Civ 10

Catalan International View A European Review of the World

Greece. Act I comedy, Act II tragedy

Issue 10 • Autumn 2011 • € 5

by Guillem López-Casasnovas

Arab springs, African autumns

by Jordi Fexas

The Outraged: the symptom and the disease

by Vicent Sanchis

Europe and the challenge of knowledge

by Enric Canela

Interview

Joaquim M. Puyal by Eva Piquer

Cover Artist: Jordi Fulla

SECTIONS: Europe · America · Africa ·Asia · Greeen Debate · Interview · Opinion Business & Economics · Science & Technology · Universal Catalans A Short Story from History · The Artist · A Poem

Positive & Negative

Contents

Editor

4......... Responsible governments / The European Central Bank

To Our Readers

Francesc de Dalmases

Víctor Terradellas

vterradellas@catmon.cat Director

director@international-view.cat Art Director

Quim Milla

designer@international-view.cat Head of International Relations

Marc Gafarot

marcgafarot@catmon.cat

Editorial Board

Martí Anglada Manel Balcells Enric Canela Àngel Font Anna Grau August Gil-Matamala Montserrat Guibernau Guillem López-Casasnovas Manuel Manonelles Fèlix Martí Arcadi Oliveres Eva Piquer Ricard Planas Vicent Sanchis Pere Torres Carles Vilarrubí Vicenç Villatoro Chief Editor

5......... Meeting the challenges facing 21st century Europe

by Víctor Terradellas and Francesc de Dalmases

Europe

8......... Europe and the challenge of knowledge

by Enric Canela

12........ The Outraged: the symptom and the disease

by Vicent Sanchis

Interview

18........ Joaquim Maria Puyal

by Eva Piquer

Business & Economics

26........ Greece. Act I comedy, Act II tragedy

by Guillem López-Casasnovas

30........ Catalonia: ‘Spain’s factory’ with a feeble financial sector

by Antoni Serra-Ramoneda

America

34........ Ollanta Humala’s three credentials

by Isabel Galí-Izard

38........ The Republican Party and the 2012 elections

by Marc Gafarot

Judit Aixalà Jordi Fexas

Africa

Language Advisory Service

Nigel Balfour Júlia López

44. ...... Arab springs, African autumns

by Jordi Fexas

Asia

Coordinator

50........ The long return of the Crimean Tatars

coordinator@international-view.cat

54........ Democracy: terms and conditions

Maria Novella

Webmaster

Cover Art

Marta Calvó Jordi Fulla

The reproduction of the artwork on the front cover is thanks to an agreement between Fundació Vila Casas and Fundació CATmón Executive Production Headquarters, Administration and Subscriptions

Fonollar, 14 08003 Barcelona Catalonia (Europe) Tel.: + 34 93 533 42 38 Fax: + 34 93 319 22 24 www. international-view.cat Legal deposit

B-26639-2008 ISSN

2013-0716

© Edicions de la Fundació CATmón. All rights reserved. Neither this publication nor any part of it may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, protocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of Edicions de la Fundació CATmón.

Printed in Catalonia by

Vanguard gràfic Published quarterly

by Natàlia Boronat

by Iris Mir

58........ Interview with Morteza Saffari Natanzi

by Marc Gafarot

Opinion

68........ Josep Suñol i Garriga: a life for Catalonia

by Jordi Badia

72........ Science and religion in 19th century Europe

by Jordi Bohigas-Maynegre

Green Debate

76........ The Year of Forests in the century without forests?

by Pere Torres

Science & Technology

80 ........The implications of the economic crisis on the Catalan

health system

by Manel Balcells

Universal Catalans

84........ Francesc Moragas

by Francesc Cabana

A Short Story from History

88........ From a Romantic myth to an impossible legend The Artist

90....... Jordi Fulla A Poem

92........ Room in Fall

by Gabriel Ferrater i Soler

Catalan International View

Positive & Negative

Responsible governments

The current economic circumstances have faced European leaders with the dilemma of either committing to responsible, rigorous policies to avoid greater evils, maintaining the foundations of the welfare state in the long term, or acting short-sightedly in the interests of their party by covering up the situation and overreaching themselves out of fear of upcoming elections. We like to think that 2012 will repay those governments that have acted responsibly and will penalize those who avoided seeing reality. Among the former we would like to acknowledge the efforts of the government of Catalonia for appealing to common sense and collective sacrifice at a time of recession, while coping with the impact and cost of widespread and inevitably unpopular cuts.

The European Central Bank

In recent months the president of the European Central Bank has been turned into a convenient target. It has been easy to criticize his lack of opportunity, his attitude and the leadership he has displayed during the various cycles of the debt crisis in various European countries. His actions, omissions and weak and inconsistent statements, when not directly alarming and dubious, have helped to ensure European finances are suitable victims of successive black days on the stock exchanges. In reality, however, his performance is merely a reflection of the hesitant and inconsistent performance of the principal European leaders. It has fallen to Jean-Claude Trichet to publicly address the profound differences and contradictions within the European Union and it looks as if he is attempting to reconcile the irreconcilable.

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To Our Readers

Meeting the challenges facing 21st century Europe

by Víctor Terradellas and Francesc de Dalmases Europe is undoubtedly experiencing moments of upheaval due to the global economic crisis. Nevertheless even amid these upheavals in the financial world we should be able to widen the perspective with which we observe our continent and look beyond what is incidental. We need to examine and take on the big challenges the new century poses for European societies.

To highlight a few: 1. Europe only has a future if it goes beyond an economic collusion. In the words of George Steiner in The Idea of Europe, ‘Europe would surely die if it didn’t fight for its languages, its local traditions and its social autonomy. People forget that God is in the detail’. Monnet’s old idea of a Europe that can be recognized by its diversity took over from De Gaulle’s outdated vision of a Europe united by interests and divided by

its states. States that day after day prove to us they are unable to resolve issues of proximity, that are not close enough to their citizens and which simultaneously show themselves to be incapable of competing in a globalized world with major emerging states thanks to their size, demography and wealth of resources.

2. The failure of a Europe of states is a magnificent opportunity for the European nations with a history that goes beyond the one belonging to the state in which they find themselves: Catalonia, Euskadi, Flanders and Scotland are set to be future states with an internal coherence and are of the perfect size to combine balanced interior and exterior trade structures, while possessing a population size and a sufficiently powerful industrial base to become successful models of the new Europe. The Eu-

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To Our Readers

ropean community has the challenge and the opportunity to recognize and promote these new political subjects. The example shown by this successful model are the existing small and middle size states that have managed to emerge more speedily and effectively from the problems that today still threaten and affect most of Europe.

3. Europe can and should learn to understand the decisive political actors on the international scene in the twenty-first century such as Brazil, South Africa, Canada, India and China. Aside from commercial competition, which may prove tough, Europe needs to face the challenge of leading the commitment to democratic values on a global scale. Europe produces and Europe consumes, but above all, Europe is a beacon of democracy, welfare and human rights, of political and cultural diversity, and the diversity of ideas, and we need to consolidate Europe as a world leader in the twenty-first century based on these values.

4. We must meet the challenge of immigration in Europe from a firm position in defence and promotion of languages, cultures and traditions that unite each and every European society. The trap of xenophobia can be avoided through unambiguous and bold arguments that spell out both the rights and the duties of immigrants with the same vigour. Universal rights are offered with the prior assumption of the inherent duties of any European citizen.

Europe has yet to see and experience a large number of waves of immigration, especially from a sub-Saharan Africa ravaged by drought and political instability, as was recently demonstrated by the humanitarian crisis in the Horn of Africa. It must do so with clear and confident ideas as to the nature of the Europe we wish to offer and see flourish.

5. The construction of Europe must be based on serious, rigid yet reasonable criteria. The Greek debacle currently affect6

ing the continent cannot be understood as the result of short-term circumstances, when Greece thoughtlessly joined the EU in 1981. At the time the relevant criteria were not adhered to. Over the ensuing thirty years it has not proved possible to straighten out a chaotic situation that has become a burden to the whole continent.

Europe needs to be built and consolidated, not broken into pieces.

6. We need to understand the profound transformation of Europe that we are experiencing. In the words of the diplomat Joan Prat, we can see how the shift from the Paris-Bonn alliance towards the ParisBerlin alliance has moved Europe’s epicentre closer to the north and more to the east.

We need to understand this new map and act accordingly. Recent events make one think that perhaps Germany has the intention of returning to ‘Mitteleuropa’ as the dominant player in Central Europe, turning its back on the project and the values akin to a Western Europe which is now in recession. The small nations and the European periphery must respond to this new map with more European feeling than ever, while reaffirming the need for a united Europe, convinced of its cultural and linguistic diversity.

The world is changing and Europe changes. It has to change. We are referring to a profound change, of going in search of a new liberating paradigm that will allow Europe and the Europeans to occupy the place we deserve on the international stage presented to us in the twenty-first century.

European nations, and Catalonia in particular, face both the challenge and the opportunity to participate with their own voice and in first person. It is not the time for regret. It is not even the time to complain about the many grievances that we appear to have. It is time to work with unity and the conviction for the tomorrow we wish future generations to inherit.

Catalan International View

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Europe

Europe and the challenge of knowledge

by Enric Canela*

Speaking of the challenge facing knowledge requires us to first consider the importance of education in Europe’s development and to appreciate the negative consequences of neglecting the education of children and young Europeans, whether natives or immigrants in terms of the economy and the welfare state.

Education not only includes a set of disciplines that allow those who receive it to attain the skills necessary to develop in the workplace in their chosen field. Much more than this, it incorporates the formation of judgment, of abstract thinking, of the ability to decide on issues that go beyond the skills needed to carry out one’s work and not only allows one to reproduce the often distorted ideas and messages that reach us every day via the media, but to create new thoughts and exercise critical thinking. It involves giving people the tools they need to be responsible citizens in the broadest sense of the word.

It also includes concepts such as knowledge, innovation and entrepreneurship.

Politically addressing the challenge of knowledge implies having previously considered the role of education. Education and knowledge are words that represent different concepts. Education provides the possibility of being able to gain knowledge and create new knowledge, and also make good use of it.

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Catalan International View

Education must be understood in its broadest, all-encompassing sense, and considered as a political objective of the highest order. How a country deals with the issue of education will determine its future. Unfortunately, all too often politicians do not see education as a political priority until the data shows their country is ranked lower than they would like. Even then, most are still not aware of the importance of having a good educational system.

For years, governments have been able to consider the education of the elites and neglect the vast majority of the population. It was necessary to educate the classes born to lead, those who provide moral concepts and a few intellectuals and scientists. The industrial age did not require more than this.

Operating a machine in a factory was mechanical work which did not require much training. In fact, the person would have fewer aspirations if their social status and education were lower.

Education was a political risk that was

best avoided. Anglo-Saxon literature is full of examples that describe this social model.

For some decades, modern societies have stopped acting or thinking in this way. Education is now available to everyone or nearly everyone in our region. This is still not the case in countries that until recently were said to be emergent.

In a few short years we have witnessed a dramatic social change. The coming of the knowledge society, which is gradually replacing industrial society, has changed the paradigm.

Something that was non-essential for the former industrial society, education for all and the provision of knowledge, has become crucial in the knowledge society. Now knowledge is a major factor of production, more important than raw materials.

Currently the developed countries, many of them poor in raw materials, cannot compete in basic manufacturing processes with countries where labour is cheap. This is not due to the lack of these materials in these countries but because in developing countries the welfare state and social rights are virtually non-existent. The maintenance of the economies of the more socially developed countries lies in their capacity to innovate and introduce knowledge into production processes, providing products that other countries are unable to produce or by achieving more efficient production processes through innovation. In other words they depend on their intellectual capital.

A significant fact related to the knowledge society is that the possibility of extrapolating from the present to predict the future has disappeared, thus condemning the society to uncertainty. For this reason, modern education should teach people how to live with uncertainty. Uncertainty is not solely concerned with the future, it is related to the validity of knowledge and af-

fects the decisions that have to be made based on uncertain knowledge.

Politically addressing the challenge of knowledge implies having previously considered the role of education If we imagine what the world will be like in a few years, perhaps we can imagine a world where the majority of countries that have already developed, economic powers like China and India, have had to respect human rights or create a welfare state similar to our own. In this imaginary future, our economies and those of such countries will compete on a theoretically equal footing.

The cheap labour that currently allows them to compete with an advantage will have disappeared and the differences Catalan International View

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will only depend on their ability to innovate. Until this happens, European countries will have no choice but to compete in order to be more innovative and have better trained human resources available to provide what the countries with cheap labour still do not provide.

The situation is not so clear, however. The countries labelled ‘emergent’ a few years ago now produce products that incorporate a great deal of knowledge and are also able to innovate and to do so with very low production costs.

The 2009 PISA Report, the latest report published by the OECD on education, shows that the leading country in student performance in reading, mathematics and science, is ShanghaiChina. Next are Korea, Finland, Hong Kong-China and Singapore. It is worth noting that the report does not show all of the regions in Asia, but the results for the regions mentioned, highly competitive nations, are spectacular.

The coming of the knowledge society, which gradually replaced industrial society, has changed the paradigm Trailing these countries are Canada, New Zealand, Japan and Australia, with the first nation of the European Union, the Netherlands, appearing in 1oth place. Europe does not do well in education. No wonder, then, that education is currently high on the agenda of the European Union, especially considering that the dropout rate for students before the completion of secondary education is very high.

Obviously, if we want to associate knowledge with the economy, we must take the next step in the education system and observe what happens in the universities, the final transmitters of the knowledge that has been produced.

Despite being imperfect and muchcriticized the best source of comparison 10

Catalan International View

are the university rankings. I personally favour the 2010-2011 World University Rankings, published annually by The Times Higher Education, but other rankings do not differ greatly in their conclusions.

According to this ranking, the majority of the 50 best universities are in the United States, with some twentynine of the total, the United Kingdom is home to five of them in 3rd, 6th, 11th, 19th and 45th place; Switzerland, Germany and Netherlands have one each, the 24th, the 48th and the 49th, respectively. Russia has the 33rd, Singapore the 27th and Hong Kong the 42nd. For its part, China has the 35th and 43rd.

Other good universities can be found in Japan and Canada. These statistics show a growing weakness of the continental European Union.

Nevertheless, if these rankings showed a perfect correlation, the United Kingdom would perform much better than Germany in the economic field.

The explanation for this paradox is that knowledge is no longer elitist and nor is it focused on the best research universities in a particular country. We must

Europe

look at the average level of all the universities in a country, at their joint capacity to transmit quality knowledge to their students and to associate themselves with the productive sectors.

An analysis of this kind would provide results consistent with the relative competitiveness of different countries and would allow us, if we make the necessary adjustments, to look at the long-term future more optimistically.

Educational policies have ensured that education now reaches everyone, but it is of a lower quality than that received by students in earlier times who were the lucky few. Education reaches more people, but the level is lower. Increasingly those who teach the teachers are less prepared. This is a vicious circle, leading to a continual fall in the quality of education. It is vital we change this

dynamic and appreciate the profession of teacher trainer as central to society if we wish the vast majority of young people to be fully incorporated into the knowledge society.

We will be committing a grave error if we see the burden of education as falling on schools alone. The errors are not theirs. Education cannot be completely outsourced, the role of the family and society are irreplaceable.

The best education systems are those in which both the family and the local education authority are involved.

It has been shown that children who begin their schooling with low intellectual capital find it more difficult to learn. Students who lack educational experience and vocabulary tend to fail and increasingly fall behind. They are unable to catch up through special attention in the classroom, as the attention only causes further delay and global failure. This delay has to be addressed in the early stages of education or it will never be resolved, and this is not something the teacher can do alone in the classroom. As schooling advances, the gap between the more able and less able students widens.

Therefore, in order to improve the results we need to improve awareness and educate families, creating environments conducive to educational development.

Addressing the challenge of knowledge forces us to make significant changes in the global educational model, and not just in schools. Without doing so, our only hope is that other countries do worse than we do. *Enric Canela

(Barcelona, 1949). Holds a Chemistry degree from the Universitat de Barcelona (UB, 1972) and a PhD in Chemistry with Biochemistry as his specialisation (UB, 1976). Lecturer at the UB since 1974, he is Full Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in the department of the same name in the Biology Faculty of the UB. He collaborates in research on intracellular communication and biochemical theory. He regularly publishes books and contributes to scientific journals of international renown. Between September 2007 and April 2009 he was president of the Society for Knowledge. Between June 2007 and June 2011 he was patron of the National Agency for Quality Assessment and Accreditation (ANECA) for the Spanish state.

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The Outraged: the symptom and the disease

by Vicent Sanchis*

The financial crisis has struck a blow to Southern Europe due to its widespread economic effects on a global scale and the manner in which each country has been affected in a unique way. Some time ago the most skilled and sarcastic analysts in the English-speaking press coined the term PIGS to refer to the effect the economies undergoing a recession (Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain) might have on the stability of the Eurozone economies. Ironically, not so many years ago the same media organizations that used this harsh and contemptuous acronym were enthusing about the ‘Irish miracle’ or even the ‘Spanish miracle’. Equally ironically, the international financial crisis, which has taken to the streets of Athens, has a very specific origin in the United States’ mortgage and banking system, which filled the international markets with toxic products, causing a chain reaction that has ultimately ended up overwhelming the more fragile and precarious economies, however solid they may have appeared a few years before.

Catalonia is one of those economies.

Its model is solid and diversified, but in the last decade it had undergone, using the same Anglo-Saxon sense of humour we might say ‘suffered’, excessively rapid growth centred on the construction sector. To sum up the situation with one statistic: in the first five years of this century Spain built twice as many houses as all the other European states put together. This frenzy for urban development had as its principle base the Mediterranean coast 12

Catalan International View

and, therefore, Catalonia. The boom experienced by the sector led to price increases and it also attracted hundreds of thousands of workers. Specifically in Catalonia, between the years 2000 and 2008 nearly one and a half million immigrants came here from non-EU countries. This influx of manpower was required to meet the growing demand for urban development and to provide for the service industries it required.

The collapse of the sector, and the entire system which it gave rise to and which

fed off of the speculation in the housing market, has resulted in extremely high unemployment rates approaching some 20 percent of the workforce, a figure that is twice as high for the young (between 16 and 24 years of age).

These figures, keeping in mind the extent of ‘invisible’ employment in the black economy, inevitably lead to a situation of social tension. This is precisely the case in Catalonia, where xenophobic political parties have begun to garner more support and where in the last lo-

However much they are said to be inspired by the Arab Spring in the Mediterranean Muslim nations, the protests in Spain and Catalonia had nothing in common with it

cal elections of March 2011, the leading Spanish conservative party, the Partido Popular (People’s Party), took a hostile line against recent immigration, seeing it as being directly linked to crime.

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There are underlying causes, therefore, that may explain why tensions are rising among society’s disadvantaged classes. Even more so when we note that the middle classes have begun to rapidly lose wealth. Not surprisingly when we consider that so far the only measures taken both by the Spanish state and the Catalan government have been budget adjustments, the drastic reduction in spending and investment, and cuts in benefits which were unsustainable. For many people, including major trade unions and political parties on the left, the ‘financiers, politicians 14

Catalan International View

and the corrupt’ have caused the crisis and the ‘workers’ have to pay the consequences.

In this context in Spain, on the 15th of May this year, an outraged protest movement (led by the ‘indignados’, or outraged) spontaneously erupted via social networks, and came to be popularly known as 15-M. It was a poorly articulated protest against the system in general, for failing to allow personal or social responsibility, together with all the evils usually blamed on ‘those in power’. Up until now it has mainly expressed itself through demonstrations

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to most of Europe, to Catalonia, to Spain, is simply untrue. Nevertheless, since there are reasons to be outraged about something, there always have been and there always will be, these ideas have fallen on the sympathetic ears of numerous theoreticians of the old Spanish left (a particularly curious case being Federico Mayor Oreja, who was secretary general of UNESCO, but who previously had a long political career in the service of the Franco dictatorship) who have been quick to play a key role.

At one time or another the protests have called for the entire system to be overhauled while demanding that there should be no reduction in social services

and gatherings in the main squares of major cities. The movement was born out of disappointment, frustration, helplessness and a lack of prospects. It was home to rather sparse theoretical contributions, such as Stéphane Hessel’s pamphlet Indignez-vous! [Time for Outrage], from which the movement took its name and sentiment.

Hessel’s theses are superficial and highly dubious. As questionable as the one that proclaims, while providing little evidence, that, ‘the divide between the rich and the poor has never been so wide’. A statement that, when applied

Spain’s outraged movement has had a disproportionate impact on the international media, which has served to make it even more appealing as the current leading social phenomenon.

Somewhat paradoxically this excessive interest can serve to make the movement less understandable. Catalonia has its own peculiarities. The core of the protest was based in Barcelona’s Plaça de Catalunya. A first attempt at eviction, with the official excuse that it was necessary to clean the area and remove any dangerous objects on the same day that Barcelona FC were to play in the European Cup final, triggered heavy clashes with the police and subsequently a strong social movement in support. A few days later, the outraged surrounded the Catalan Parliament and tried to prevent access by MPs who were due to debate a revised budget proposal. The initiative received the attention and the rejection of Stéphane Hessel himself. Nevertheless, a few days later, on the 19th of June, the movement recovered its social imCatalan International View

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pact by convening a demonstration that drew tens of thousands of people.

