majority of Scots expressing a ‘No’ vote. Around half of Scots are against independence, almost a third of Scots are in favour of separation, and a little less than a fifth are undecided. Recent polls indicate that a majority of people are against secession. Far from being homogenised and dissolved within the British and Spanish polities, Scotland and Catalonia now face a possible – and plausible – future of political independence.Īccording to the agreement reached by the British Government and the Scottish Executive, Scotland is to hold a referendum on independence on 18 September, 2014.
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Such assertions have been repeatedly falsified in contemporary times. These approaches insisted that both territories were failed national communities which were bound to disappear. What similarities and differences are there between the Catalan and Scottish political contexts? It is worth underlining the erroneous prescriptions put forward by the functionalist and Marxist schools of thought about these two territories. Luis Moreno compares the two independence movements, noting that while the Scottish referendum campaign has been dominated by practical issues such as the economic impact of independence, the Catalonian debate has tended to be more emotionally driven and linked to identity. Scotland is due to hold an independence referendum in September 2014, while independence supporters in Catalonia recently held a mass demonstration in favour of the territory’s independence from Spain. This blog originally appeared on LSE EUROPP – European Politics and Policy blog and Agenda Pública Guest blog by Luis Moreno - Research Professor at the Institute of Public Goods and Policies (IPP) within the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)