Now that the supporters of the protest seem to have given in to the heat of summer by withdrawing from the square to the suburbs, where they state they will convene assemblies to debate ‘proposals’, it is time to make an assessment. Firstly, it should be said that however much the protests in Spain and Catalonia may have been inspired by the Arab Spring in the Mediterranean Muslim nations, they had nothing in common, despite what some short-sighted analysts argue in the international press. The outraged have made a significant impact on the media and have garnered widespread, but rather passive social support. There exists the problem (the recession and the social unrest that arises from it) and the outraged symptom. However, this is not the only symptom and it has many weaknesses that dilute it to the point where it can almost disappear. Beyond the specific protests there is very little substance. They call for the entire system to be overhauled for instance, while demanding that there should be no reduction in social services; it has made demands that no administration is able to fulfill, such as increases in unemployment benefits and a reduction in the retirement age; it has questioned representative democracy in the name of ‘real’ or ‘participatory’ democracy yet it was unable to find leaders or spokespeople, drowned out by the slogan ‘No one represents us’. It is easy to find the

nerve of populism under this muscular reflex. A populism which is apparently of the left, while receiving support from small groups on the extreme right. In Catalonia, there were those who have criticized the movement for either deliberately or accidentally diluting in a sea of unified Spanish sentiment the Catalan protest movement, which in recent years has rapidly increased its independent spirit.

It is easy to be outraged, but committing oneself, as Stéphane Hessel calls on us to do, is much more difficult. The protest by the outraged gained the sympathy of thousands of people in society who feel anxious and upset, and rightly so, for the serious structural flaws in the system, for the impunity with which those who are responsible for the many ills in society behave and the inability of politicians to make the representative democratic system more participatory and honest. But the phenomenon has not gone further. Articulating constructive proposals immediately raises insurmountable differences that break the unity originally found in the rejection. Perhaps the outraged movement will remain as one more symptom of a disease which will take a long time to cure, that won’t respond to superficial or easy solutions. What is clear is that in agitated times such as these we should ask journalists and everyone in the communication sector to be as professional and honest as possible. Neither Catalonia nor Spain are Tunisia.

*Vicent Sanchis (Valencia, 1961). Holds a degree in Information Sciences from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. In his career as a journalist it is worth highlighting that he has worked and collaborated on many publications and with numerous publishers; he has been editor and director of El Temps magazine, director of Setze magazine, the Catalan supplement of Cambio 16, and director of the newspapers El Observador and Avui. He has also excelled as a scriptwriter and director on different TV programmes. At present he is president of the editorial board of Avui, and vicepresident of Òmnium Cultural. Vicent is also a lecturer in the Faculty of Communication Sciences at Universitat Ramon Llull in Barcelona.

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Interview

Joaquim Maria Puyal ‘The concealment of the truth exceeds the journalist’s ability to uncover it’ Interviewed by Eva Piquer*

Photos by Xabier Miquel Laburu

Joaquim Maria Puyal (Barcelona, 1949) is a communicator from head to toe. He is a presenter who seduces the listener with his gaze, his voice and his gestures. He holds a PhD in Linguistics from the Universitat de Barcelona, he presented and directed numerous programmes on Catalan public television which are still missed by the viewers twenty years on. The Puyal brand is a guarantee of quality, a job well done and a passion for journalism. His work for both radio and television has done a great deal for the linguistic normalisation of the Catalan language, which for forty years suffered persecution at the hands of the Franco regime. Puyal’s commentaries on Futbol Club Barcelona matches have been broadcast in Catalan since 1976. In his book ‘Aicnàlubma’, this veteran journalist reflects on television’s social responsibility and defends the viewer’s rights.

You’re seen as a master journalist. Are you comfortable with this role?

I feel responsible for passing on my experience to people who want to do this job. I see it more as a commitment than a compliment. The transfer of knowledge is characteristic of humans: the older generation teaches their craft to apprentices.

You are a benchmark for generations of communicators. Did you aspire to this when you started? It seems to me you’ve always wanted to go a little beyond the day-to-day routine.

I have always had a sense of the importance of our work, rather than for myself in particular. A person who speaks on the radio or TV influences the way events are viewed, whether they like it or not.

I belong to the generation that was at university when Franco died. It was down to us to start using Catalan in the media. Not because we were charged with doing so by the gods, but because it was our job at that historic moment. It’s in this vision of

transcendence where my great disappointment lies.

I can’t complain about anything on a personal level: I’ve worked for many years with a lot of enthusiasm, with a lot of success and with a lot of plaudits. But I am hugely disappointed to see that the industrial fabric of our society doesn’t sufficiently reflect our identity, our culture, our way of seeing the world and life. When I refer to ‘us’ I mean the Catalans, and I appreciate that catalanitat is a value which (like all identites) is not monolithic, not fixed, not self-contained, which is evolving and has imprecise limits. But we understand each other when we talk about ‘us’. If we didn’t it would mean we don’t exist as a group any longer.

You say that journalism is an endangered profession.

Can it still be saved?

I believe in human evolution: throughout history humans have overcome critical situations, and current threats can also be overcome, though don’t ask me how. However, the concealment of the truth ex-

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Interview

ceeds our individual ability as journalists to uncover it. It is in a dirty alliance with the economic, social and political structures. The system makes people believe what it wants them to believe, via the media.

When it’s convenient to make us believe Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, when it’s convenient for a military coup to be seen as an uprising of salvation, when it’s convenient for a self-confessed terrorist like Bin Laden not to stand trial but to be killed outright and for them to tell us he wasn’t assassinated. Faced with all this, we can’t be anything more than a docile means of transmitting power.

The figure of the free, committed journalist is in crisis and the economic recession does nothing to help the survival of this type of professional...

Often liberty and commitment end where the mortgage or the children’s school fees begin. I’m very lucky because, as a result of the success my work has had I don’t have economic problems and I can state my opinion with more freedom. But journalists can’t do much on their own, we need platforms through which we can express ourselves (our companies and the media in general) and which have a certain capacity to accept the alternative view and to be complimentary, as well as diverse.

This is incredibly difficult to achieve as they are normally related to pressure groups or large holding companies. It’s true that freedom of thought and 20

individual freedom of opinion have more or less been in crisis in all cultures and in all societies. Gay Talese, a pioneer of new journalism, said a short time ago that it would be tragic if journalism was reduced to Facebook or blogs. Therefore we have to find the solution between everyone. For my part, in ‘Aicnàlubma’ I suggest a social idea: journalism and television are social activities which have to provide social returns. The viewer has rights.

Does a journalist have a social responsibility above all else?

I repeat that before anything else the journalist has a mortgage and children to support. We have to keep our feet firmly on the ground; our activities form part of a profession that is part of a system.

But, within this system, the media has an enormous influence on our social perception of reality. For this reason I believe that there should be ways to protect the media and the rights of the consumer. A private group can have a clinic, but the clinic can’t do whatever it wants: good medical practice has to be maintained. Good journalistic practice also has to be guaranteed by social coverage. We need to progress in our right to reliable information. The profession ought to act against the publication of lies.

This would penalise the media empires that think there are no limits and that they can conduct business as they like. Calling for rules of this kind isn’t

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Interview

an outdated romantic attitude, but rather a healthy idea for the future.

‘There are a lot of people who worry about the death of newspapers but few people who worry about the death of journalism’, you once stated.

This is due to the strong influence of the economic interests from the business world. Through a process of osmosis we have come to believe that their economic interests are also our own. People ask me if I’ve sold a lot of books. I’d rather that less people bought them and the readers tell me they’re interesting than sell more and that they’re not read.

A book is not a simple commercial product. Now Barça [Barcelona Football Club] are going to wear a shirt publicising the Qatar Foundation. They say that it’s for economic reasons and no one objects.

But maybe a significant number of club members would have preferred to pay a higher membership fee or that they recruited one less player a year so they could continue with UNICEF on their chests.

You’ve never stopped being a radio man, and following the dictatorship you were one of the pioneers of radio in Catalan. Did you have a clear idea of what you wanted to address, communicatively speaking, right from the start?

I come from an immigrant family. My father was from Aragon and my mother was half Aragonese and Catalan. They had a really hard time during the war, one of my uncles died in a concentration camp and my grandparents had to emigrate. When I was born, they didn’t talk about politics much in my house. I went to a school run by priests who taught in Spanish. When I began to work for the radio and went to university, everyone spoke Catalan at home and in my neighbourhood, but on the radio and at university everyone used Spanish. After working on the radio for a few years, one evening I suddenly thought: ‘I speak to all my colleagues in the office in Catalan, so how come we speak Spanish on air?’ . This incredibly simple question opened my eyes. When the dictator died it occurred to me that I could suggest we broadcast Barça matches in Catalan. I was working for a company in Madrid, Cadena SER, and couldn’t count on the management agreeing to the idea. However, at the time I had the support of the director of Ràdio Barcelona, Manolo Terán, who was a free-thinking democrat, who has been unfairly forgotten. He told me that we could

try and present the idea to Madrid, so long as it didn’t cost them money. We were lucky enough to have La Caixa [savings bank] as a sponsor. We went to Madrid and asked if we could broadcast football in Catalan on an FM frequency (which at the time almost nobody used). The managing director asked me, ‘will they understand you?’ . That question underlines the complete lack of appreciation of our reality in 1976 by someone in charge in Madrid. We’ve made very little progress in this area in the last 35 years.

Often liberty and commitment end where the mortgage or the children’s school fees begin Why do they still not understand us?

Because we’re not in charge. Those who are in charge continue to explain things in keeping with their interests and we always have to operate reactively, or by adapting ourselves to the situation. Personal militancy is relative, variable and makes few demands: everyone obviously has their own priorities. The fact that we don’t have our own communication network hasn’t helped either, and for this I blame the politicians and businesses. The absence of a strong private business initiative in Catalonia in Catalan will make a big impact if we don’t find a solution in a very short time. We are inundated by communications which are not produced with a Catalan mentality to an extent unheard-of throughout the rest of our history. On TV, with the expansion of digital channels, this effect has been particularly evident. We are being faced with a massive frontal assault.

More than once you’ve said that you regret not having been able to create a Catalan media group...

While privately I’ve received all kinds of prizes and rewards that I don’t deserve, as a citizen I complain about it. We lack an industry which is prepared to spread the message of our culture and our identity.

Have you completely given up trying to start a private media project?

I always find it difficult to give up on something.

One of the few abilities I have for operating in this world is of always having done what I’ve set out to do. I acted when they wanted to sell Cadena 13, and I joined forces with Grupo Zeta to obtain a conces-

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Interview

sion of frequencies, but they only gave us three.

Think about it, 35 years after the general’s death and we don’t have a competitive private TV channel in Catalan in Catalonia. Instead we’re invaded by a load of private Spanish channels. Where’s our industry? What do our politicians do with the frequencies? We’ve only got TV3, which isn’t very clear on what model it should be following, we’ve got public radio that suffers the same problems as TV3 and that’s your lot. In terms of radio we have the really valuable growth of RAC1, but there’s very little else. Our children and fellow citizens receive all kind of communications in a language other than our own, with metaphors which aren’t our own, with content and scenarios which aren’t our own. The decline in the quality of our language and its social usage in the last twenty-five years is undeniable, and in a sense the mass media is largely responsible. The Catalan that was secretly spoken in Catalonia during the Franco period had a lot more vitality than what’s spoken nowadays in public in Barcelona.

In the case of languages which are in contact within the same group, the more potent language gains ground and always ends up winning on a practical level You’ve always had the desire to help Catalan. You’re even a member of the philological section of the Catalan Institute of Studies (IEC).

No one would say to Iñaki Gabilondo or David Letterman that they’ve done a lot for the Spanish or English language just because they’ve spent a lifetime speaking in Spanish or English. I’ve simply tried to act with the same logic as they have.

But here we have a minoritised language. Your TV programmes and football commentaries have done a lot for the linguistic normalisation of Catalan.

I’ve tried to use the language, without trying to invent anything else: language invents itself. You need to start by assuming that people know what their language is and that they respect it. The problem becomes serious when we no longer really know what our language is or that we even despise it. This is the most dramatic and significant sign of the degeneration of our linguistic awareness.

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When Universitat Rovira i Virgili awarded you an honorary doctorate you said, ‘either we get to work or we’ll lose our language’. Who has to get to work? The speakers of Catalan? The politicians?

It’s very difficult for individuals to act: people have more pressing problems than saving their language.

At the end of the day, language is an instrument for communicating, for relating to one another and understanding each other. Understanding helps make life easier and more pleasant. Language has a practical element; it makes no sense as a sacred object.

It only makes sense to the extent to which it is used on the street, in the markets, in business, in bed, at school, in restaurants. When they make a group of people believe they have two mother tongues they are obliging them to unnecessarily double their effort. You don’t need to have two languages, in the same way as you don’t need to have two cars outside your door. This is the contradiction of bilingualism.

Polyglot individuals are a different matter. But in the case of languages which are in contact within the same group, the more potent language gains ground and always ends up winning on a practical level. Catalan can’t compete with a media which speaks as badly as it can, or which speaks directly in another language. It’s very unlikely we can win in the end with only the goodwill of a few, without a political structure as support, or a degree of social prestige and a media industry that shares the feeling of belonging to a language. One day our children will say to us, ‘I just want to understand my classmates. Don’t force me to have a testimonial linguistic attitude belonging to another age’. This is the big risk. It’s obvious that languages, like everything in life, end up dying one day.

The president of the IEC, Salvador Giner, stated that, ‘with our own state Catalan’s survival would be guaranteed’.

He’s probably right. But I’m not so sure that having our own state is the only means to ensure Catalan survives. The Flemish have been able to defend their own language without having their own state, thanks to them having a sufficiently strong linguistic awareness.

According to the writer Jaume Cabré, ‘trying to ensure the survival of our language is now a good enough reason to work for this country’s political independence’. Do you agree?

Catalan International View

It’s easy to agree with Jaume, but let’s say that when we speak about language, we Catalans have been incapable of projecting ourselves as we should and demanding our own capacities within the existing limits of autonomy. Nowadays people could already be linguistically independent, Madrid doesn’t have to give us linguistic independence: each and every one of us could have it by speaking in Catalan, writing in Catalan and singing ‘campions’ [champions] in Barça’s stadium instead of ‘campeones’. It seems like a contradiction that everyone talks about independence now that it’s in fashion, when there are a series of independences which we could have right now and we don’t use them.

Now in 2011 with print journalism in crisis, there are more newspapers in Catalan on Catalan newspaper stands than ever. Is this a good sign?

I’m sure it is. The problem is that the social usage of Catalan isn’t sufficiently guaranteed. It’s not the same having a newspaper that’s been translated, however good the translation may be, than a newspaper written in the language itself. In Valencia it’s hard to find newspapers in Catalan. How come, with the linguistic domain of Catalan you can’t find

the most important newspapers written in Catalan?

From a linguistic point of view this robs us of structure and harms us.

You say you’re in love with TV, but you’ve got divorced. Fifteen years ago you stopped making TV in order to reflect on it. What were the irreconcilable differences which led to the divorce?

I was interested in broadcasting certain content, making sure they got large audiences, while the people who offered me work demanded large audiences but they weren’t bothered about the content.

It’s really hard fighting for viewers if you create interesting messages, trying to make them attractive, when your competitors produce attractive messages that are of no interest. I wasn’t prepared to commit myself to such an uneven fight, where the system was against me and the referees were against me.

Should public TV commit itself to quality even at the expense of the ratings, in order to avoid falling into the so-called ‘genre addiction’?

Private TV channels have contaminated the language to such an extent that you yourself have referred to it as public TV, as if private TV had no

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Interview

obligations. It’s in the interests of the owners of the private channels to instil the idea that they can do whatever they like while public TV is subject to parliamentary quotas, varying degrees of intervention depending on the political party in power and a series of constraints which are a hindrance, rather than ensuring that the management is appropriate.

The deterioration of TV is a worldwide phenomenon...

It’s pretty much worldwide, yes. But the deterioration of the Spanish private channels is following the Italian model, which is the worst in the world.

Do you think the quality of TV3 is similar to the best TV channels in the world?

The world is a big place and there’s a lot of TV channels. In spite of its difficulties, TV3 maintains certain principles and it’s our great cultural cornerstone. It’s a tragedy that we have a very poor communication network, because, as I said earlier, we don’t have competitive private broadcasters, because the concession of licences accepts the broadcasting of insignificant and irrelevant programmes, because our major media organizations do business in Spanish, because the idea that TV is expensive has taken hold, because there’s a lack of will to bring together professionals to create competitive, winning projects…

Life’s about believing in something and acting according to your own convictions With the Internet and social networks the number of outlets has increased and it looks like everyone can have the right to their own say, even if they express opinions which aren’t respectable or which haven’t been opposed.

When we say ‘everyone’ we forget that half the world lives in disgraceful conditions don’t we? Here, in the name of freedom we state that everyone has the right to say what they like. But this right to the freedom of expression shouldn’t be confused with the right to disseminate messages in public without verifying them in advance. It’s like the pilot before take-off asking their passengers what altitude they want to fly at and what route they want to take.

If journalism is a profession it’s because it requires expertise. This expertise brings knowledge, working 24

methods and a commitment to being scrupulous.

Without these three elements one shouldn’t be allowed to broadcast collective messages on industrial networks. Social networks are a different matter, where everyone says what they like and everyone knows what it’s all about.

You’ve been broadcasting football matches for many years. In the absence of a state and a national sports team, do you think Barça serves as Catalonia’s ambassador abroad?

We Catalans have a certain reticence when it comes to appearing in public. It’s easier for Barça to appear abroad as a Spanish team that as a Catalan team because in many places they don’t know anything about Catalonia, and they probably don’t even know much about Spain. It’s hard to visualise Catalonia abroad.

It’s for precisely this reason that Barça can help us teach people.

Pep Guardiola has proven himself to be a magnificent teacher by saying that he’ll answer questions in Catalan anywhere in the world. All the Catalan universities should immediately award him an honorary doctorate for this reason alone. No one in this country with the ability to reach the masses has ever done as much for the use, the prestige and the awareness of Catalan in the outside world than Guardiola. But this has got more to do with Guardiola’s personal desire than his institutional position or the collective attitude of Barça’s current board, members or fans.

If Barça was no more than a club, would you perhaps have grown tired of following them?

When Gamper founded Barça he didn’t intend to make anything more than a club. Barça began to become more than a club because people saw that it was a way of saying what they couldn’t say. We give it the sheen of representing us. When people in Fuentealbilla see Iniesta with a Barça shirt, they don’t see this sheen. And they also call themselves fans. Now Barça has become a social phenomenon, partly because we win. But we’d stop seeing the shirts you see nowadays in Tahiti, Peru and Hong Kong if Barça lost. It’s not so much thanks to a marketing or communication strategy: it’s thanks to the ball, that it goes in the goal! All in all Guardiola is the catalyst for this. Behind him there is a

Catalan International View

Interview

group of people who pat themselves on the back.

But the model the club follows isn’t that solid. The vision of Barça as ambassadors for Catalanism is not that certain either. And the idea of being ‘more than a football club’ has many meanings, and we’ll have to see how it evolves.

used at home and not for going to Turkey, the press conference will be held in Spanish and that’s that.

In order to defend our language we should say that without a Catalan translator there’ll be no press conference. Barça should make it clear that the club’s lingua franca is Catalan.

Barça’s successes have helped us to get rid of our complexes. We Catalans are short on self-esteem, and at least now we can display our barcelonisme with pride.

But we Catalans would feel even more proud if Messi spoke in Catalan, and if the club didn’t have doubts about aspects related to its image. Barça isn’t clear on which language it should speak when it goes to Germany for example.

Are you optimistic, in spite of everything?

I see the possibilities, more than anything. Maybe Guardiola isn’t an optimist, but he’s shown that it’s possible to speak Catalan to the outside world. You don’t need to be an optimist to try and do what you can. Life’s about believing in something and acting according to your own convictions. Maybe you’ll never achieve everything you’re trying to do, but at least you can move in the right direction.

With a state behind us, such details wouldn’t be an issue.

Perhaps not. But with what we’ve got now Barça could tell UEFA that the club uses Catalan and that they need a Catalan-German translator when they play in Germany. It seems like the club isn’t always interested in doing this. Imagine we go to Turkey and there’s no translator from Catalan to Turkish. If Barça considers it has a language to be

What do you value most in life?

Goodness and honesty, I suppose.

What do you prefer, beauty or intelligence?

The question seems a bit odd to me: they’re not mutually exclusive concepts. I find intelligence to be an extremely potent force, but I admit to being defeated and overcome by beauty.

*Eva Piquer Writer and cultural journalist. Works for several newspapers and magazines. Has been a lecturer at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and a New York news correspondent. Won the 2002 Josep Pla prize for her novel Una victòria diferent (A Different Victory). Also author of several books, including La noia del temps (The Weather Girl), Alícia al país de la televisió (Alice in Television Land) and No sóc obsessiva, no sóc obsessiva, no sóc obsessiva (I’m Not Obsessive, I’m Not Obsessive, I’m Not Obsessive). Her latest book is called La feina o la vida (Life or work).

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Business and Economics

Greece.

Act I comedy, Act II tragedy

by Guillem Lopez-Casasnovas*

I was recently invited by the Financial Times to give a lecture in Athens. My visit gave me the opportunity to discuss with friends and renowned economists, some of the events being read with great interest in the international press these days on the Greek crisis, with the aim of gaining some insights for a better understanding of the situation which, as the title suggests, started as a comedy and may end as a tragedy.

It should be said from the start that it is surprising that the problems of such a small country, with a GDP equal to that of Catalonia, should generate such a volume of newsprint and such concern in the Western world. It is likely that if Greece did not belong to the Eurozone, the issue would not have made the TV news more than a couple of times.

There would have been coverage of the devaluation of its currency and the ensuing impoverishment and that would have been that. The fact that Greece is in the common monetary area gives its internal situation a disproportionate relevance of some magnitude. The Greek government’s declaration of bankruptcy, and its failure to repay its debt, regardless of possible knock-on effects and the bad example it sets for creditors of other indebted nations, has created a paralysis in the system of payments and repayments among national banks. The Euro26

Catalan International View

pean Central Bank’s (ECB) assets may suffer heavy losses, as a result of providing the Italian, Spanish, Potuguese and Greek governments with liquidity in exchange for pledging debt securities that in the Greek case have now be shown to be worthless. There have also been other effects that some had thought may lead to the end of the Euro. At the very least it has undermined the credibility of the political independence of the ECB, when it is well known that the ECB’s losses are shared between everyone and Spain is responsible for around 10%!

Moreover, creditors who have been ‘stung’ are unlikely to once again lend money to a government that defaults on its payments.

In this very uncertain setting, given the level of public debt the Greeks have and their proven inability to collect taxes, their social collapse would be also guaranteed.

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If loans continue to be approved it will buy some time while the errors are addressed, but nothing will change if this elderly country does not change itself. Indeed, part of the loan will never reach the empty pockets of the Greeks since it will be spent on their behalf to pay private creditors who have agreed to renegotiate part of the debt that will not be repaid. Cleaned up in time, only the public creditor would have remained and this would have presumably been the best time to conduct a ‘quit’ on a large scale or to pardon the debt, this time only at the expense of European taxpayers. Otherwise, no Greek government could hope to find a way out by returning its loans at the current interest rate (of around 17% and more). Suffice it to say that this hidden healing in favour of private banks clearly avoided future evils, but it is still rewarding the reckless, who

gave credit at extremely high interest for a risk that was finally covered by the public bailout. This means it has allowed for the enrichment of those who held onto the debt without selling it.

Those who forecasted a likely failure, via their CDS (Credit Default Swaps), a way to protect themselves in case of default, didn’t entirely get away with it.

It is worth noting that neither was it certain that the wholesale insurers who dealt in these titles would pay out, since many of them could in this instance go bankrupt. Moreover, a loan that is extended for a few more years gives extra time, which could become a waste of time if the Greek government fails to take seriously the measures required to re-establish the macroeconomic balance.

Of all the arguments I heard in Athens, my closest colleagues emphasized a more sociological rather than Catalan International View

The Parthenon, Athens

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economic version of events. Political patronage and corruption is a form of cancer that has been going on for many years in Greece and that right now perhaps even the IMF’s most aggressive chemotherapy will be unable to eradicate. Such is the advanced state of decomposition in which the social body of the beautiful Hellenic Republic finds itself.

While some Greek politicians and public trade unionists seem to see the situation as a great comedy to be continued, the associated social economic cutbacks lead to authentic tragedies which the former try to avoid by transferring them to the most vulnerable sectors of the population Let’s take a closer look. Since the 80s, Papandreou’s father (Andreas), a socialist, but with the acquiescence of the Conservative party, wove a web of influences, logrolling and transfers from grateful pockets, with the money that began to pour in from the European Union in the name of solidarity.

Runaway expenditure and the creation of futile public employment, fees for contributions and perks which are not the result of a productive effort, became common knowledge. Without having a significant administrative track record, the ruling parties, with union support for the public sector, have appointed administrative directors, managers of public services and have generally created employment with no other merit than party membership and the fact of being close to power and the ruling families. An extreme form of dual employment with higher salaries in the public sector than in the private sector, with no regard for productivity is also present. Even today social security still allows for retirement at an average age 28

Catalan International View

of 48, if one has worked for a certain number of years in the public sector. To make it worse, whenever the party in power has changed they have increased rather than replaced the posts in order to cover up the shameful quotas between them. Those who still think that the reactivation of new lines of credit will allow the status quo to continue are in the majority: they form part of the farce. It includes the unions and public employees who openly want to maintain the benefits they have achieved, with the continued complicity of some elements of the political party apparatus, while private sector employees suffer the most. It’s a comedy for the privileged classes and a tragedy for the most vulnerable.

It is true that Spain is not Greece, although it is possible to see some similarities that highlight the importance for the Spanish state for it to make some of the changes that the Spaniards call on the European Union to make.

It is common sense that transfers by countries in the name of solidarity should be given on certain conditions to make sure that they are spent correctly for once. Transfers which it must be made clear won’t be maintained forever, since among other negative aspects they may even erode, rather than help, the strength of the entrepreneurial sector and damage productive capital, driven by more easily accessible money from grants and the financial mediation committees than by work effort. Spain has much less public debt (half of the Greeks’); it still has a productive economy and a foreign sector that sufficiently pushes its export capacity. Nevertheless, Spain’s civil servants retain certain privileges, from job security to certain prerogatives in social rights (such as access to free health insurance, unlike other citizens), they suffer from a high level of absenteeism, and relations between the political and business classes are

sometimes rather embarrassing. We have well known entrepreneurial leaders who have been prosecuted for illegal conduct, tax fraud and for abusing their dominant position, as the courts have recognized, through the use of privileged information to earn profits for them and theirs... Most of them have received very light punishment or have simply got away with it due to the statute of limitations, their age or thanks to a political reprieve. This clearly shows the importance of being alert to institutional deterioration and social capital, something which is easy to lose and difficult to subsequently recover.

The truth is citizen cultures are not improvised, they grow out of honesty.

There are factors of social perception which do not change overnight, and which are now so prevalent in Greece, and yet can barely be detected in the Spanish context.

We should recognize and appreciate the difficulty of the adjustments currently asked of the Greek population.

The benefits derived from an excess of public spending which up to now has been financed by someone else, must be paid for, sooner or later, when the other finally says ‘enough’. The community’s acceptance of spreading fiscal compliance is now not so easily accepted by those who thought that everything was free.

The situation which these cultures reflect is in stark contrast to most of the Anglo-Saxon tradition, in which

some union practices or company codes would have stood up to the least public scrutiny. This demonstrates that often major economic and social transformations come more from changes in mentalities than a supposed foreign intervention, which are often viewed as hostile (it is easy to see them as a common enemy), which are seen as an imposition and it is hoped are temporary.

The Greek context highlights errors in the entire system: those who thought they were very smart and those who without being so have been able to take advantage of the situation and they are willing even now to stick to their own beneficial agenda. *Guillem López-Casasnovas

(Menorca, 1955). Holds a degree in Economics (distinction, 1978) and Law (1979) from the Universitat de Barcelona (UB). He obtained his PhD in Public Economics from the University of York (UK, 1984).

He has been a lecturer at the UB, visiting scholar at the Institute of Social and Economic Research (UK), University of Sussex and at the Graduate School of Business at the University of Stanford (USA). Since June 1992 has been full professor of economics at Barcelona’s Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF), where he has been vice-rector of Economics and International Relations and dean of the School of Economics and Business Science. In 1998 he created the Economics and Health Research Centre (CRES- UPF), which he directed until recently. Co-director of the Master’s in Public Management (UPF-UAB-EAPC). In 2000 he received the Catalan Economics Society Award and in 2001 the Joan Sardà Dexeus Award. He is also a member of the Menorcan Institute of Studies, The Catalan Royal Academy of Medicine and a distinguished member of the Economists’ Society of Catalonia. President of the International Health Economics Association and since 2005 one of the Spanish Central Bank’s six independent Council members.

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Catalonia: ‘Spain’s factory’ with a feeble financial sector

by Antoni Serra-Ramoneda*

Writing about the Catalan financial system is quite a challenge when the situation is so unsettled. While banking organizations all over Europe are subject to reforms, changes in ownership and their mode of operation, with the situation being even more agitated in Spain, in Catalonia we may witness a veritable tsunami by the end of this year. It is impossible to predict what the outcome will be once the waters recede. One thing that is certain is that the situation will be completely different from when the financial crisis began, accompanied by the building crisis, back in 2007.

The Catalan economy has always had one contradiction: although from the industrial point of view it is potent at the Spanish level (which explains why our country is nicknamed ‘Spain’s factory’), its indigenous financial system is rather weak. The various collective attempts to create a noteworthy bank in keeping with Catalan industry have ended in failure, as Joan Sardà and Lluc Beltran recount in their classic study. In 1920 the Barcelona Bank went bankrupt, in an attempt by the heroic Manuel Girona to provide us with a modern banking entity capable of financing new initiatives. In 1931 the Bank of Catalonia went the same way after a troubled history. These two failures, alongside others of secondary importance, led some people to believe that Catalans lacked the genetic code needed for initiatives which require 30

Catalan International View

a collective effort such as those called for in the banking business. This myth took on new life when, during the closing years of the Franco era, Jordi Pujol decided to acquire a modest bank in Olot, change its name to Banca Catalana (Catalan Bank), and undertake a crusade to make up for the absence of a local financial force, thus allowing it to redress the strangulation faced by many investment projects due to lack of support. This attempt also failed in the midst of the post-dictatorship Transition following an arduous journey. The Catalan Bank ended up being consumed by the BBVA, the second biggest Spanish bank. It was another disappointment to add to the list.

What were the essential traits of the Catalan financial system when the economic crisis erupted? One can basically identify four: The first was the

Business and Economics

strong influence of the financial, banking middlemen in funnelling savings toward investments. The small size of our companies made it difficult for them to have direct access to capital markets, which meant they had to rely on the banking system, or self-financing, to obtain the resources needed for them to function correctly. Secondly, the strong presence of non-Catalan banks with an extensive network of offices in our country. Only the Banc de Sabadell made a relatively significant impact, but it was a long way behind Santander and BBVA, two Hispanic titans. Thirdly, there is the difficulty of obtaining resources in the long term, given the preference for shortterm formulas, thus leading to fragile structures in our industrial fabric. And fourthly, last but certainly not least, the great importance of a particular type of

entity which is difficult to classify both legally as well as economically: the savings bank.

The former headquarter’s of Banca Catalana, Barcelona

In spite of the lack of ability the Catalans displayed in the world of commercial banks, in the field of savings banks they got it just right Paradoxically, in spite of the lack of ability the Catalans displayed in the world of commercial banks, in the field of savings banks they got it just right.

It is true that these had proliferated throughout Spain, but they are much more common in our country. Two statistics back up this claim. Firstly, of the 45 savings banks which operated in Spain, ten had their headquarters in Catalonia, including some of the most Catalan International View

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Business and Economics

The headquarters of La Caixa, Barcelona

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important, such as La Caixa de Pensions, known as La Caixa, which stood and still stands head and shoulders above the rest. Secondly, when one considers the distribution of offices between banks and savings banks one sees that in Catalonia the latter far outstrips the former in terms of sheer numbers.

Consequently, the effects the economic crisis may have on this type of banking organisation will have greater impact in Catalonia.

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In general savings banks are more fragile than banks for three reasons: The first is the shortage of their own resources which, logically leads to a lower guarantee coefficient. The general tendency, thanks to the Basel finance reforms, is to slightly raise the minimum requirements that said coefficient can reach in order to strengthen its solvency. Although to some extent they can resort to emitting participatory bonds which can serve to in-

Business and Economics

crease their own resources, many savings banks will have no choice but to undergo an emergency operation and transform themselves into banks, often at short notice and with extensive state involvement. The second is the serious exposure to housing risk that characterizes many of the balance books of Catalan savings banks. The story is well known. Traditionally they specialised in the provision of mortgages to families for the purchase of housing. Subsequently, faced with a growing demand for housing, lending spread to the provision of housing credit to construction companies. When the bubble burst, the construction companies ended up with a huge portfolio of unsold properties which made it impossible for them to honour their agreements with the savings banks, which had no choice but to accept the properties as compensation for their losses. The third reason is the intensity with which, in moments of euphoria, they rushed to securitize a large proportion of their funds, which they mostly invested in foreign countries due to their simplicity and lower cost. Now, these bonds, in the hands of foreign funds and banks, are due to be repaid. Needless to say, refinancing them is practically impossible given the fear produced by the indebtedness of the Spanish economy as a whole. All of these actions call for extreme measures in order to avoid disaster.

Catalan savings banks have already begun to consolidate themselves. Of the ten that existed at the outbreak of the crisis only three groups remain which, for now at least, maintain their

The effects the economic crisis may have on savings banks will have greater impact in Catalonia centre of power within the country.

Meanwhile, two of them have begun initiatives which will de facto involve them ceding their credit-giving rating activity to new banks with headquarters in Madrid. The ownership of their property will be decided in the future. Of the three groups that have been formed without leaving the country, only one appears to have found a definitive solution. La Caixa, having absorbed Caixa Girona, has been thoroughly restructured through the creation of a holding company whose main financial instrument Caixabank, possesses 81% of its shares. It is difficult to predict how Unnim and CatalunyaCaixa will fare, but it is hard to imagine that the fund created by the state, the FROB won’t end up playing a decisive role in its future. In short, everything points to the fact that finally the banking system, which has been through so much, will end up resting on two pillars: Caixabank, the third largest in Spain, and the Banc de Sabadell, which has gradually learnt how to carve out a decent place for itself on the Spanish scene. In the end it seems as if the curse on our banking activities has been broken. A separate question, one that is debatable, is whether the subsequent outcome will be best for the future of our economy.

*Antoni Serra-Ramoneda (Barcelona,1933). Emeritus Professor at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) and its former rector. Former president of the Caixa de Catalunya and former vice president of the Institute of Catalan Studies. He is currently the chairman of the Tribunal Arbitral Tècnic de Catalunya (Technical Arbitration Tribunal of Catalonia) and the president of Tribuna Barcelona. He was awarded the prestigious Creu de Sant Jordi (St George’s Cross) in 2005. He also holds the Narcís Monturiol Medal for Scientific Merit and the Medalla d’Or al Mèrit Científic of the Barcelona city council and is an Officier de l’Ordre National du Mérite de la République Française.

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America

Ollanta Humala’s three credentials

by Isabel Galí-Izard*

Ollanta Humala finally managed to convince the international press that his conversion to ‘Lulaism’ was not just an election strategy when he pledged that if he were to win the elections he would not expel America’s anti-drug agency, the DEA, from Peru.

The Drug Enforcement Administration’s role in Latin America goes beyond fighting criminal organisations linked to drug trafficking alongside the police forces of countries with which it has signed treaties. The mere presence of American intelligence personnel on the soil of a country on the sub-continent is, at the very least, a sign of confidence and acceptance of Washington’s policies, both in terms of drug trafficking and security.

Ecuador is the major exception. It is the only country considered ‘Bolivarian’ where the DEA continues to operate, in spite of the fact that since April 2011 Washington ceased to have an ambassador based in Quito. The DEA left Venezuela in July 2005, accused of espionage by Hugo Chavez’s government, followed by Bolivia, in November 2008, when they were accused by President Evo Morales of conspiring against his government. Nicaragua could prove to be the second exception, but the reality is that it is not a drug-producing country and neither is it the country which most suffers from drug-trafficking in Central America.

The DEA maintains an office there, but according to President Daniel Ortega, 34

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it is not active because he refuses to permit it.

In recent years Peru has become the world’s largest producer of coca leaves.

It is still not the leading producer of cocaine, however; Colombia is in the lead because in spite of its eradication policies, genetic improvements allow for the planting of up to four crops a year. Nevertheless, Peru has become the third most worrying country for global antidrug authorities after Colombia and Mexico. Between 88% and 93% of the cocaine which is produced is destined for illegal use and the authorities who have to combat the drug trade are poorly equipped, poorly paid and have proven to be easily corrupted.

As a result, Ollanta Humala’s announcement has been the crucial proof that he has distanced himself from ‘Bolivarianism’. It is not that Venezuela and Bolivia do not fight against drug trafficking, they do as much or as little as countries with the DEA operating in their country, but any country which expels them is considered by the United States to be declaring itself openly hostile and lacking in trust.

The two credentials which he previously presented to the Peruvians re-

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ceived a different welcome in terms of their credibility. Ollanta Humala won because he managed to appear more democratic than Keiko Fujimori, but he has been unable to convince the all important markets of his conversion to classic social democracy.

The true dilemma facing the Peruvians was made clear the day on which the winner of the 2010 Nobel Prize for Literature, Mario Vargas Llosa, announced that he backed Alejandro Toledo’s decision to join forces with Ollanta Humala. Having to choose between Humala and Keiko Fujimori meant having to choose between cancer and AIDS; or at least this was how Vargas Llosa described the choice in the first round of elections. It was a literary means by which to describe the dilemma facing the wealthy Peruvian classes and more specifically the urban elite in Lima: having to vote out of fear in order to avoid fear, to avoid future worries, whoever they chose. Both options, Keiko Fujimori and Ollanta Hu-

mala, forced them to review their recent history, their murky, troubled past.

Ollanta Humala won because he managed to appear more democratic than Keiko Fujimori Ollanta has not only had to deal with the memory of the 2006 campaign bearing the stamp of Hugo Chavez. There was also the attempted coup against Alberto Fujimori in 2000, the so-called Locumba Uprising. In Peru to this day many still accuse him of supporting a second coup led by his brother Antauro, in 2005, this time against Alejandro Toledo. Ollanta has denied any active or passive involvement in this second conspiracy, to the point of acknowledging that it is only right that his brother is in prison, but the echo of a story repeated by the media hundreds of times has made it, if not the true version of events, then at least plausible.

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Nonetheless, Ollanta not only faces rejection for his past, he is also unpopular for embodying or having embodied etnocacerismo or ethno-nationalism, an ideological doctrine formulated by his father Isaac Humala which stands up for the cobriza race, the Andean ethnic groups, vulgarly known as cholos’ These claims for identity have gone no further in present-day Peru. Ollanta did not refer to such demands in the electoral campaign which won him the presidency, but in spite of the promised changes, it remains part of the ideological basis of his social and national conscience.

Humala’s challenge is to convince Peruvians that the country needs social bases that allow the most disadvantaged to have opportunities With the current state of affairs, Peruvians have had to rethink what model they wish their country would follow in a future which appears to differ from a present that is economically successful, thanks to Alan Garcia’s current term in office. Before the elections, this dilemma was apparent on two fronts: some saw it as a battle between a new Hugo Chavez and anti-Chavezism, and others who argued that what was at stake was democracy versus the dictatorship that Alberto Fujimori represented.

The country became divided and remains divided. Vargas Llosa, for example, ended his relationship with El Comercio, Peru’s leading newspaper, because he felt they had taken an editorial line which strongly favoured Keiko Fujimori. Normal relations have still not been resumed.

The clearest example of this division, however, was Lima stock exchange’s reaction the day after Ollanta Humala’s close-run victory. With a 12% drop in share prices and the suspension 36

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of trading for several hours some Peruvian journalists ventured to call it an economic coup. More neutral observers saw it as a normal reaction from the ‘markets’, this invisible entity, to a lack of information as to Humala’s economic policies, as if behind the withdrawal of capital from the stock exchange there were not real, informed people.

How else are we to interpret the fact, therefore, that less than 12 hours after the results were released they called for Humala to immediately announce who his minister of finance was to be?

There were several hours of tension and uncertainty, but in fact Ollanta Humala’s victory speech on the night of his electoral victory could have come from any European politician with social democratic leanings. The following is a direct quote from his speech to his supporters in Plaza Dos de Mayo that very night. They are words spoken in the heat of victory and are of value precisely because of their spontaneous nature, far from the restraint called for in a formal interview: ‘Let’s continue the good work we’ve been doing so far. We’re going to put right the bad and undertake a transformation, doing whatever is needed in order that economic growth isn’t a ‘spurt’ ’ adding, ‘we’re going to have an open, market economy, that will allow us to correctly consolidate and strengthen our internal market’.

It was a moderate speech which ultimately was not aimed at convincing those who were applauding him in the square. It was directed to those watching on TV, frightened or disappointed by a result which initially would not allow them to have a free hand in mining contracts, continuing to pay low taxes and having access to an unregulated workforce. In short, what Ollanta Humala offers the Peruvians is a government like the one Lula created during his terms in office, with redistribution policies aimed at economic growth

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which narrows rather than widens the gap between the richest and the poorest members of society.

While Peru’s economy has grown since 2005, with a spectacular annual average growth rate of 7%, according to the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) human development index, it shows behaviour which highlights that the economic growth is too uneven.

Peru’s Human Development Index (HDI) score for 2010 stands at 0.723, which gives Peru one of the highest rankings on the Latin American continent. It is even higher than Brazil, while only being surpassed by Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Panama, Mexico and Costa Rica. However, when one factors in the cost of inequality, Peru drops by 31% and its HDI stands at 0.501. In comparison with its neigh-

bours, Venezuela’s change in position when one introduces this figure comparing the difference between the richest and the poorest sectors is some 21% and Colombia’s is of 29% (source: http://hdrstats.undp.org/images/explanations/PER.pdf ).

The challenge for Humala is no longer only to convince the stock exchange in Lima that his government will not oppose capitalism (in the days following his victory shares returned to their usual levels), but rather to convince Peruvians that the country needs social bases, improvements in education and health to begin with, that allow the most disadvantaged to have opportunities to escape from poverty by their own means. And the abandonment once and for all of pious, inefficient welfarism.

The first meeting between Ollanta Humala and Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff

*Isabel Galí-Izard (Barcelona, 1973). She holds a degree in Communication Science from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and a masters in International Relations from the Universitat de Barcelona. She is a journalist for the International Desk of TV3 (Catalonia Television), currently working as their Latin American correspondent. From her base in Bogota, she has covered the whole of Latin America since October 2008 and publishes the collective blog La Panamericana. Previously she was a Middle East correspondent, where she lived between September 2004 and April 2007 and where she travelled throughout the region, from Egypt to Iran. She has also worked for Televisió d’Andorra, el Periódico de Catalunya (newspaper) and CNNPlus TV channel.

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The Republican Party and the 2012 presidential elections

by Marc Gafarot*

The Republican Party is one of the two major political parties in the United States. In modern times, it has been the most socially conservative and economically liberal party. The Republican Party was formed in 1854 as a coalition of Whigs, Northern Democrats and the Free Soil Party in order to oppose the spread of slavery and to promote the modernization of the United States. With the motto ‘Free Land, Free Labor and Free Men’ the party steadily grew from its foundation and retained its dominance until the 1930s. At that time the party enjoyed a broadly heterogeneous social base that included professionals, businessmen, white workers, particularly in the north, and blacks. It was seen as the party of ‘big money’ while also being the party that best represented the social rise of a country undergoing radical change, as the US clearly was in the second half of the nineteenth century and the early part of the twentieth. This all changed with the coming of the Great Depression and the implementation of Keynesian policies as part of FD Roosevelt’s New Deal in an attempt to overcome the economic crisis. Since then the party’s social and political foundations have changed and blacks, white workers and minorities in general have tended to place more trust in the Democrats. The Republicans did not return to power until the fifties with the Eisenhower - Nixon ticket.

Since then the party has had five presidents: Nixon, Ford, Reagan, George Bush senior and George W. Bush.

[1] American political parties have central executives which are weak in nature and with much less power than their European counterparts, for example. Their main activities include the organization of fundraising events rather than setting the political or strategic agenda. Ideologically American parties are generally more diverse than Europeans parties since their channels of communication are designed that way and moreover the constituency has a significant influence on its elected representative.

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The Grand Old Party1 (GOP), as the Republican Party is known, enjoys solid support among the well-off white middle classes and among the most powerful groups in the nation. Among the largest minorities, the blacks and Latinos, it has a low level of support.

This is not the case for minorities who have fled communist countries, such as Cuba or Sino-Vietnam. The Republicans currently hold a majority in the House of Representatives and a minority in the Senate.

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Uncertain elections: the 2012 presidentials

The 2012 elections will be a battle between the country’s economy and its demography. As it stands, the economy poses a significant threat to President Obama’s aspirations to be re-elected. He wouldn’t be the first president to lose an election due to poor economic performance, as Bush senior can testify. Demographics, however, are radically changing the face of America and may prove to be the powerful trump card which allows

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Obama to remain in the White House for four more years. In Washington, everyone is aware of Obama’s growing weakness and the fact that his policies are ‘hostages’ to Republican dictates. In a little over two and a half years in office, the president has frittered away most of the political credit and the special aura that won him the presidency.

In a recent survey six out of ten respondents saw President Obama as a poor economic manager. When such statistics are compounded by recent

financial arrangements that have been deemed unsatisfactory by the right and the left, the effects may prove fatal to the re-election prospects of the current incumbent of the White House. Some analysts believe he will get away with it in terms of the nomination but will pay the full price at the presidential elections. The growing debt crisis has been a clear political defeat for Obama.

We will soon see if aside from being a political defeat it is also one for the economy for both America and the Catalan International View

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world. Clearly the biggest problem for Obama is how to rebuild his image as a man of state who can take control of the American economy. Many of his unfulfilled promises to traditional Democratic voters have begun to weigh on him like millstones around his neck.

Undoubtedly this reduces him politically far more than the mistrust and suspicion he initially aroused among Republicans. Obama is losing the political centre, and currently the strength of the Tea Party is one of the thorns in his side. This is clearly not a good sign.

This is why the Obama option inevitably depends on American demographics. Obama’s electoral apparatus knows it and for some time now has been working to mobilize the black vote, which in principal should see few desertions, and the Latino vote in particular. No resources will be spared in undertaking this task. Results from the crucial swing states in the west such as Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado could well prove decisive.

Between now and the elections the Re40

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publicans will find it difficult to shake off the widespread perception among minorities (especially blacks and Hispanics) that they are the party that defends the rule of white America above all else. We must not forget that even McCain beat Obama for the white vote. Only a huge victory among this group would return the Republicans to the White House. Cohesion among the Republicans, which inevitably calls for a unifying leader, will be key, as is the degree of disaffection towards Barack Obama.

On taxes, economic policy and the philosophy of the new American right

The Republican recipe is very clear: the reduction of taxes and cuts in public spending. For many Republicans this is all that is needed to revive the economy once more. Nonetheless, things are never as simple as they sometimes appear, especially if we remember that the United States is among the countries with the lowest levels of taxation when

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compared with other developed industrial economies. The theory that the United States suffers from economic stagnation because of the high level of taxation is therefore relegated to pure dogma.

The conservatives are overly reliant on abstract ideas which are often far removed from the American reality.

Their insistence on becoming the unrepentant champions of social cutbacks could have a devastating effect on part of their own social base. Especially the more conservative elements who do not necessarily enjoy economic conditions which are typical of ‘the party of big money’. Since its inception the American conservative political agenda has had a rigorous, intellectually stimulating political agenda with some very clear values: family, security and prosperity.

The rejection by some conservatives of reaching a compromise with the Democrats distances them from a centrist position, especially according to the image Obama’s team seeks to project of him as a president who seeks agreement on matters affecting the national interest above party lines.

In the conservative American mind there is a clear link between debt and moral decay. This goes unnoticed in Europe but not in America. The welfare state supports permissive moral behaviour and irresponsible economic conduct. Deconstructing this system and strengthening more paternalistic charitable systems, would reinforce traditional sources of authority and order in which Judeo-Christian morality would prevail. It is a Puritan ideal that harks back to the original Founding Fathers of the United States. They were obsessed with debt, which they associated with the slave economy and dependence on others.

We should not forget something which is often ignored in other countries: American conservatives are there

to constrain the government’s power and restore moral order. British Conservatives, on the other hand, are there to stay in power. While American conservatives defend radical ideas and policies, like revolutionaries bursting with religious values, the British Tories survive thanks to a chameleon-like ability to adapt their beliefs to a new orthodoxy that borders on orthopraxy.

The 2012 elections will be a battle between the country’s economy and its demography

The Republican Party’s credentials and its major players

Nowadays many new conservatives embrace ideas which originate from abstract principles with little regard for the real life problems currently facing America and the American way of life.

It is a peculiar return to a Jeffersonian past by calling into question Washington for being ‘artificial and corrupt’ and minimizing federal power, as far as possible. In the US, sooner or later the Jefferson vs. Hamilton debate (Alexander Hamilton, who defended a strong central government) rears its head once more, with politicians taking one side or the other. For many Republicans such a debate is seen as a tragedy because an excess of ideology is more of a burden than a virtue. However, many believe that the moderate conservative ideology also has an important role to play in modernizing the US. In the past this was the case but it remains to be seen if this will happen in the future.

Currently, Mitt Romney is the best-placed individual to be the Republican candidate in next year’s elections. It should therefore come as no surprise that he is following a strategy of limiting and focusing his comments to Obama and not making many references to his Republican rivals. The Catalan International View

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question is whether he can afford this luxury for much longer. Romney has been waiting for his opportunity for a long time but his candidacy is not without obstacles: he is a Mormon and he is perceived among his people as being overly in favour of making pacts with the Democrats. In this respect the health care reforms he carried out as Governor of Massachusetts are not very popular with the radicalized and surprisingly vocal grassroots of the party. Nevertheless, we should not underestimate him: he is still the best-known and most experienced candidate and his fund-raising abilities are unmatched within his party. At another time, as was the case with Reagan, Bob Dole and George Bush senior, he would unquestionably have been the candidate, thanks to his presence, political savvy and his links to economic power.

The Tea Party’s amateurism and their desire to take a back seat make them into a point of moral reference for (ultra) conservative America

Supporters of the Tea Party, and all those who define the new Republican party, represent something new in politics that has a lot to do with pure, unbridled idealism. Their amateurism and desire to take a back seat make them into a point of moral reference for (ultra) conservative America while simultaneously, and accidentally, protecting the progressive values represented

by Obama and a significant proportion of the Democratic Party. Ironically, Obama’s greatest critics may turn out to hold the key to his re-election.

Many Americans are disappointed with Obama, especially those on the Democratic side who had the highest hopes. Whatever happens, leaving the 42

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country in the hands of the Tea Party is something that most American conservatives would view with great uncertainty and mistrust.

The Republican Party ought to keep in mind certain statistics: in 1980, when Reagan defeated Carter, 88% of voters were white. This figure fell to 74% in the 2008 presidential elections.

Both Bush in 2000 and McCain in 2008 won the white vote with 55% of the vote. The new demography of the country was not so favourable, leading to a tie between Bush and Gore in a far from perfect election and McCain lost the overall vote by seven points. Worse still for the Republicans, the proportion of white voters is expected to continue to fall in the 2012 election. In the last elections McCain was unable to attract more than 31% of the Hispanic vote and a paltry 4% of the AfricanAmerican vote.

And the names...

Who can unite them? Michele Bachmann, Congresswoman for Minnesota and a member of the Tea Party, and Herman Cain could receive some support from the establishment. Romney, Pawlenty, Huntsman and Bachmann herself could share the support of the ever-present Tea Party. However, so far at least, no candidate can achieve such a degree of cross party support as the Governor of Texas Rick Perry. Bush’s former right-hand man in Texas could turn out to hold the magic wand, forging a coalition between the GOP and the Tea Party. He spoke about the Tea Party when no one else in his party paid them the least attention, preferring an insulting indifference. Such a union would enjoy the support of the business world and the party’s grassroots. It should not be forgotten that he is a man with experience in government. This diversity makes him dangerous, and perhaps more importantly, highly versatile. His support base is so

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wide that he can garner votes and support in many different sectors.

At present other Republican figures like Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Rudolph Giuliani and Newt Gingrich, are shrewdly leaving the door open to their participation in the primaries but without explicitly making a public commitment, thereby spending more energy on self-promotion. Much has been said about Sarah Palin. Everyone knows her and this is both her greatest asset and her greatest obstacle. Palin has failed to seek strong alliances, and today, similarly to those mentioned above and others, she is more out of the presidential race than in it. It seems as if the battle is between Romney and Perry. This would see a return to the centrality of the Republican Party and

perhaps a reconciliation with sectors of the population that voted for Obama four years ago which are now likely to switch sides if the Republicans move towards the centre.

The Iowa caucuses, the first major electoral event of the nominating process for the post of President of the United States, are still too far off to make concrete predictions but pretenders to the highest political office in the United States are jostling for positioning and beginning to show their cards and political credentials. What until recently seemed impossible, the defeat of Obama, now appears quite the opposite. The political battle is on in the US, much is at stake and the rest of the world is waiting expectantly.

*Marc Gafarot Holds a degree in Humanities from the Universidad de Navarra, an MSc in European Studies from the London School of Economics and an MA in Latin American Studies from the University of Liverpool. As a journalist and political commentator he has worked from London for Bloomberg LP, in Latin America for Summit Communications and served as a Parliamentary Adviser at the European Parliament in Brussels and Strasbourg. Gafarot is currently Head of International Relations for Catalan International View. He has written a book on Flanders and Federalism in Belgium called ‘La mort de Bèlgica? La gradual i pacífica emancipació flamenca’ (The Death of Belgium? the Gradual and Peaceful Flemish Emancipation) and co-authored The Student’s Guide to European Integration.

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Africa

Arab springs, African autumns

by Jordi Fexas*

It looks as if the revolts in the Arab world will continue for some time and we shan’t see the end of them soon.

At this stage no one can be sure of the political map which may emerge from the popular uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East.

Tunisia and Egypt, most probably with the Iranian protests as a precedent, showed the way and established the model of ‘express toppling’ of a dictatorship, which is so untypical in the region. However, in other countries where these two cases were an example of how to try to get rid of an autocracy, even with apparently similar targets, the consequences have been strikingly different. While at first it seemed as if Tunisia and Egypt would be the norm in terms of the speed and relatively low level of violence involved; it now appears as if they are the exception.

The Islamists are a powerful movement, well-established and with a proven track record in most countries where autocracies have fallen or are faltering The rising levels of bloodshed and social, political and economic destruction in Syria, Yemen and Libya indicate they may be moving away from 44

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the ‘fairytale’ of popular revolt with its more or less happy and peaceful ending.

The image of political change associated with cyberactive, politically restless young people alongside chador-wearing mothers pushing prams, calling for freedom and the right to a better future in squares and streets has been replaced by the young once again, as they are always the main protagonists. This time, however, they have a scarf around their neck and a rifle in their hands.

Democracy, something rare and elusive in this part of the world, appears in most cases to resist the slogans and street protests. Once more it seems as if the dictators will cling to the tradition of writing their epitaphs in blood.

Nevertheless, we should not underestimate the seductive power the rebellions in the Maghreb and the Middle East may still have on many societies in the world that share their desires, while not having exactly the same problems.

When he spoke a few weeks ago in Cairo, Father Rafik, a priest and renowned commentator on Egyptian

Africa

political and religious affairs, stated that, ‘although it seems that calm has returned to Egypt, there is petrol everywhere, it will only take a spark at the right time and place and everything will go up in flames’.

Unfortunately, the petrol is not only found in Egypt. Beyond the sea of sand, in sub-Saharan Africa, one can also encounter autocratic kleptocracies which appear ripe for a cyber-revolt, a digital

spark to kindle the fire, a young population that is fed up with the kleptomaniacs that pilfer the meagre public funds or at best waste them.

Corruption, rising food prices, democracy and new means of communication are some of the ingredients that most figure in the cocktail of riots in 2011. Nevertheless, in the case of the Arab world we should not forget that the popular revolts were probably the Catalan International View

The fall of Mubarak sees the start of a new political era in Egypt

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result of various protagonists coming together, in spite of holding different agendas, united by their dissatisfaction and desire for change.

The Islamists are a powerful factor, well-established and with a proven track record in most countries where autocracies have fallen or are faltering.

We should not forget that countries like Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, and Syria feature regimes that were born in the shadow of 1960s pan-Arabism of a secular nature, and that they severely persecuted Islamic-inspired groups. As a result, these groups have often brought a promise of change and offer an alternative to the corrupt practices of their respective dictatorships. Although they have not been formally observed much during this ‘Arab spring’, the Islamist grassroots movements are the real protagonists of the revolts, together with a cyber-savvy younger generation which is increasingly better educated and increasingly frustrated by the lack of future prospects.

This year some 17 electoral processes are due to be held in various states in the region in order that they can choose their presidents or representatives In the case of sub-Saharan Africa the religious element is unlikely to carry any weight except in a specific instance such as Nigeria, a precarious and turbulent democracy where interfaith tension plays a destabilizing role.

In this region there is a different set of ingredients which may ignite the cocktail of possible disturbances.

First of all it is worth stating that despite what one may think, in Black Africa the processes of political change were launched globally a lot longer ago.

Up to now, most long-lasting dictatorships and authoritarian regimes have been concentrated in the Islamic north 46

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of the continent. In spite of the multitude of conflicts that have struck the sub-Saharan continent in recent decades, we can state with a certain degree of confidence that the transition to democratic models began many years ago, and that states with formal structures of parliamentary democracy have been in the majority for some time, unlike in the Arab Muslim world.

Supra-state organizations are a prime example in this regard. Over the last few decades The Arab League has become an exclusive club of capricious autocrats who do not even take the trouble to make explicit reference to the fundamental democratic rights of the citizens of their states. They don’t even bother with empty rhetoric to placate their own people and the world. This is in contrast with organizations aimed at regional integration like the African Union (AU), which has worked hard to promote processes of democratization in the region and formally censor explicit attempts to move in the opposite direction, although they are not above empty rhetoric themselves at times.

It must be acknowledged that the African Union, established in 2002, has been much more forceful in condemning anti-democratic changes and tendencies [than the Arab League]. The direct implications of democratizing processes in Burundi in 2003 or the Comoros in 2008 and the recent involvement of the AU and ECOWAS on the side of Alassane Ouattara in the Ivory Coast conflict display very different behaviour from that found in the Arab context and its regional organizations.

We can find many instances of the AU carrying out dubious actions, many minor and others not so minor. Prime examples are the AU’s tolerance, condescension and inactivity with regards to the situation in Mugabe’s Zimbabwe and in particular of Teodoro Obiang Nguema being named as president of the institution, in January 2011. To

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some extent these invalidate and discredit the organisation’s ability to take legitimate action in many areas where they wish to promote democratization in the continent.

Needless to say, when we speak of democracy in Africa, we are talking about so-called formal or procedural democracies. They suffer from high levels of corruption, inefficiency and feature clan-based client networks. Political turn-taking is not usually exempt from conflict and tension and the sense of service and the common good is often absent when it comes to managing the structures of the state.

Nonetheless, even when talking of incipient democracies with serious structural deficits, the majority of heads of state in sub-Saharan Africa are elected as the result of multi-party elections. As a result, this year some 17 electoral processes are due to be held in various states in the region in order that they can choose their presidents or representatives. The major threat to these democracies is not so much weariness of a political system and the entrenched political class that perpetually clings to power, but rather the distribution of wealth that has generated sustained growth for nearly a decade in many African states. In spite of the global crisis, growth in GDP for the continent as a whole is estimated to be 5% for 2011 and around 6% in 2012. The economic crisis has caused states classified as endemically or structurally poor, such as Burkina Faso, to decrease their growth from 5% to 3.5%, but at least it is still positive growth.

Recent years have been considerably better than the last decades of the twentieth century, with fewer wars, more democracy, and some economic improvements. However, it is also true that many of these democracies are permanently vulnerable, facing as they do destabilising factors which can be easily triggered.

Inflationary trends in food prices are a highly destabilizing factor in many corners of the continent, whether provoked by rising energy prices, the Chinese intervention in food markets or the effects of climate change.

Where these factors are combined with a kleptocratic regime which represses the rights of its citizens, with or without Facebook we have the new breeding ground for unrest and the toppling of dictatorships beyond the Tropic of Cancer. One need not enter into political fiction in predicting that North African shockwaves may spread beyond the tropics, because they have already done so. Currently, Eritrea, Lesotho, Togo, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Burkina Faso, Gabon, Swaziland and Cameroon among others, have already been witness to popular protests, which chronologically at least have something in common with the riots in the Arabic world.

While they have their own logic and dynamic, the latter serve as a reference.

The repression combined with news blackouts and restrictions on journalists’ right to exercise freedom of the press have been the prophylactics employed to prevent ‘contamination’ by the Arab revolts. In Equatorial Guinea, in Djibouti, Zimbabwe and Eritrea where the regimes’ control over the media is very strong, satellite dishes, which are often kept hidden, have been the only way to follow the news. Official TV, radio and newspapers have chosen to hide the facts in some cases and to distort them in others. In Ethiopia for example, the journalist Eskinder Nega, was arrested by police on charges of having ‘incited riots in Ethiopia, like those in Egypt and Tunisia’ by publishing an article on an American website specialising in Ethiopian affairs.

The fragile, unstable democracies and longest-lived authoritarian regimes are those which are trying harder to get the breath of air from the winds of change blowing from the north of the Sahara.

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African geopolitics are changing, as is the world in which we live. The paradigms that governed post-colonial Africa, in a world of blocs and the Cold War during the final decades of the last century are currently undergoing a mutation. Today’s players of African chess are not the same as they were; and neither do the act in the same way. African regimes are aware that the continent’s importance has increased in global geopolitical terms and are trying to exploit their assets as best they can. In many ways relations with the African world are still neo-colonial in nature, but now perhaps the new paradigm is that the neo-colonialism and interventionism are multi-polar in keeping with the new global geopolitics. New players emerging from globalization, seeing diplomacy as a means to the strategic access to raw materials and potential emerging markets.

The fragile, unstable democracies and longest-lived authoritarian regimes are those which are trying hardest to get the breath of air from the winds of change blowing from the north of the Sahara Aggressive, interventionist policies such as those employed by France, with the use of wars, sympathetic dictatorships and coups, were a common practice. Such practices have given way 48

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to a softer form of diplomatic intervention, concerned with its global image, in pursuit of political and economic stability. It is more comfortable with formal democracies and soft dictatorships, than with bloody regimes, since nowadays the continent is less invisible than it used to be.

Democratization is an element of struggle in the model of intervention and influence, especially by the West.

Through the extension of democratic values ​​it seeks a means to move or stop the growing influence of new powers like China. The events in Libya and Sudan are typical of how the US in particular has intervened by trying to force regime change or create new states. They may have done so to improve the human rights situation but also to counter or displace if need be the subtle, yet implacably efficient Chinese penetration of the African ‘petrocratic’ regimes.

The fragile, unstable democracies and the longest-lived authoritarian regimes are those most interested in receiving a breath of fresh air from the winds of change blowing from the north of the Sahara. Trying to predict whether there will have a domino effect and which pieces may fall is a risky business in this part of the world.

Nonetheless, perhaps it is worth counting those regimes that are best situated in this wave of citizen-led, democratic coups which is sweeping half the world.

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King Mswati III of Swaziland; inherited the throne in 1986 and despite being a popular figure, backed by the weight of tradition, his extravagant, luxurious lifestyle in an impoverished country, has led to opposition protests in recent months with more strident calls for a parliamentary monarchy, putting the king in an uncomfortable situation.

Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe; has been elected prime minister since 1980 and the country’s president since 1987. The authoritarian, autocratic nature of his regime in recent years, which includes election fraud, has become a de facto dictatorship blighted by riots, international isolation and the collapse of the economy. Since the Arab riots, control and repression have increased in order to thwart opposition attempts to mobilize the population against the regime via social networks.

Paul Biya, Cameroon; in power since 1982. Since 1992 he has been formally re-elected in multi-party elections, but always under suspicion of fraud. He is the longest-ruling head of state on the whole continent. In recent months the opposition has organized several protests against the regime with explicit reference to the Egyptian revolt.

Ali Bongo, Gabon; has already witnessed protests relating to the dubious elections of 2009 which initiated a succession process leading to the son of veteran dictator Omar Bongo (who died in 2009) succeeding him in power.

This autumn we cannot rule out the possibility that the end may be in sight for the majority of the continent’s veteran dictators in the darkest parts of Black Africa. A storm is building and the Western and/or Eastern allies of these dictatorships do not wish to see change threatening their interests, however they would accept it if it meant they could retain their priviledges. In the global

Isaias Afwerki, Eritrea; in power since 1991, when the country’s de facto independence began. The Arab riots further provoked an already highly active opposition against a regime that postponed presidential elections indefinitely in 1997 and has now further restricted the freedom of expression while repression has become more widespread.

Ismail Omar Guelleh, Djibouti; in power since 1999. Despite the existence of a multi-party system, the electoral processes have been boycotted by the opposition. In this key geo-strategic enclave for Western powers, riots have increasingly taken on a destabilizing dimension.

Eduardo do Santos, Angola; the country’s strongman since 1979, despite having initially been elected and having an elected parliament, the presidential elections have been postponed, leading to protests that have been suppressed without much hesitation. This regional power has one of the largest armies on the continent and its petrocracy still has the support or passive complicity of a middle class appeared by the economic miracle which oil has provided in recent years.

Teodoro Obiang Nguema, Equatorial Guinea; in power since 1979 is perhaps one of the bloodiest, most corrupt dictators in the region. His system combines repression of the opposition with promises of openness and arrangements for his succession in order that his son, Teodorin Obiang, can inherit the state of Guinea as a family heirloom.

world in which we live, when the dominant powers choose the wrong ally, the ever-growing competition mercilessly expels them and replaces them. *Jordi Fexas

(Barcelona, 1966). He holds a degree in Contemporary History from the Universitat de Barcelona, specialising in Anthropology and African History and conducted doctoral studies at the Institut d’Història JVV(UPF). He has a wide range of experience in the private sector. He has also worked as an anthropologist, conducting fieldwork in Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

As a journalist he has contributed articles in numerous magazines dealing with contemporary issues. He is currently Igman-AS’s Head of Projects in the Maghreb and Sub-Saharan Africa.

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The long return of the Crimean Tatars

by Natàlia Boronat*

The Crimea is a peninsula of some 26,000 km² on the north coast of the Black Sea that is currently part of Ukraine. Throughout history it has been the disputed home to numerous peoples who have valued its geostrategic position and favourable climate.

This former jewel in the crown of the Russian Empire was home to the first war ever to be recorded photographically: the Crimean War of 1853 to 1856, in which Turkey, France and Britain united against Russia. It is also the place in which the victorious Allied powers divided up the spheres of influence during the Yalta Conference at the close of the Second World War in February 1945. The Soviet nomenklatura saw the Crimea as an ideal place to spend their summer vacation and to this day many Russians over 30 years of age have fond childhood memories of the peninsula where they went to recover from the long winter months common in most of the country.

In 1954 the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev commemorated the third centenary of the union of Russia and Ukraine by ceding control of the autonomous republic of Crimea to Kiev.

At the time no one would have thought that the Soviet Union would collapse less than 40 years later and that the Russians were to mourn the loss of the peninsula.

The Russian Empire annexed the peninsula in 1783, which had previously been dominated by the Crimean Khan50

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ate since 1441. It was one of the Khanates populated by Tatars that emerged after the collapse of Genghis Khan’s Turkish-Mongol Golden Horde. Following annexation, Russia founded the city of Sevastopol as a military base for the Russian Black Sea Fleet in order to reassert control over the region and halt Turkey’s regional pretensions. For the Crimean Tatars a long process of decline began which also affected other ethnic groups on the peninsula such as the Karaims, the Krimchaks, the Greeks and the Armenians who increasingly saw the presence of people of Russian origin.

Like other ethnic groups which formed part of the Soviet Union, the Crimean Tatars suffered during the civil war following the October Revolution of 1917, the great famine that affected several areas of the USSR, the forced collectivisations and the heavy repression orchestrated by the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in the 30s. However, the biggest disaster for the Tatar people came with World War Two, when the Crimea was a major battleground for the forces of Hitler’s Germany and the Soviet army. The city of Sevastopol, a strategic port for the USSR, was besieged by Hitler’s troops for 247 days,

from 1941 to 1942, and Nazi leaders sought the collaboration of the Tatar elite. When the Red Army regained control of the peninsula, Stalin ordered the relocation of the entire population of Crimean Tatars (some 200,000 people) to Central Asia, since they were accused of having collaborated with the Nazis, despite the fact that many Tatars had fought on the Soviet side.

Seidnebi Ablaiev, an 85 year-old Crimean Tatar, who currently lives with his entire family on the outskirts of the capital, Simferopol, neatly sums up the history of the last century: ‘since the 20s the Tatars of our generation haven’t seen anything good’. His wife, Shura, who was 14 years old in 1944, remembers well the morning of May 18th: ‘it was still dark and the soldiers billeted in our house told us we had to get up and leave in 15 minutes, but we didn’t know where we were going. My mother said that we were probably going to be shot. But why? Of course there was no reason, but since there was a war on and everyone was being killed we thought they would kill us as well’.

The troops loaded them onto cattle wagons and they undertook a 20-day journey which took them to Uzbeki-

stan. It is estimated that nearly half of the Crimean Tatars died due to the hardships of the journey, with those who survived scattered throughout Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and the Urals.

Shura recalls how upon arriving in the Fergana Valley, in Uzbekistan, she did not understand why she was branded an ‘enemy of the people’. However, since she had to feed her younger siblings and her ailing mother she went to work in a textile factory and soon made friends with Volga Germans, who had also been deported, and local people.

With the political opening of Mikhail Gorbachev’s Perestroika in the late 80s, the Tatars were finally rehabilitated and were allowed to return to their traditional homeland Unlike other ethnic groups who after the death of Stalin were rehabilitated and allowed to return home from 1957, the Crimean Tatars, the Volga Germans and the Mesketians (Georgian Turks) were not as lucky since the Soviet elite believed that such groups Catalan International View

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could facilitate Turkish and German interference in the USSR. Refat Chubarov, a member of the Ukrainian parliament and vice president of the Mejlis, an institution which supposedly represents the Crimean Tatars but which plays a symbolic role, is the son of deported parents, having been born in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, in 1957. Chubarov explains that from the 60s onwards the Tatar nationalist movement began to gain strength and many leaders were imprisoned. With the political opening of Mikhail Gorbachev’s Perestroika in the late 80s, the Tatars were finally rehabilitated and were allowed to return to their traditional homeland.

Crimea has an identity crisis, since many people have failed to realise that they are not part of Russia, but rather they belong to Ukraine, a feeling which is used by some Russian nationalist politicians Nevertheless, the return was not easy because it failed to count on the support of a resettlement programme and their homes, or those of their ancestors, had largely been occupied by Russians, many of whom had also been forced to move to the mainland in the 1940s. Servi, Seidnebi Ablaiev’s son, recalls how in 1989, ‘we first took over the land by force, challenging the truncheon blows and the tanks, for the following six months we camped out near the municipal administration until they gave us our land back. We immediately read a prayer and cooked Plov (a typical rice dish)’. The family built a rudimentary shack where they lived for two years while they completed their house using materials such as door frames and windows that they had been able to bring from Fergana.

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According to the latest census of 2001 there are some 250,000 Tatars, but estimates put the current figure for those who have returned closer to some 280,000, since the statistics are somewhat outdated. The Tatars began to occupy land and build homes and part of the population, after many protests, managed to obtain legal ownership of their property. However, there are many who live in poverty in what are essentially shanty towns, waiting for the authorities to give them a piece of land and they also face many difficulties when conducting business. For Chubarov his people’s main problems are, ‘economic, many are unemployed or have no land’ and the fact that, ‘there are no mechanisms to solve the problem of homelessness or laws governing legal problems’. Moreover, according to this politician, ‘since so many Tatars have dispersed throughout the peninsula they are unable to have effective representation in the institutions’.

Chubarov also laments the fact that villagers from economically significant tourist areas have been denied the right to return to their place of origin.

According to the 2001 census, 12% of the inhabitants of the Crimea are Tatars, 24% Ukrainians and 58% Russians.

Russian is the de facto official language, regularly used by more than 80% of the population, even though the official language is Ukrainian. The deportation of the Tatars scattered them widely and put an end to much of the traditional elite, who were very important to the Muslims at the time of the Russian Empire. Chubarov warns of the dangers of assimilation and the disappearance of his people, who are losing their language after 50 years of not being able to study it in school. Nowadays there is a certain revival of Tatar thanks to educational projects and there are 14 schools where one can study it. However, the Seidnibi Ablaiev family exemplify what is happening on the peninsula in that

the grandparents speak Tatar to their grandchildren, but the younger generation reply in Russian.

The vice president of the Mejlis believes that the main obstacle to solving the problem of its people is the lack of political will because while they believe that, ‘the deportation of the Tatars was genocide, a crime committed by Stalin’s Communist regime, in the Ukraine there are many politicians who to this day still say that Stalin did the right thing’.

Crimea has an identity crisis, since many people have failed to realise that they are not part of Russia, but rather they belong to Ukraine. This feeling is used by some Russian nationalist politicians and is also manipulated by Moscow. In addition, the port of Sevastopol will continue to host the Russian Black Sea fleet until at least 2042, after the presidents of Russia and Ukraine, Dmitry Medvedev and Viktor Yanukovych, signed an agreement in 2010 to extend the lease in exchange for a 30% discount on gas prices for 10 years. The former head of the Ukrainian state, the pro-Western Viktor Yushchenko, repeteadly threatened that Kiev would not renew the contract, but the deal was one of the first things Yanukovych negotiated on being elected.

When the tourist season approaches, the Russian media features news related to interethnic conflicts between the Crimean Tatars and the Russian population, but the Mejlis believe it is only an attempt by Moscow to discourage tourists from going there on holiday in order that they remain on the Russian Black Sea coast.

Chubarov denies there is any real ethnic conflict because there is a good

level of coexistence. Nonetheless, he warns of the danger of the lies which are told from the outside, from Moscow, such as, ‘when they recall the war in Chechnya and Islamic terrorism in Russia and that we are also Muslims or when we defend the interests of Turkey or that we’re NATO’s vanguard in the Black Sea’. The vice president of the Mejlis openly defends his people’s right to self-determination in their historic homeland while claiming that they do not constitute a threat to Ukrainian territorial integrity. He feels it is unfortunate that Russian nationalists in the Crimea exaggerate the ‘Tatar problem’ by saying that, ‘we want to build a Caliphate and expel all the Russians’.

Ukraine is caught between siding with Europe or with Russia, while Chubarov is clear that his people’s salvation can only take place within the framework of a state which respects democratic European standards and not one based on the principles of the Soviet past where politicians had no respect for the rights of Tatars. This is why they favour the adoption of European structures. *Natàlia Boronat

She holds a degree in Information Sciences from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and in Slavic Philology from the Universitat de Barcelona. Since 2001 she has spent most of her time in Russia.

She worked in St. Petersburg as a Catalan lecturer at the State University and in the tourism industry. She now lives in Moscow, where she works as a freelance journalist for different Catalan media organizations and reports on the current situation in the post-Soviet arena.

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Democracy: terms and conditions

by Iris Mir*

‘If you would like to speak at Hong Lim Park Speakers’ Corner, please complete this registration form. It will take you about five minutes to complete’. This is how residents of Singapore are encouraged to notify the government of their plans to hold an event that involves some form of public expression of opinion such as a speech, a demonstration, a public performance or an exhibition. One can register to use Speakers’ Corner (the only place in Singapore where public speaking is allowed without running the risk of being arrested) on the Singapore Government’s National Park’s website. The application includes a list of terms and conditions that must be taken into account when holding such events to ensure everything runs smoothly. However, the existence of this area of total freedom of expression, which was established in 2000, is no guarantee that in Hong Lim Park at least Singaporeans have unrestricted access to this civil liberty 365 days a year. When sensitive events take place, such as last May’s elections, Speakers’ Corner is closed until further notice. In this way the government ensured that if tensions rose during campaigning they did not result in an outbreak of chaos that might have threatened stability.

Stability and harmony were the pillars on which the independent Singapore was established by its founding father, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew. The charismatic leader believed in a political model that ensured prosperity and economic growth in order that the state could become a fully developed country in record time. In this ethnically diverse city-state such an ambitious goal only appeared possible by ensuring social and racial harmony between the Chinese ethnic majority (76.8%), the Indians (7.9%) and the Malays (13.9%). Security and stability became the key factors in the successful formula for prosperity. To some extent such aims were the result of the city-state’s unique solutions. Therefore, with the vision of a political system superior to Western democracies based on liberal values, Lee equipped his model with a 54

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strong government and one-party rule that guaranteed his role as leader and mentor while ensuring the country’s sustained, successful economic growth.

As the most qualified person for the post, Lee ruled the country for three decades while a fragile, censored opposition tried unsuccessfully to challenge his power.

As in Malaysia and other Asian countries, a developed Singapore relies on a meritocratic approach to leadership where the most talented are those with a vision of how the country should develop and what road-map should be followed. This system results in a governing elite who directly or indirectly ensure their hegemonic leadership through the very system of governance they created. Lee not only had a vision but he and his family also ended up having tremendous control over the

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country’s political and economic power. In spite of having retired as prime minister, Lee still wants to ensure that his vision persists, at least in order that he does not lose his privileges. In 2004 his eldest son, Lee Hsien Loong, was sworn in as prime minister in the same month that Lee was nominated ‘minister mentor’. Hussein Mutalib, associate professor of the National University of Singapore, speaking in an interview with the local media company Channel News Asia, explained that,‘the idea of having a Minister Mentor in the cabinet is to try to give a guiding hand in each and every important aspect of governance in Singapore. This role covers more than leadership renewal, it goes beyond the issue of who is to be recommended and tested for higher echelons of leadership. I think it covers the very survival and prosperity of this place called Singapore’.

Lee’s autocratic and meritocratic government is sustained mainly by the discourse on Asian values. This superior value system, arising from a different culture, history and traditions than the West, ensures that the common good is seen as having priority over individual rights. It is an approach to governance that is simultaneously challenging the notion of the internationalization of liberal democracy while arguing that a different, but equally legitimate, form of democracy is possible in Southeast

Asia. On top of this, as Daniel A. Bell, the author of the book China’s New Confucianism, explains, ‘most Asian countries with a Confucian heritage seem to be doing quite well in terms of economic modernization. Some of the basic values like education, hardwork, social responsibility, serving the community, etc. seem to be important in terms of underpinning relatively stable and orderly societies with economic growth’. And this is where the debate begins: is democracy or autocracy more conducive to economic growth and prosperity? Is Asian democracy a genuine democratic system?

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tures of liberal democracy; respect for human rights. Some might argue that the very existence of a universal declaration of human rights means that they are, indeed, universal rights and therefore all countries in the world, regardless of their particular circumstances, must respect them. Conversely, Asian governments seem to disagree. As was made clear in 1993 with the Bangkok Declaration of Human Rights, a different perspective was possible, by which some political and civil rights could be curtailed for the sake of the common good of economic development.

The Asian Economic Miracle works as a good example: strong Asian governments shape political systems that prevent chaos from emerging by ensuring social cohesion, while convincing their fellow citizens that their unique circumstances require an enlightened leadership who know how to make the most of their countries. This unique system of development was built upon the uniqueness of Asian values and respect for a hierarchical society that at the same time justified an autocratic 56

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form of governance. This strong reaction to the universal declaration of human rights was also the result of the common wisdom among Asian statesmen that Western countries are in decline due to excessive individualism. It was also a way to reject Westernization for being what they regarded as a new form of colonialism, while defending a system of their own.

Nonetheless, the system falters when it fails to meet public demands.

This was demonstrated by May’s Singapore elections when the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) had their worst electoral results since 1996 due to growing opposition and a more politically active population. The political activist and leader of the opposition Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), Chee Soon Juan, sees these results as proof that, ‘Singaporeans came alive politically, expressing themselves in quite unprecedented ways’, according to an article he wrote for The Guardian directly after the election. He holds that this sudden shift in the political arena has been made possible due to the strong resentment among the population against the government which has encouraged Singaporeans not to be afraid of Lee’s ‘heavy hand’ while coming together thanks to the accessibility of new media (the ordinary press is closely monitored by the government).

A trajectory that seems to match the idea that economic growth is conducive to democracy; development leads to the emergence of a middle class and a better informed and educated society that is accompanied by a younger generation that challenges the political discourse of the hegemonic leadership because they fail to share the momentum of independence and the hardships that came with it. Bell stresses that, ‘in Singapore they were not only rebelling against the lack of democracy but also against the gap between the ideal of meritocracy and reality. If it

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were truly meritocratic the Lee family would not have such power of favouritism, either politically or economically.

Political leaders are supposed to be humble according to Confucianism, not arrogantly portraying how great they are. Not requiring the world’s highest salaries’. Decades of hegemony and compliance led to a huge gap between the state and the society with the former blindsided by his powerful vision, losing track of the emerging needs of the society. This gap between the leadership and the citizenry ended with the emergence of the conviction that elites may no longer be seen as virtuous as they once were. Bell points out the election results do not mean that the, ‘model does not work but that the leadership needs to be more sensitive than they were in the past because even if they are doing a good job in terms of policies, it doesn’t go down well with the people’. The thorny issue is what being more sensitive entails for Asian governments when it comes to their efforts to narrow the gap between the state and society without losing elitist hegemony.

Asia’s democratization is a doubleedged sword. Asian autocracies and/ or illiberal democracies seem to use this right to uniqueness to build hybrid regimes (semi-democratic or softauthoritarian) based on Asian values, aimed at instrumentally using democracy to achieve larger ends. In its global survey, Freedom House rates Singapore as a partly free country, ‘with limited respect for political and civil liberties’.

This means that the hybrid nature of the city-state’s autocratic system, as with many other Asian countries, is

aimed at preventing the emergence of a pressure from below as a way to ensure the domination of the elite. As Bell points out, ‘Asia’s challenge comes from the fact that East Asian politics might not necessarily work through improving societies by simply having more democracy. Both meritocracy and Western democratic models have problems but the ideal should be to try and combine the two’.

Asia may be on the way to creating a political system of its own that could have the potential to challenge the Western liberal approach to democracy Asia may be on the way to creating a political system of its own that could have the potential to challenge the Western liberal approach to democracy. However, so far democratizing Asian countries seem to be pushing for a form of democracy with a set of terms and conditions attached that result in partially free states, instead of creating a genuine democratic Asianstyle of governance. Asian democracy and Asian values may be diffuse terms but one thing is for sure: ‘freedom is elusive, difficult, risky, hard to define, let alone to achieve; but those who are unfree know exactly what unfreedom is’1. And for those who are unfree, be it Asians or Westerners, culturally and politically unique circumstances do not make a difference when it comes to their fight to have their right to freedom respected either from a Western or an Asian perspective.

[1] Garton Ash, T. (2005) Free World. America, Europe, and the Surprising Future of the West.

Vintage books; pp. 220

*Iris Mir She holds a degree in Media Studies from the Universitat Ramon Llull (Blanquerna Faculty of Communication Sciences) and a Masters in Political and Social Science, specialising in contemporary democracies from the Pompeu Fabra University. She focused her research on democracy in Southeast Asia. From 2006 to 2010 she lived in Asia working as a freelance journalist for various Spanish media outlets and she was also the China-Southeast Asia region correspondent of the Catalan radio station COMRàdio and the Catalan magazine El Temps.

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Morteza Saffari Natanzi Iranian ambassador

by Marc Gafarot* Photos by Ignacio Gil

Ambassador. I imagine that as an experienced diplomat you are conscious of Iran’s image in the Western world. We often hear that in your country the current theocratic regime instigates and allows gross human rights violations towards collectives such as women and homosexuals or ethnic minorities such as the Kurds. How do you respond to this? Do you appreciate the fact that in Europe we criticise public executions and harsh penalties for adultery?

Firstly you need to check your sources.

Are your remarks the result of firsthand experience of Iran or do they come from sources which are hostile towards the Islamic Republic of Iran? As you know, after the victory of the Islamic Revolution in Iran with a sovereign, independent, popular government in our country, the United States and many other Western countries that saw their interests threatened, carried out all manner of actions and spread propaganda in order to hurt our country. You will have seen the negative publicity from these countries. These words and this propaganda don’t coincide with the realities of present day Iran. Unfortunately, the USA and the dependent, hostile media spread lies against Iran that they sometimes even believe themselves. This is something that you 58

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can see for yourself if you travel to Iran.

Furthermore, a respect for human rights has its roots in our history, culture and religion. You know that human rights were first granted in a widespread, comprehensive manner by Cyrus the Great, one of the great emperors of Iran, 2,500 years ago. While the majority of the current civilised regions lived in barbarism and tribal warfare, the people of Iran lived happily thanks to their culture and their peaceful civilization. Unfortunately for centuries it was continuously invaded by characters such as Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan who went to great lengths to put an end to Iranian civilization.

In the Qur’an and in Islamic and Iranian civilization women hold such a position in society that the Prophet of Islam said, ‘paradise is beneath the feet of mothers’. If you were to travel in Iran nowadays, you would be able to see the key role and high standing that women have in the family and society.

Currently 62% of university students are women and in Iran women aren’t seen as second class citizens, who seek equal rights. In contrast to some European countries, in Iran some jobs which are a danger to a woman’s delicate

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figure and face are carried out by men, but there are no limitations to what women can study or where they work.

As we all know, certain things are illegal according to the laws of some countries and we must all respect these laws in order to protect these countries and prevent disorder and avoid problems.

Failure to respect the law is punished in every country.

Should we admonish Spain for fining or imprisoning its people for breaking the traffic laws, when these same infractions receive a lesser punishment in our country?

Adultery and rape are appalling acts according to our culture, and they are illegal according to our laws so Iran shouldn’t be criticised if they aren’t illegal in Europe. But as you are aware, in recent years, no one has been hung for this crime.

Proving this crime isn’t very difficult, it’s not impossible. Unfortunately, the West and especially the US, use its media against our country, continuing its opposition against the people of Iran.

These complaints don’t only come from the US; one also hears criticisms from the heart of Iran or from Iranians who for political and social reasons have had to leave the country.

No government can hope to please all its citizens. Man is born free and has different perspectives and tendencies.

Governments are formed by the perspectives and wishes of all the people.

Emigration and migration happen in every country. Some Spaniards move to other European countries or the US, and some Americans move to the EU or even live in Iran. Can one criticise countries because of this?

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If you take a look at the rate of Iranian emigration in recent years you won’t find a significant increase.

The Muslim people of Iran, in keeping with the teachings of Islam which recommends emigration as a means to acquire wisdom, appreciate this principle. It is also worth noticing that these people return to Iran.

Adultery and rape are appalling acts according to our culture, and they are illegal according to our laws Please forgive the tone of my questions, but your country is the subject of many accusations... Does Iran sponsor terrorism in places such as Bahrain, Yemen, Egypt, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia or Gaza? Does it consider them to be legitimate regimes?

If you take a good look at the situation in the region, you’ll see how the USA, Israel and even Europe try to deflect the wave of a search for freedom by people in the region and how they resist it, in spite of constantly emphasising their support for democracy, free elections and the freedom of choice.

With regard to Bahrain, we are witnesses to the fact that certain countries in the region considered to be the friends of the Americans send troops to Bahrain to crush the popular uprising, in order that the government they support stays in power. They support a government of 20% of the population which governs 80% of the population.

In your opinion what kind of a country supports the governments of countries in which a revolution emerges? What is the opinion of the populations of these countries with respect to the US? What do they think about Israel? Take a look and compare them. What is their opinion of the Islamic Republic of Iran? Are the people in these countries against Iran or against the governments 60

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backed by the US? So far a lot of terrorist acts have been committed around the world. In New York, Washington, London, Madrid, etc ...

Up to now, how many Iranians have been implicated in these terrorist acts?

Unfortunately, some countries, in order to divert public opinion, blame other countries to hide their own problems. The US created the Taliban and when the group’s usefulness ended it decided to eradicate them, but it was too late, it was like a dangerous virus which had got out of control. With the excuse of the fight against terrorism and the killing of Bin Laden thousands of people have died in more than ten years in Afghanistan, and in an act of pure propaganda they announced his death and proceeded to celebrate it. Without doubt, history will question the behaviour of those involved.

Iran’s crime is to discuss these events in a transparent way. The US knows who sponsors these acts of terrorism in these countries, and who protects these regimes. From our point of view, if the West didn’t interfere in the internal affairs of Islamic countries, the people of these countries would know how to deal with their leaders and create democratic governments. But instead the West looks on with preoccupation at the positions taken by free leaders and has spared no effort in trying to redirect these tendencies.

Some thirty years have passed since the revolution led by Khomeini. Thirty years of conflict-ridden relations with the USA and Israel. Is there a possible road to reconciliation?

Unfortunately, the world’s major powers never acknowledge the independence and impartiality of other nations.

As you know, in the period between the First and Second World Wars, the Iranian governments of the time declared themselves to be neutral, but the Allied powers didn’t respect Iran’s impartiality

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and invaded our country on both occasions, using it as their ‘Bridge to Victory’.

At the time of the Second World War the British removed Reza Shah from power as he had betrayed them.

They installed his son on the throne and following the people’s call for the nationalization of the oil industry and the Shah going into exile in 1953 the USA, with help of England, organised a coup overthrowing the legitimate people’s government of Mosaddegh, thus reestablishing the monarchy in Iran. Official documents published by the United States government clearly confirm the US’ intervention in the coup. Following the Islamic Revolution in 1979, the US tried to keep the Shah in power using all the means at their disposal, but after the failure of the Nozhe uprising and the attack in Tabas, they encouraged Saddam to declare war on Iran and armed and supported Iraq for eight years in their fight against Iran. As you are aware, Iraq and some other nations in the region continue to be firmly opposed to the liberals in Iran. Nevertheless, the government and people of Iran are waiting for a change in America’s position with respect to Iran. If it were to revise its hostile stance towards Iran, we would review our relations with the USA. As you know, Israel is a product of the taking of Palestinian land and the killing of innocent Palestinians, so from our point of view and other independent countries Israel is not a legitimate country. We’re not against any tribe, race or religion but we cannot recognise a government that is the result of the massacre of the region’s legitimate settlers. The democratic control and government by the legitimate settlers of this land, composed of Muslims, Catholics and Jews, will open the way to a stable sovereignty.

Recently your president expressed the desire to ‘eliminate the state of Israel’. Was

this an unfortunate slip or is this his definitive policy towards the Israelis? Do you have an opinion on a hypothetical peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians?

The Israeli regime has been massacring the innocent people of Palestine for years. It has occupied part of Lebanon and Syria. It has attacked Jordan several times. It prevents the legitimate owners of the Palestinian territory from remaining on their own land. They have upset the security and tranquillity in the region for several decades and they have been a source of discrepancy and conflict between Muslim countries in the region. What is more, the existence of Israel is one of the most important motives for a discrepancy between some of the Islamic countries in the region and the West.

Iran has always maintained that it doesn’t wish to interfere in the affairs of other countries in the region. Iran believes that the people of other countries in the region should control their own destiny and elect whatever government they see fit. Iran has never planned any action against another country. Iran believes that if the inhabitants of the Palestinian region were allowed to return (since the majority of the land was usurped by the Israelis, forcing them to leave the country), and if they held free elections, the majority of voters would elect a government that would bear no resemblance to the current government of Israel. Unfortunately, in order to put pressure on Iran, some countries have interpreted this as Iran’s attempts to eliminate Israel.

If they carried out the policies called for by the West and held free elections allowing the minority to vote, peace would be re-established in the region. If we take a look at other Islamic countries in which interference from the West, and the US in particular, is lower, do we see signs of disagreements and conflict?

Iran believes that we should let people choose the best for themselves.

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For many years now, your government has been conducting an international political battle against the organization ‘The People’s Mujahedin’ [or MKO] who form part of the National Council of Iranian Resistance. In spite diplomatic pressure from your government, the EU removed this organization from its list of terrorist organizations. Do you see this situation as proof of international weakness? Do you feel it might have an effect on your country? People tell us that there is growing discontentment towards the regime in Iran, especially among the nation’s youth.

If you take a look at the history of the origin and the activities of the MKO, who are known as the ‘Hypocrites’ in Iran, you’ll notice that the Iranian government hasn’t initiated a fight against this group. Rather they started their campaign of terrorist acts in Iran following the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

They have killed nearly 10,000 people, including government employees and civilians in the street and the bazaars.

Among others they have killed the president, prime minister, the president of the judiciary, some ministers, members of parliament, and so on... This group emerged during the eight years of war forced on us by Iraq and they used all available means to help Saddam in his attacks on Iran. This group attacked Iran with Iraqi help even in the closing days of the war following the accept62

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ance of UN Security Council Resolution 597. This opposition group perpetrated many crimes in Iraq, and as well as participating in the torture of Iranian prisoners, they took part in Saddam’s repression of the Iraqi population.

For this reason, in 2002 the Spanish government added the ‘Hypocrites’ to the list of terrorist groups. The US also put this group on the list of terrorists. Nevertheless, unfortunately the European Union, thanks to its political position and in order to put pressure on the Islamic Republic of Iran, has removed this group from the list of terrorist groups.

The citizens of European countries should ask their politicians and representatives why a group that has killed thousands of people and has left its members in appalling conditions in the [refugee] camps in Iraq has been taken off the list of terrorist groups. And moreover, why have they been allowed to operate in their jurisdiction and in the European parliament?

At present the families of many of these people hang around the entrance to the Ashraf camp in Iraq, asking to be allowed to see their children and bring them back to Iran, but those in charge of the camps won’t allow it. These people are being held incommunicado and isolated from the outside world, locked up in these camps. Why aren’t they allowed to choose their future, why aren’t they given permission to talk directly to their families? The Iranian Government has pardoned those who have not committed crimes and has given them permission to return to Iran. The handful of leaders of the ‘Hypocrites’ that prevent these people from meeting up with their family, are seeking the support of various countries and are trying to obtain funds. The Europeans should ask their leaders why they support this terrorist group. What do you think would happen if a country or an individual supported ETA, what would

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the Spanish people and the Catalans in particular think about that country or that person? Unfortunately, a few Spanish members of the European parliament and the Catalan MEPs in particular, lend their support to members of this ‘Hypocrites’ group. Does this not raise questions in the conscience of the Catalan people?

The history and actions of this group are so negative that they have become one of the most hated groups in Iran, and there’s no way this is going to change.

If you travel to Iran and speak to people you will be able to see this for yourself...

Aren’t you worried that the uprisings which are taking place in various Arab countries might reach Iran?

You know something about the history of the revolutions and the demands of the Iranian people. At the start of the (Christian) twentieth century Iran was among the first countries to have a monarchical revolution in which it called on the king to re-establish a people’s parliament and a legal system. In 1979 following the Islamic Revolution the Iranians once more challenged and eliminated the monarchical, dictatorial regime. As you can see, resistance and opposition to the monarchical, dictatorial regime started 32 years ago in Iran and have spread to countries in the region. By using the Iranian experience, people in the region expressed their democratic wish for the establishment of independent Islamic governments. The citizens of the countries of the region have risen up in order to obtain what other democratic, Islamic countries like Iran already have. In the past 32 years we have held more than 30 elections and referendums, council elections, elections for the Islamic Consultative Assembly, elections for the ‘Council of Wise Men’ and presidential elections that all receive the support of the people.

Can you punish a person or a country because you distrust the contents of their mind?

You speak of peace but the world is concerned about your program of uranium enrichment. So far you haven’t given sufficient guarantees to satisfy the international community and your nuclear program is rather worrying for the whole world.

I wonder whether you have a very low profile information policy or is there some truth in the rumours that cast doubts on your good intentions?

If you take a look at the history of international organizations like the International Atomic Energy Agency and the NPT, you will see that Iran was amongst the first countries to become members of these organizations. Also, as you can see in the documents and reports prepared by the IAEA, there are no documents which indicate that Iran is diverting material for use in illegal activities like the construction of the atomic bomb.

Nevertheless, to prevent protests from the US, they’ve been obliged to declare whether Iran has the intention of manufacturing a bomb or not.

Can you punish a person or a country because you distrust the contents of their mind?

How is it that Israel, according to statements made by their government and declarations made by experts from different countries, including Americans, are in possession of thousands of atomic warheads and isn’t a member of the NPT and yet doesn’t have any problems? Meanwhile Iran is punished when there’s no evidence that it has deviated from its peaceful activities.

In our opinion this goes against the rights of the world’s independent nations to have access to the peaceful use of nuclear energy. A double standCatalan International View

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ard is being applied. The construction of nuclear power stations and the program of uranium enrichment began in Iran under the Shah and received the support of the US. But now there is an independent government in Iran, the project is opposed by the US. With God’s help, the enrichment of uranium and the production of fuel are carried out in Iran and the country doesn’t need to import them. Our independence has opponents, but we’ve accepted it. When they’ve grown tired of putting pressure on Iran they’ve assassinated various nuclear scientists in our country in order to cause problems for our projects, but without any success.

What would Iran like to say to the world?

How can Iran help world peace?

The Iranian government, backed by its glorious history and civilization, and the application of its religious knowledge, have repeatedly declared its willingness to cooperate with the most important countries of the world in finding a way to world peace and security, but unfortunately this offer has been unwelcome. In the first years after the appearance of the Taliban in Afghanistan, Iran warned that they were a terrorist group that threatened security in the region, but no one paid attention until after the attack on the US and the threat to their interests when the group was finally accepted as dangerous. For many years Iran identified Saddam as

a threat to peace and a cause of conflict, but during eight years of war with Iran the West supported Iraq. Only after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, which endangered US interests in the Persian Gulf, were they willing to stand up to him. For years Iran has emphasised the desire of the peoples of the Arab countries to achieve independence from corrupt, dictatorial governments which are backed by the West. We foresaw the current situation, but now that the current situation has arisen and there is a tense atmosphere the world is paying attention. With these events we can witness the ability of the US and other powerful nations to change the course of the revolutions. This will increase the people of the region’s dislike for the West. Iran believes that one does not need military intervention to achieve peace and security in the region and that non-interference is the best way to solve the region’s problems. In previous centuries Iran has shown that it hasn’t constituted a danger for neighbouring countries and this situation will continue.

In light of the current situation, motivated by the economic crises and the revolutions in North Africa and the Arab countries, the Islamic Republic of Iran is willing, through the use of its economic and political power, to help solve these crises. Iran is always willing to talk and negotiate with the world.

*Marc Gafarot Holds a degree in Humanities from the Universidad de Navarra, an MSc in European Studies from the London School of Economics and an MA in Latin American Studies from the University of Liverpool. As a journalist and political commentator he has worked from London for Bloomberg LP, in Latin America for Summit Communications and served as a Parliamentary Adviser at the European Parliament in Brussels and Strasbourg. Gafarot is currently Head of International Relations for Catalan International View. He has written a book on Flanders and Federalism in Belgium called ‘La mort de Bèlgica? La gradual i pacífica emancipació flamenca’ (The Death of Belgium? the Gradual and Peaceful Flemish Emancipation) and co-authored The Student’s Guide to European Integration.

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Advertising Feature

For every need: its technology and its network

by Albert Buxadé*

The news, topics or words used most often in recent times in the world of telecommunications (fibre optics, transmission speed, investments, costs, etc.) sometimes seem to adopt conflicting stances.

The data transmission world is clearly growing by the day which puts the capacity of existing networks to the test and poses a challenge for future technologies. Today nobody casts doubt on the great capacity and performance that fibre optics offers the vast majority of business needs, but neither are they unaware that the costs of these infrastructures are very high.

At Vodafone we know that all this is true, and indeed we have one of the country’s largest fibre networks, above all for the capacity of our mobile network connection nodes. As with traditional fixed ADSL our long-term vision in this regard is that mobile networks will steadily absorb more traffic and replace these terrestrial infrastructures. The reasons are clear: steadily increasing speeds, a steady drop in prices and the ease of service subscription and availability.

Barcelona is already enjoying HSPA+ Dual Carrier 43.2 Mbps technology, which has doubled its network capacity in the capital’s connection hotspots. This rollout has served to boost users’ browsing experience quite considerably. They can browse, share and transfer files with upload speeds of up to 43.2 Mbps and download speeds of up to 5.7 Mbps.

These features have turned the ‘ADSL phone’ into a clear substitute for a 66

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significant portion of fixed traffic. What’s more, current tablet and smartphone trends mean that ‘mobile data’ represent the future of Internet connections.

The recent allocation of spectrum will allow for the upcoming migration to advanced mobile broadband technologies such as LTE and LTE Evolution, of which Barcelona will be the finest example and world capital thanks to being the venue of the Mobile World Congress. The availability of speeds of up to 100 Mbps merely underscores the previous remarks about the future of data and from which networks they will travel.

Investing in this technology migration will by no means be cheap and the current competitive pressure of the market itself and regulators may slow down a technology that it makes perfect sense to strengthen as it solves long-standing issues such as the country’s digital divide. One of the biggest challenges right now is also ensuring universal access to mobile broadband for the countryside, which due to its unique nature does not currently have fixed broadband.

Vodafone has taken a step forward in this regard by providing universal access to town and village with less than a thousand inhabitants. This project will be extended to 3,100 towns and villages throughout Spain by March 2012.

Advertising Feature

Last year in Catalonia Vodafone invested â‚Ź6.5 billion in rolling out coverage, and throughout the region 234 municipalities with fewer than a thousand inhabitants now enjoy coverage. This ensures that rural dwellers can also enjoy the benefits of the information society.

That said, the coexistence of current technologies is the best scenario and each need must find its technology and its network. What really matters is finding ways to enable all the

players (operators, regulators and local government) to cooperate as closely as possible, so as to put Catalonia at the forefront of innovation and technological progress and maintain channels of communication with the public and businesses alike. All this will help improve the current situation and put us in an excellent position to tackle future challenges.

For more information:

www.vodafone.es/administracionespublicas

*Albert BuxadĂŠ Head of vodafone catalonia

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Opinion

Josep Suñol i Garriga a life for Catalonia

by Jordi Badia*

‘I only wish for my patriotic position to be heard, as a man who has taken up an independent position in spite of knowing that it is the most uncomfortable, contrary to what the simplistic may believe. And it is the most uncomfortable because such independence of criteria and behaviour, that do not coincide with the ideology of the parties at war with each other, almost always lead one to receive the censure of one or another ...’ ( Josep Suñol, ‘La Rambla’, 28th December 1931) On the 6th of August 1936, at approximately six o’clock, Josep Suñol i Garriga was shot by a detachment of Franco’s troops stationed in a road labourers’ cottage. The house had been given the nickname ‘Cottage of Death’ since the early days of the war when it had been very costly in terms of human lives to gain control of and to defend. The cottage was located 52 kilometres from Madrid on the La Coruña road, where it passes through the Sierra de Guadarrama, on the way to the Alto de Leon. When Franco’s soldiers shot Josep Suñol, they knew they were killing an important member of the Spanish Republic. They had seen him arrive in a chauffeur-driven Ford flying a Catalan flag, accompanied by a soldier and a journalist. Among his papers they found a large sum of money and documents that showed he was a member of Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (the Republican Left of Catalonia) party. Suñol had travelled to Madrid as the Catalan Government’s special envoy. It is unclear whether they knew he was also the president of Barcelona FC, as the first eye-witness accounts of his execution make no mention of the fact. In any case, none of the soldiers involved could have foreseen that the person they had just shot would become a legend for future generations of Catalans and Barça (Barcelona FC) fans.

Josep Suñol i Garriga was born on the 21st July 1898. He was a middle-class, left-wing republican and a Catalan nationalist. He was part of the bourgeoisie by birth; his grandfather, Antoli Suñol i Ramoneda had started a prosperous business, based on the import and sale of products from the colonies which his father, Josep Suñol i Casanovas went on to grow and expand with the production, refining and sale of sugar.

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his own convictions. He was influenced somewhat by his uncle Ildefons, who in the early twentieth century succeeded in politics in the ranks of Catalan independence and republicanism; he died when Josep Suñol was just 15 years old.

The left, republicanism and Catalan independence were the three pillars of his beliefs. Politics, sport and journalism were the main areas through which he acted.

The work of Josep Suñol i Garriga is more intense than extensive. It lasted

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just ten years, from well into the second half of the twenties until the time of his tragic death at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. A perfect way to sum up his life would be the motto Esport i Ciutadania (Sport and Citizenship) which for many years appeared as the subtitle of La Rambla weekly, founded by Suñol in February 1930.

This rallying cry was soon explained in the pages of the newspaper: ‘This is the goal: to strive for social efficiency in all the energy of the youth,

which -frustrated by the violence in other avenues-, erupts in a somewhat sterile fashion, on our playing fields. It was not, -and still isn’t- a battle against sport -a new force, the glorification of the human body, a noble love for the fight-, twinned with the generous and friendly exercise of the spirit. It was the physical struggle in the stadium and the civil struggle on the streets of our cities. The youthful democracies of Europe offer a living example.

Catalonia -a European people, with European aspirations- could follow them in Catalan International View

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their parades of athletes and their citizens’ marches. And in this hour of supreme individual responsibility, we proclaim aloud the slogan ‘Sport and Citizenship’. When we say Sport we mean the race, the enthusiasm, the optimism, the noble struggle of youth. And when we say Citizenship, we mean civility, Catalan eagerness, liberalism, democracy, generosity and broad spiritual values’1.

Suñol put into action the regenerationist debate that had been imported from Europe following its emergence from the Great War

[1] La Rambla de Catalunya, II, no. 46, 9th February 1931, p. 14-15.

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In order to understand him in all his magnitude we must go beyond these lines, however, and examine his career as a whole. Suñol performed simultaneously on three fronts: the ideological, through the newspapers with which he worked (La Nau, 1st October 1927 to October 7th 1929), financed (La Nau dels Esports, October 7th 1929 to February 3rd 1930) and created (La Rambla, 10th February 1930 to 27th July 1936); in the sporting world as director and president of the Catalan Football Association and as director and president of Barcelona FC; and in the political sphere, as an Esquerra Republicana deputy to the Cortes Generales (General Courts) during the Second Spanish Republic. For Suñol, the press and, above all else, football were instrumental, in that they could serve to educate people in this youthful democracy, to make them continue towards the complete Catalonia in which he believed and for which he had fought.

Suñol put into action the regenerationist debate that had been imported from Europe following its emergence from the Great War. The most extreme position concluded that Catalonia neither wanted nor was able to confront Miguel Primo de Rivera’s dictatorship (1923-1930) due to a lack of discipline Catalan International View

and physical strength. As a result, the first step towards the nation’s democratic regeneration was the education of its citizens in physical exercise and sporting values. Among the ‘young democracies of Europe’ that ‘offered a living example’, Suñol focused on Czechoslovakia, which had gained independence in 1918, and its leader and first president, Thomas G. Masaryk.

Masaryk is key to understanding why Suñol chose to support Francesc Macia (the 122nd president of Catalonia, formerly an officer in the Spanish army) Masaryk founded the Sokol movement in 1862, a network of gymnasiums which evolved into patriotic cultural centres in which young Czechs were educated physically, morally and intellectually. In 1918, when Masaryk was 68 years old and living in exile in North America, he announced his country’s independence. Macià had also been an exile. The Catalan political class had him down as an old, clumsy collector of failures since his frustrated military uprising in Prats de Mollo (1926). He was 72 years old when he returned to Catalonia in February 1931. At that time his Catalan State Party had little influence. Nevertheless, Suñol was able to appreciate Macià’s popularity among the working classes. First, from the pages of La Rambla he campaigned for Macià’s amnesty and return to Catalonia, becoming his spokesman. Once he obtained his return, he made him into the charismatic leader who guided Catalonia towards realising itself as a country. As part of the hastily formed Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya party, Macià won the municipal elections of April 12 1931 which two days later gave rise to the Second Spanish Republic and his election as president of the Generalitat of Catalonia.

Suñol’s use of the mass media and football made him highly popular, but it also generated much criticism. If we were to judge him in contemporary

terms, we would say he was a media personality. He constantly appeared in the media even though he never held a government post. He was very well known and in the photographs of the era he is usually seen near to President Macià, though at a discrete distance.

After Macià’s death during Christmas 1933, Suñol’s public presence declined due to health problems that forced him to take periodical sabbaticals abroad.

Since he strongly wished to maintain his independence, he never participated in partisan struggles; acting as a bridge between the various parties and factions. The clearest evidence of the popularity and esteem in which he was held is that on the three occasions he stood for election to the Spanish General Courts (1931, 1933 and 1936) he won with a large majority. In fact, in the first in which he stood, he beat Francesc Macia and Lluis Companys, two presidents of the republican Generalitat.

The political class, essentially on the right, accused Suñol of populism.

Meanwhile, the intellectuals rejected him for his enthusiasm for football and sport, ignoring the cultural and literary projects he promoted via the Catalan Football Federation. He often said that if the youth are determined to go to football matches, there’s no point in going to lecture them in a library. In early 1936, a time of great tension and social unrest, his rivals and detractors began to talk of the ‘Suñolisation’ of the country. It was a cheap, unfair accusation since Suñol had always condemned violence and did so to the very end. In his last article of July 27th he made a desperate plea to end the disaster which Franco’s uprising was to bring to Catalonia and the Republic.

Suñol sensed from the start that the revolt would be both dramatic and decisive for the fate of the country and for democracy.

Suñol in the former Barça stadium with Lluis Companys, president of Catalonia at the time

*Jordi Badia Was born in Sabadell on 2nd February 1963. He is a journalist who has worked for Ràdio Sabadell, Ràdio Terrassa and Catalunya Ràdio, for whom he was their Brussels’ correspondent, and Avui newspaper.

From 2003 to 2008 he was Barcelona FC’s director of communications. He holds a Humanities degree from the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), and has an MA in Research in Communication journalism from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. He is author of the ‘Chronicle of Nuñisme’ (Proa, 2003), ‘Barça Uncovered’ (Ara Llibres, 2008) and ‘Josep Suñol i Garriga. Living and dying for Catalonia’ (Pagès Editors, 2011).

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Opinion

Science and religion in 19th century Europe: some considerations

by Jordi Bohigas-Maynegre*

During the nineteenth century, characterized as ‘the century of science’, the relationship between faith and science reached high levels of tension. It is well known that the development of some scientific theories challenged the traditional mindset based on Christian teachings. It was a time in which the autonomy of the spheres of knowledge of theology and science (or philosophy) were still not very well defined. Some thinkers, spurred on by the prestige science had attained, saw knowledge as only obtainable through experimental observation and not by the authority of religious revelation. For others, the emancipation of scientific methods from theological oversight represented the dangers of the emancipation of the results, or in other words the secularization of the world. God and nature were seen to have been simultaneously separate and inextricably linked and the study of one without the other meant condemning oneself to not understanding anything and committing the mistake of believing that nature could exist without God. One can see how this apparently troubled ‘relationship’ between science and religion has given rise to various phenomena. To mention two: on one hand, the consolidation of the scientific method and the unstoppable advance of the secularization of society implied a change in the traditional religious mentality, which lead to the need to review the concepts acquired by that very knowledge structure. Certain scientific theories, such as evolution (originating in the eighteenth century), the atomic theory of matter and the theory of the conservation of energy, called into question the foundations of traditional thinking and contributed to a new world view. The story of creation found in the Bible, the sacred book of the Christians, had been accepted for centuries, while Aristotelian 72

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thought allowed for certain common ground between philosophy and the Bible. The story of creation transmitted, among others scientific principles, the unchanging nature of species and a vitalist, teleological view of organic nature. The overall result was rational, perfectly suited to meeting the need for an agreement between faith and reason characterized by Thomism. Since the seventeenth century the prevailing Aristotelian system of ecclesiastical teaching had begun to unravel, calling into question both the approach and the methods of both theology and philosophy. The development of disciplines such as geology and palaeontology, for example, rolled back the age of the Earth to a time previously undreamt of and cast doubt on the unchanging nature of species. The theories of Charles

Opinion

Darwin (1809-1882), who achieved fame with the publication of On the Origin of Species (1859), gave the impression that God was no longer the Lord of a creation that evolves according to natural selection that has nothing to do with Providence, as was traditionally taught. Calling into question the reality of Adam and Eve seemed to ruin the foundation of the story of salvation: the existence of evil on Earth and the coming of the Saviour, the Redeemer, became incomprehensible.

Here we focus, however, on some examples taken from the history of the Catholic Church and its relationship with science.

A Church under siege

Here, we find another aspect of this relationship: the numerous interpretations that were made of the new discoveries and the ‘advance’ of science.

For certain freethinking sectors, linked to the concerns of republicans, radicals and middle-class liberals who sought to undermine the politico-religious establishment dominant in their respective countries, the new science was a weapon to attack the foundations of institutionalized religion and thereby, religion itself. They depicted the relationship between religion and science as a troubled one and in order to do so they sought examples in history (with Galileo’s trial being the classic instance).

In this sense, the natural system outlined by Darwin provided ammunition for this ‘scientific’ anticlericalism, to the point of becoming an icon for those seeking to employ science as a tool against the scriptures, although Darwin

distanced himself from some of his disciples’ more dogmatic views. The ‘cult’ of science adopted various guises in the second half of the nineteenth century, with positivism and scientific naturalism (British and German) and figures such as Huxley, Tyndall, Büchner and Haeckel. The German zoologist Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919) a noted figure in monistic philosophy, saw matter and energy as attributes of one universal, infinite substance, and emphasised the unity of organic and inorganic nature.

Unlike Darwin, who was a creationist (which is to say he believed in a creative power at the beginning of time), some of his followers were in favour of spontaneous creation, a long-established theory that saw complex animal and vegetable life-forms as spontaneously arising from inert matter, thereby allowing them to reject the ‘miracle’ of Creation. This theory was temporarily confirmed by the finding of Eozoon canadense in 1858, a Cambrian fossil that later proved to be inorganic.

The consolidation of the scientific method and the unstoppable advance of the secularization of society implied a change in the traditional religious mentality The reigning pope at the time, Pius IX, failed to get the strategy of reconciliation with science off to a good start. Surrounded by Italian troops who threatened to invade the Papal States, and pressed by the winds of change blowing across Europe and within Catholicism itself, in his sadly famous enCatalan International View

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cyclical Quanta Cura and its accompanying document the Syllabus, the Pope was to condemn the ‘modern errors’ and in particular, attempts to reconcile religion with ‘progress, liberalism and modern civilization’.

Attacks made by science on theological thinking stimulated the Church, both as an institution and as a collection of members to update themselves on scientific matters The Catholic response

The Catholic response was far from unique and centralized in the Vatican, aside from some general guidelines on science-faith reconciliation and the restoration of Thomism in university faculties and schools. It became necessary not to miss out on the ‘scientific bandwagon’ in order to oppose, with solid arguments from the field of science, attacks on the scriptures, thus presenting Catholicism as the greatest ally of the progress of modern science. The Jesuits’ successful scientific tradition, with their astronomical and meteorological observatories scattered throughout their schools around the world, seemed to confirm this. In addition, the agnosticism traditionally associated with modern science could be overcome in the name of that same scientific methodology: apologists for science had to come out in support of the revealed truths. Shortly before Rome’s anti-liberal shift in 1848, Pope Pius IX himself restored an old scientific academy named Accademia Pontificia dei Nuovi Lincei, which aimed to promote scientific research and advise the Pope’s government on scientific matters. The main figure of the time was the Italian Jesuit Angelo Secchi (1818-1878).

Protected by Pius IX, the physicist, astronomer and meteorologist Secchi 74

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was director of the Roman College observatory for 28 years (1850-1878).

He was a pioneer of astronomical spectroscopy and one of the world’s first scientists to establish that the Sun was a star, and he drew one of the first maps of Mars. With the capital occupied by Piedmontese troops in 1870, the new Italian state took control of the university observatory of the Roman College.

Secchi received tempting offers from the government, but nothing could alter his loyalty to the Pope, and the new authorities did not dare to expel him from his laboratory, where he continued his research until his death at the age of 60. The Vatican went without an observatory until Leo XIII opened one in 1891. It remained in Rome until 1935, when Pius XI decided to transfer it to Castelgandolfo.

Nonetheless, the Church’s response was characterized by its diversity and adaptation to different national realities, always in accordance with common standards of the time. Some of the key initiatives emerged from francophone countries, and were carried out by the local hierarchy, grassroots clergy, laypeople and professors of Catholic faculties: in short, we are talking about the establishment of a network of Catholic universities (the first, Louvain, dates from 1834) and the creation of the Société Scientifique de Bruxelles (1875).

The latter brought together Catholic scientists from around the world and organised conferences for Catholic scientists, which were held on six occasions between 1888 and 1900. The conferences were a successful attempt to create a Catholic intellectual space free from the interference of mainstream scholars. In these conferences the tensions which existed within Catholicism became clear when it came to allowing for scientific autonomy on issues affecting theology and, ultimately, the reconciliation of science with religious teachings. There were obviously epi-

Opinion

sodes of conflict with the ecclesiastical authorities and the most intransigent sectors who were fearful of attempts by the secular and ecclesiastical grassroots to create a different form of teaching.

Thus, in 1888 the conference rejected a motion calling on it to oppose the theory of evolution, seeing it as going against the Bible. Many Catholics already distinguished between evolution being employed for anti-religious ends and its application as an important concept as part of science.

By way of conclusion

In short, far from being a hindrance, the attacks made by science on theological thinking stimulated the Church, both as an institution and as a collection of members to update themselves on scientific matters. Catholic scientists came to spearhead the renewal of theologi-

cal thought in many parts of the world.

Gradually, exegetical studies began to expand in faculties of theology. The Bible ceased to be considered as a scientific manual or see the book of Genesis as a work of history, prehistory, geology or biology. Christians began to appreciate and accept that the sacred scriptures simply declared that the world had been created by God and came to express themselves in the cosmological terms that were in use at that time. Furthermore, at the start of the twentieth century, this view coincided with the abandonment of positivist dogmatism and the recognition of the enigmatic nature of reality and, consequently, the possibility of interpretations which are not only scientific. Christians and scientists are able to recognize the limits of their knowledge and their methods, and to respect each other.

Label from an emblematic Catalan liquor featuring a charicature of Charles Darwin

*Jordi Bohigas-Maynegre (Girona, 1978). Holds a PhD in History from the University of Girona (UdG), his thesis was entitled ‘For God and for Science: the Church and Science in Contemporary Catalonia’, which he presented in May this year. He was a research fellow at the UdG between 2003 and 2007, and later served as professor of Contemporary History at the university and as a lecturer to second year undergraduates. His research interests include the Peninsular War, on which he has written the following books in collaboration with Francesc X. Morales: The Peninsular War in La Selva: The Impact of the Napoleonic Occupation on Rural Areas (2008) and Girona from 1808 to 1809. Sieges, War and Society in Northeast Catalonia (2010). He is currently preparing a biography of Dr. Francesc Rovira, and is studying social revolution during the early months of Civil War in the Girona region.

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Green Debate

The Year of Forests in the century without forests?

by Pere Torres*

Every human civilization, with its technological wonders and its artistic and intellectual advances, has depended on a non-human invention: the ability of certain cells to use sunlight to produce organic matter and release oxygen. From this biological miracle comes the oxygen we breathe, the food we eat and most of the energy we consume (wood obviously, but also coal, natural gas and oil). We can also follow the trail to many other materials: everything which is made from organic products or oil (textiles, plastics, drugs and so on).

Photosynthesis takes place in microscopic algae, in the grass found in meadows and the weeds that grow everywhere. Its most dramatic manifestation, however, is the forest. Nevertheless, its importance has been so underestimated that all too often we have acted as if it simply did not exist. In an attempt to remedy this lack of appreciation, the United Nations have decided that 2011 is to be the International Year of Forests, with the accompanying slogan Celebrating Forests for People.

Why should we celebrate forests for people? For a reason which is both simple and ignored: forests are vital and are undergoing a disturbing decline. To begin with this second aspect, the decline, it is worth considering some statistics.

Since the mid-twentieth century, the FAO has published studies on the state of forests worldwide every 5-10 years.

In the last edition, 2010 (Global Forest Resources Assessment 2010), there is an item of news which, if we are optimistic, we can see as positive: the halting of deforestation. In the first decade of the twenty-first century, less forest was lost than in the last decade of the twentieth century. Whereas the net loss was previously 8.3 million hectares per year, it currently stands at 5.2 million. This decrease is certainly positive, but we should not forget that every passing year we still have less and less forest.

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The phenomenon is not uniform across the planet, however. Noticeable differences can be observed between continents. In fact, deforestation is concentrated in South America and Africa, which have reduced their wooded areas by some 7.4 million hectares annually. The global balance is lower (5.2 million in total) because of the increase of forests in Asia and Europe.

Without wishing to downplay the importance of the overall data, from a quantitative point of view, the issue of forests is largely played out in a handful of countries. One in particular: Brazil. For many years, we have witnessed campaigns calling on us to ‘save the Amazon!’ In fact, what they were calling for was the salvation of the Amazon rainforest. In spite of the efforts and international sympathy, the Amazon is still very vulnerable. Again, the statistics speak for themselves: in the last decade of the twentieth century Brazil lost 2.9 million hectares per year, in the first decade of this century, it reduced the annual loss to 2.6 million.

The much-feted president Lula, who promoted the country’s development, reducing poverty and turning Brazil into a regional power that made the world sit up and take notice of, nevertheless failed to reverse the negative trends of deforestation. It doesn’t look as if it will happen now either: last May,

Green Debate

Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies declared an amnesty on crimes of deforestation committed before 2008, and passed a new Forest Code that increases the likelihood of using forested land for agriculture and the rearing of livestock.

At the time of writing, the law is pending approval in the Senate.

Brazil is in fact a country where attempting to protect the forest or jungle can still lead to death: last June the activist Zé Claudio was murdered. He was the successor in this struggle to Chico Mendes, who was also assassinated, in 1988.

In Africa, the decline in forests occurs mainly in the central region (Nigeria, Cameroon, Congo, Tanzania).

There have been positive results in Asia, however: Indonesia has reduced its 1.9 million hectares per year losses (in the decade preceding 1991) to 0.5 million (in the decade preceding 2001) thanks to a moratorium on new concessions. Moreover, China, India and Vietnam have launched ambitious reforestation programs with net gains of 3 million, 300 thousand and 200 thousand hectares per year respectively.

In Europe, the largest recoveries of forests occur in the north, in Scandinavia and in the south they occur in the western Mediterranean. The European phenomenon is linked to its economic and demographic development. In France, a team coordinated by Emilie Andrieu, of the INRA, was able to reconstruct the history of the forest over the last 235 years. He identifies several stages: • From 1771 (the first year for which data exists) until 1942, wooded areas both decreased in size and were increasingly fragmented into eversmaller units. The main driver was the transformation of forests into agricultural land.

• From 1942 woodlands were recovered due to rural depopulation, while forestry activities remained stable until the eighties, when they declined somewhat.

This pattern is applicable to almost all European countries: more land is available for forests thanks to a decline in agriculture and the process of rural depopulation. In Europe, Catalonia is one of the countries in which this phenomenon has manifested itself with greater intensity: 36% of its land was forested in 1975, while today the figure has soared to 51%. This figure puts Catalonia near the top of the ranking of Western countries (the European average is 44%, while both Canada and the United States have around 33-34%).

Deforestation is concentrated in South America and Africa, which have reduced their wooded areas by some 7.4 million hectares annually As we can see: a mixture of positive and negative statistics, but with a preponderance of negative news. In spite of the slower rate of decline, the forests do not have a very favourable future if the tendency is not reversed from fewer forests to more forests.

A team led by Dr. Gregory Asner of Stanford University calculated that if the rate of deforestation between 2000 and 2005 is maintained until the end of the century and given the influence of global warming there will be a chilling outcome: 80% of currently existing tropical forests will have disappeared.

The study can be read in the December 2010 issue of Conservation Letters. Unfortunately, the global quantity of forested areas which form part of a protected natural area is less than 15%.

Finally, given that the world population continues to grow, the amount of forest per capita is doubly endangered.

A 1997 study by the World Resources Institute (entitled The Last Frontier Forests) gave estimates for this variable: 0.56 hectares per capita in 2000, falling to 0.38 in 2050, i.e. a third less.

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Green Debate

In addition to the reduction in the size of forests, a second threat has arisen: fragmentation. Forests will also lose out, even if they remain more or less constant, since due to human intervention they are experiencing many discontinuities and their ecosystems are shrinking. Populations of plants and animals need a continuous area of a certain size in order that species can continue to be viable. Obviously, the larger the individuals, the greater the necessary area needs to be. If a habitat is fragmented and remains below this minimum threshold, the population may well disappear.

In short, the quantitative picture is not encouraging. Again, however, the key question: why do we want to preserve our forests?

There are at least four reasons:

1. There are schools of thought which deny that nature exists to be used by humanity, without any limits. On the contrary, we humans are just another species and therefore we have no right to eliminate others for our own benefit. This is the socalled ecocentric view, as opposed to the anthropocentric.

2. Forests also have a symbolic meaning for many cultures and religions. In fact, they should have such a significance for all members of our species: a significant part of hominid evolution occurred in forests.

Without forests, the world would probably have an intelligent species, but it wouldn’t be Homo sapiens.

3. If climate change is a systemic threat to the future of humanity, forests could either work in our favour or against us. They accumulate nearly 290 gigatonnes of carbon, far more than the atmosphere.

Every time we lose forest biomass, the carbon it contains adds atmos-

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pheric concentrations and, thereby encourages global warming. However, if this biomass were increased it would remove CO2 from the atmosphere and would go some way to offsetting emissions due to human activity. We have already seen that forests are lost each year. In the last decade, forest loss has led to the release of half a gigatonne of carbon into the atmosphere every year.

4. Nevertheless, perhaps we are most susceptible to the utilitarian angle. Forests are useful, very useful, to mankind in two ways: directly and consciously on one hand, and indirectly and unconsciously, on the other.

Forests have produced, and continue to produce, both food and materials that our species have used since its very beginning. Even today, many rural communities in the tropics depend on forests for their survival.

Nonetheless, the major importance of forests is to be found in the ecosystem services they provide. These can be seen as all the functions that forests carry out which are necessary for life or human activity and which have not been assigned a price. As we have already seen: the forest is a carbon sink, thereby helping to regulate the cycle of this element and, consequently, the climate. There are many other ecosystem services, however: • The regulation of rivers.

• The purification of water and air.

• The prevention and mitigation of floods.

• Disease control.

It would cost us much more to attain the levels of prosperity and welfare to which we aspire without the ecosystem services which forests provide.

The International Year of Forests is worthwhile for all these reasons, indeed

Green Debate

it is worthwhile for any one of them, especially if it serves to raise awareness and increase our commitment to solving the problems.

The solutions are naturally linked to the causes of forest loss, which are basically five-fold: 1. Agriculture and livestock. The transformation of large tracts of forest into farmland and pastureland. In some countries this may be as a response to the shortage of food, but in the countries with the highest levels of deforestation the main reason is for export. Deforestation due to soybeans in Brazil and palm oil in Indonesia are wellknown examples.

2. Timber and minerals. The extraction of high value timber, which is found in low concentrations inside dense forests, and also mining lead to large quantities of trees being cut down to facilitate access.

3. Urbanisation and infrastructure.

The development of human settlements is based on the conversion of non-urban land into urban land. While in the Western world the major source of land for building is agricultural land which was obtained by the removal of forests decades or centuries ago, in developing countries, forests continue to suffer due to urbanisation.

4. Forest fires. As well as those started due to the conversion of forests to other uses, some are the result of the negligence, arson and neglect.

5. Pollution and global warming.

Human activity outside forests can nevertheless have adverse effects on them. Well-known phenomena such as acid rain-induced air pollution, which has been remedied in Western industrial countries but not in emerging countries: in 2006 a Chinese parliamentary committee warned that a third of the country was threatened by acid rain.

Furthermore, forests are vulnerable to climate change: the half a million hectares of forest Australia lost each year this past decade have been attributed to the severe, longlasting drought that it has been experiencing, a condition that may well be more frequent and intense around the world due to global warming.

The wold’s forests

In short, the three main ideas that should emerge from the International Year of Forests are basic but nonetheless critical: human prosperity depends on forests, they continue to suffer a decline and human action can prevent it. If we could only accept these facts and act accordingly, the situation would quickly change. *Pere Torres

Biologist and environmental consultant. After some time spent on research (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona), he joined the Government of Catalonia in 1991. He was in turn secretary of the Catalan Inter-university Council (1991-1993), Head of the Environment Minister’s staff (1993-1995), general director of Environmental Planning (1995-2000) and secretary for Regional Planning (2000-2003). Since 2004 he has done consultancy work in public management, sustainability and land use planning and has been a regular contributor to the International Institute for Governability and the Institut Cerdà.

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Science and Technology

The implications of the economic crisis on the Catalan health system

by Manel Balcells*

The health system is in crisis in the whole of Europe, and in Catalonia in particular. The global economic crisis has a direct effect on the cuts that countries are making in their health systems. The repercussions are very different, however, depending on the starting point of each country. In the USA, for example, the debate has centred on the health system model, which has in fact become a weapon in the political fight between Democrats and Republicans. In developing countries, the problem is obviously of a totally different kind: they are far from achieving what is known as the European welfare state.

In the case of Catalonia, fully integrated into the European reality, the crisis relies on the sustainability of a system that is becoming increasingly more sophisticated, more technologically advanced, and which has to attend to an aging population; a population with chronic pluripathology, with greater life expectancy, and also displaying a greater quality of life as compared to the past.

In Catalonia, general underfunding and, in particular, the underfunding of the health system (1/3 of the Catalan government’s total budget) mean that, in times of crisis and economic recession, general budgetary cuts affect the health system even more intensively.

Naturally, this budgetary trimming represents a serious threat to the quality of healthcare, the consolidated services, and biomedical research. Indeed, these cuts constitute a grave threat to 80

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the Catalan Biocluster, which, despite its growth, is extremely fragile.

It is time, therefore, to create a paradigm shift, to consolidate the health system not only as an expenditure generator, but also as a system that generates wealth, that creates jobs (directly and indirectly) and that constitutes a tool for boosting a new economy based on medical technologies, spin-offs from hospitals and research centres. In addition, it needs to be re-conceptualized as a system that is capable of generating economic returns based on exploiting growth in the form of patents and licences.

Some statistics

The Catalan Research and Development system ranks very highly internationally in terms of the volume of scientific publications. 50% of these publications are related to biomedi-

Science and Technology

cal research. According to the Science Citation Index (SCI) 2006, the 1,793 Catalan publications represented 25% of the total of Spanish publications, 2.5% of European, and 0.9% of worldwide publications. As to the quality of the publications, measured by their impact factor, the total for Catalan publications was 6,189, with an average of 3.4 per paper. Hence, they are in an excellent position internationally.

In contrast, the number of patents generated by this knowledge is much lower in comparison to other European countries and the USA. Spain represents 1.4% of all patents applied for in the European Union, compared to 44.1% for Germany, and 15.4% for France. In 2008, Catalonia processed 75 applications for patents and it licensed 22 companies, representing 38% of the patents and 30% of all the licences in Spain. If we examine the statistics re-

lating to the creation of companies, the rates are similar. We are therefore facing a significant mismatch between scientific production and the generation of economic activity. In short, one of the weak points of the Catalan system is the recovery and transfer of knowledge.

It is time to consolidate the health system as a system that generates wealth, that creates jobs and that constitutes a tool for boosting a new economy based on medical technologies Innovation potential of hospitals

Catalonia has an excellent hospital network in terms of healthcare and scientific research. In fact, out of the 10 hospitals in Spain that are leaders in scientific production, 6 are Catalan; Catalan International View

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Science and Technology

and these occupy the top positions in the ranking.

The excellent large-scale scientific output of Catalan hospitals stems from a dual model of university research institutes located in large hospitals. These institutes conduct both basic and translational research.

However, innovation (particularly, in medical technology, diagnostic imaging, healthcare processes and clinical management), also relies on the entire hospital network in Catalonia, with more than 232,000 working professionals, most of them with excellent academic qualifications and with a historical record of participation in international networks.

We should immediately generate evaluation instruments, and then gradually introduce the methodology of open innovation in our hospitals Several studies led by prestigious business schools, and a recent OECD report (Reviews of Regional Innovation: Catalonia, Spain, 2010), have noted that the Catalan cluster is between the fifth and the tenth top clusters in the world in terms of the level of dynamism of their networks. The OECD report also emphasizes the great potential for innovation within hospitals, with all that this implies for immediate applicability and subsequent marketing. This is the case, for example, of new diagnostic and therapeutic techniques.

The knowledge industry

In Catalonia, an industrial conglomerate that bases its competitiveness on knowledge (in the broader sense of the word) has been shaped throughout the years. This has taken place in a constant and persistent way, as the result of the search for excellence, a powerful health 82

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sector, and the capacity of various universities to become campuses of international excellence.

This new industry, the so-called ‘knowledge industry’, has still to be explored and strengthened. It is a highly interdisciplinary field, young and fragile and yet poorly articulated. Nevertheless, above all it is based on talent and entrepreneurship. Furthermore, this industry has great internationalization ability, with the potential to interact in a highly globalized world.

A good example of this is the success of the entire collection of companies that developed the ALBA Synchrotron. Many of these are Catalan companies, and they are now called on internationally for their expertise.

This favourable environment represents a clear-cut opportunity to convert our potential in biomedical knowledge into direct economic returns for the system as a whole. This is already being done by a number of countries (e.g.

Israel, Sweden, the USA), and I believe that it is key to the health sector’s contribution to a solution to the current crisis.

Structural changes

Paradoxically perhaps, during times of budget cuts, we should promote the creation of technology transfer tools. If we limit our actions to cuts in spending, without making structural changes, the effects will be useless.

In order to introduce these changes, we must innovate. And not only innovate, but also implement technological improvements that generate savings, following a validation process and subsequent evaluation and marketing. It is necessary to introduce elements of competitive dialogue between technology buyers (i.e. hospitals) and innovative companies based here (whether Catalan or foreign). These changes, which will allow an increase in our productive capabilities, will be only pos-

Science and Technology

sible with features such as innovative public spending.

I am therefore referring to deep changes: medium-term structural changes that should lead us to have centralized units to evaluate innovation (as can already be found in other countries), as well as units to commercialize patents. I am also talking about attracting capital-risk to the projects and about leveraging them, if necessary, with public money, especially in their initial stages of development. Without the latter, we will always be dependent on the economic context, multinationals and shrinking budgets.

Proposals for the future

This is a future that should be the present. The large economic potential of our healthcare system (even with budgetary cuts) allows us to meet these challenges.

We should immediately generate evaluation instruments, and then gradually introduce the methodology of open innovation in our hospitals.

We also need to encourage entrepreneurship in the schools of medicine and nursing, to develop specific

training programs in order to support professionals with innovative motivation and ideas that can be turned into projects. We must urgently implement a program to promote innovation in hospitals and develop it in a supervised way in all health centres.

Finally, we should immediately establish one (or more) capital funds in order to finance early stage projects.

We must articulate a public-private participation in those projects with a good chance of reaching the market.

All this has to be done in a participatory way. It needs to be done rather urgently, with financial support, with the complicity of all the economic and social agents, and with an international vision.

Conclusions

Despite being underfunded and despite suffering significant cuts, the health sector in Catalonia has a number of important strengths. One example is the field of the knowledge industry; it is now time to turn it into an emerging economic sector of the economy.

At this point, what we are missing are the tools allowing us to reverse the current situation. Most importantly, if we want to escape, in the mediumterm, the state of economic dependence, and if we want to generate jobs, attract capital and help fight our way out of the general crisis, what is needed is investment in technology transfer. In short, we have a chance; and those who are capable of working along these lines should do so for the sake of the country as a whole. *Manel Balcells

(Ripoll, 1958). Doctor specialising in Orthopaedics, Traumatology and Sports Medicine. Holds a degree in Health Management from EADA, as well as a degree in PADE from IESE. He is a member of a number of scientific societies. In his long, distinguished career in the health sector he has been Medical Director of Granollers General Hospital (Barcelona); both director and secretary of Coordination and Strategy for the Department of Health of the Generalitat of Catalonia; councillor for the Department of Universities, Research and Information Society; consultant for the Catalan Hospitals Consortium. From the 27th of December 2006 to February 2011 he was president of the board of directors of the Private BioRegion Foundation of Catalonia. At present he is the Director of the Area of Knowledge at Consorci Sanitari de Terrassa (Catalonia), as well as Consultant on Strategic Planning.

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Universal Catalans

Francesc Moragas:

the founder of La Caixa

by Francesc Cabana*

Francesc Moragas i Barret (1868-1935) is one of the most important and delightful characters of the nineteenth century Catalan economic world. Not only did he promote what is today the biggest company in Catalonia (La Caixa d’Estalvis i Pensions de Barcelona), but he created the savings model that has successfully lasted for a century in Catalonia and Spain. As is often the case, success was due to the combined efforts of two individuals who complemented each other perfectly. While Moragas had the idea which he developed, managed and directed for 30 years, it was the entrepreneur Lluis Ferrer-Vidal who introduced him to the Catalan bourgeoisie and who gave his unconditional support. Undoubtedly they would not have been able to do anything of great significance without the help of the other. They died just a few months apart: Moragas in March 1935 and Ferrer-Vidal in April 1936.

Francesc Moragas was a lawyer by trade and came from a family with strong ties to the legal profession: his father, both his grandfathers and his stepfather, Joan Antoni Sorribas (his mother remarried following the death of her first husband), were all lawyers. The latter was to exert a strong influence over his life. Nevertheless, Francesc Moragas never actually worked as a lawyer.

His stepfather died just as he was graduating from law school and Moragas found himself with the responsibility of running a magazine created by Sorribas called Los Seguros (insurance).

For many years Catalan business had recognized the significance of insuring commercial operations and knew that the practice could be applied to social welfare. At that time, the state had still not created a social security system and the working class had to fend for themselves with the creation of so-called ‘help banks’ or ‘savings banks’, sometimes shared with the proprietors of industries. These sav84

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ings banks proposed the establishment of a fund that would serve to pay the pensions of workers upon reaching retirement age or in the case of disability caused by their work. The debate surrounding social welfare developed at a time of tension between capital and labour, and finally came to a head during the Barcelona workers’ strike of 1902.

Employers sympathetic to the workers’ misery asked Francesc Moragas to draft a project to create a ‘pension bank’, in order to improve the conditions of retired workers.

Moragas initially proposed the creation of a pension fund and sought the support of the long-established Caixa d’Estalvis i Mont de Pietat de Barcelona savings bank, founded in 1844 and the only one of its kind at that time in the Catalan capital. He sought administrative support for the pension fund and asked them to manage its funds.

However, the conservative ‘Noble Savings Bank’, so named for the numerous members from the nobility on its board

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of directors, replied that the project did not suit the savings bank’s agenda.

Moragas and his protector Lluis FerrerVidal, on behalf of the employers and institutions they represented, agreed to combine the activities of a savings bank and a pension fund. On the 5th April 1904 La Caixa de Pensions per a la Vellesa i d’Estalvis (The Retirement Pensions and Savings Bank) was created in Barcelona with a board consisting of businessmen who were friends of Lluis Ferrer-Vidal and organizations such as the Barcelona Economic Society of Friends of the Nation, the Catalan Agricultural Institute of Saint Isidre and the Barcelona Athenaeum. The aim of the pension bank was to help retired and disabled workers, while the savings bank was intended to generate income from workers’ savings.

The creation of La Caixa de Pensions, which was established in 1905, was followed in 1908 by the creation of the Instituto Nacional de Previsión (INP, or the National Social Welfare Institute) by the Spanish state, which gave rise to the social security system. The directors of the Institute looked to Francesc Moragas for advice, since he was prominent in the field of social welfare. In 1910 the INP recognized La Caixa de Pensions as a participant organisation which operated throughout Catalonia and the Balearic Islands. The name for the organisation thus became La Caixa de Pensions per a la Vellesa i d’Estalvis de Catalunya i Balears.

Until 1910 the savings banks, which had existed for over half a century in Spain, were social-profit organizations rather than commercial entities. They were highly paternalistic in nature and of little importance. Their customers were exclusively working-class (savings banks were known as the ‘poor-man’s bank’) and the middle class who ran them did not quite know what to do with the income they generated. Some savings banks were limited to investing them in government bonds, while others used the income as loans to the very same industrialists or merchants who managed the bank. As a result, their prospects were rather limited.

Employers asked Francesc Moragas to draft a project to create a pension fund, in order to improve the conditions of retired workers As La Caixa progressed, Moragas realized its potential. Firstly, the agreement with the National Social Welfare Institute was a break with the tradition of having only one office, forcing the bank to open one in all the provincial capitals. Nevertheless, La Caixa did not limit itself to these cities, as it also opened offices in the regional capitals. It often did this by taking over small savings institutions, associated to religious centres and rural savings banks. Another rule La Caixa broke was that of only having working-class clients. They opened up to all social classes, at the same time as they increased their savings deposits (with the famous savings book), with easily available deposits which meant money was available in the form of cheques, just like in a bank.

This change increased the resources received from third parties, and in 1920, fifteen years after it began, La Caixa was the leading savings bank in Catalan International View

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The historic former headquarters of La Caixa d’Estalvis i Pensions de Barcelona

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terms of the volume of its deposits. It has maintained its position ever since.

Moragas broke with tradition both in terms of the savings bank’s passive operations (its deposits) and in its active operations and the application of the results. In 1911, inspired by the attractive terms the state was offering for the construction of social housing (known as ‘Cheap Houses’), La Caixa Catalan International View

decided to get involved with the building of housing and the granting of mortgages to their owners. Over time, mortgages were to become the most common form of credit offered by savings banks.

La Caixa generated profits (or ‘surpluses’ in the case of non-profit organizations) and it was here that Moragas not only broke all the molds, he also

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initiated an authentic social revolution, which was to make La Caixa extraordinarily popular. A good example of this popularity is the fact that during much of the twentieth century in Catalonia, the number of savings accounts opened exceeded the total population.

La Caixa’s surplus or profits were destined to its Obra Social (Welfare Projects). It carried out a wide variety of social work, playing a pioneering role by operating in areas that had previously not had any coverage. La Caixa promoted women’s employment through the creation of the Institute for Working Women, which managed a nursing school, clinics and houses for families.

It supported healthcare with its AntiTB Project, opened the first public libraries, organized children’s and adult summer camps, created the Catalan Institute for the Blind, the Institute of Social Studies and the Agricultural Project with its ‘farm houses’ that rented out farm machinery to farmers and its model smallholdings. All of these changes occurred before the start of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), and included the period of General Primo de Rivera’s dictatorship (1923-1930).

La Caixa and Francesc Moragas maintained tense relations with the regime due to Moragas’ opposition to totalitarian regimes and the profoundly Cata-

lan nature of his work, which was not at all appreciated by the dictator.

La Caixa generated profits and it was here that Moragas not only broke all the molds, he also made La Caixa extraordinarily popular As mentioned earlier, Francesc Moragas died shortly before the start of the Civil War. He did not experience the three years of conflict, much less the 37 years of the Franco dictatorship, which began in 1939. However, the work of Moragas and La Caixa was acknowledged by the other Catalan and Spanish savings banks. Eventually, all savings banks were to follow the example set by Moragas and La Caixa de Pensions per a la Vellesa i d’Estalvis.

An example: the Madrid Savings Bank (CajaMadrid) made its changes well into the twentieth century, and it did so under the leadership of a Catalan who had worked for La Caixa. The elderly, rigid savings banks of the nineteenth century were to become financial organizations that operated like foundations in the second half of the twentieth century, thanks to lessons learnt from Francesc Moragas and his followers.

*Francesc Cabana (1934, Barcelona). Holds a degree in Law and is a member of the Barcelona Bar Association. He worked on the Barcelona stock exchange (1957-1959), for Banca Catalana (1959-1982), worked as a World Bank financial consultant for Third World countries (1984-1992). He was also associate professor of the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya (1997-2005). Cabana is the author of some forty books on Catalan economic history, among which two deserve a special mention: Fàbriques i Empresaris. Els protagonistes de la Revolució Industrial a Catalunya (Factories and Business People. The Protagonists of the Industrial Revolution in Catalonia), for which he was awarded the ‘Estudis’ Prize of the IV Bonaplata Award for Cultural Heritage, bestowed by the Science, Technology and Industrial Archaeology Museum of Catalonia, and Caixes i Bancs de Catalunya (Banks and Savings Banks in Catalonia), for which he was awarded the Joan Sardà Dexeus Prize, bestowed by the Economist’s Society of Catalonia. He is a regular contributor to the Avui newspaper and an honorary member of the Catalan Society of Journalists (2003) and the Economist’s Society of Catalonia (2006). In 1998 he was awarded the St. George’s Cross. He was second vice president of the Ateneu Barcelonès from 2008 to 2011, when he was named president of the organisation. One of his most recent publications is the four volume La Catalunya emprenedora en imatges (Entrepreneurial Catalonia in Pictures).

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A Short Story from History Curated by Manuel Manonelles

From a Romantic myth to an impossible legend

A Romantic view of Montserrat

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Montserrat is a mountain and shrine that for centuries has generated passion and interest among both locals and foreigners alike. Year after year it attracts crowds of visitors alongside a large number of pilgrims. The list of monarchs, princes, saints and all manner of public figures that have visited the place is endless. However, it was one visit in particular, the one undertaken by the German philosopher Wilhelm von Humboldt in March 1800, which unwittingly contributed to one of the most legendary episodes in the history of this mythical mountain.

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Von Humboldt was deeply impressed by Montserrat, for its unique topography and the thirteen hermitages located there; a unique combination in Europe at that time. He related his impressions in a letter sent to his friends, Goethe and Schiller; leading exponents of German romanticism and key members of the Weimar Circle.

This correspondence was to have a major influence, especially when it was first published in 1803, under the title ‘Der Montserrat bei Barcelona’.

The birth of the romantic myth surrounding Montserrat is largely thanks

to this work. Other contributions came from English travellers such as Tickenesse, or the Frenchmen Laborde and Langlois who, during the first half of the 19th century edited several collections of engravings of the mountain that ended up being sold in bookshops in Paris, London or Berlin. This served to spread the mountain’s fame, metaphorically reinterpreted through the lens of Central European romanticism, German romanticism in particular.

A few decades later, Richard Wagner in his opera Parsifal, adapted and revised in his own way the Arthurian legend and, in particular, the medieval version of von Eschenbach’s epic poem.

Wagner identified the castle safeguarding the Holy Grail at ‘the mountain of Montsalvat, near the Pyrenees’. Soon there were those who identified ‘Montsalvat’ as ‘Montserrat’, while others argued that it was in fact the castle of Montsegur, the last refuge of the Cathars, situated on the northern slopes of the Pyrenees.

Little by little the romantic myth and the legend became mixed and began to merge. This explains how for decades the famous Baedeker travel guides made mention of the legend, and helped to strengthen and spread it in the subconscious of visitors to the mountain, especially those of German origin.

It was this cultural background that led to an event that could be classified as surreal if it weren’t for the people who participated in it. On 23rd October 1940 the dictators Franco and Hitler held their one and only infamous meeting in Hendaye, a train station on the border between France and Spain. The very same day, one of the Nazi regime’s most powerful figures, the sinister head of the SS Heinrich Himmler visited Montserrat, situated over 600 kilome-

tres away from where the main meeting was held.

Himmler’s visit was a strange one, being both awkward and disconcerting. The abbot excused himself on the grounds that he was ill, and the Nazi delegation appeared not to show much interest in the explanations provided by a young monk who was the only one in the community to speak proper German.

During the visit there were some rather tense exchanges between Himmler and the monastic community, especially when he bluntly expounded his theory that Jesus was not Jewish at all, but rather Aryan... The final blow came during a visit to the monastery’s renowned library and the bibliographic treasures safeguarded there. While being shown round Himmler brusquely demanded to see the documentation related to the Holy Grail, to the monks’ utter surprise.

Needless to say the monks tried to make him understand that it was purely a myth, that such documents did not exist.

But following Himmler’s insistence and the monk’s emphatic denials the visit abruptly ended and Himmler and his retinue returned to Barcelona.

The romantic myth had become an impossible legend, in a sick, crazed mind.

Catalan International View

Wilhelm von Humboldt

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The Artist

Jordi Fulla

My favourite time of year has always been from September to December. It stimulates me to advance projects, ideas, but it is also true that mysteriously each year it slips by ever more rapidly. I prepare myself during spring and above all in the summer, to savour the moment and then suddenly, flop!

It’s over.

Now I only seek a sort of slow calm, I want to look without doing anything else, without hurrying, I want to let things simmer… This is why I paint, why painting is so important. Important as it doesn’t serve any purpose, because one doesn’t have to understand anything. How beautiful this possibility is.

I love this sensation of displacement, of disturbance, going through life without having to give any explanations. I have followed this path all this time and now having hit my forties, looking back I see that all that 90

unnecessary stuff in life is a fraud, a falsity.

I have the sensation that most of the time what we do is devoid of reality. I have the sensation that we only really exist when we do nothing, when our thoughts run wild without concreting into any visible action.

I’m left with the music that it transmits...

Now I just look, observe and don’t want to be rushed.

Painting is a slow process, that raises doubts about what we really see and I enjoy the suspense of time in which one can use an open and sensitive prism. The fiction of painting for me establishes the most transparent reality. The detained instant…

I’m interested in the sensations provoked by painting, the sound of the act itself. Painting things as they dissolve, between having and not having, painting ambiguous atmospheres, in harmony with the cadence of one’s breathing. Allowing paint to impose its own

Catalan International View

The Artist

reality despite my endeavours to shape it. It is in this dialectical conspiracy that the image of what is invisible appears, the gaze.

And the music that it transmits takes me back to the beginning, to drawing.

In the last few years I have gone back to drawing with a vengeance. I love looking at other people’s drawings, because it is there that one finds all the dreams and pursuable options, it is there that one finds the skeleton of life. I went back to drawing during a stay in Japan that moved my very inner core. There I systematically drew every day, in several sketchbooks, because I needed that impasse of thought that drawing offers, in order to digest everything that I encountered and that rattled so many things inside me. It didn’t help to take photographs, as I had done for so many years, I needed to redefine my thoughts in lines, one by one, sweating over each gesture in the sketchbook, mentally redrawing everything my gaze landed upon, everything I observed, everything that intrigued me.

Thanks to those drawings and that process I still retain a vivid image of those things, those moments of thought, fruit of the observation of the little things that make everything possible. Just like when, as a boy, I drew the little chick…

There I found once again this possibility to discover the world, through the touch of the hand on paper, thanks to this magical natural human circumstance that means that we can take in with our eyes, process in our brain and translate, through the impulses of the arm, through the fingertips, following the suggestive touch of the sheet of paper. What magic, how simple, how easy and how immense all that is.

Since then, on returning from that time abroad, everything changed. I had almost found what I needed, to live in the void, chasing the music that emanates from it, and I decided to sit down on a chair at a small desk to rethink, without moving, beginning to draw from dawn to dusk, looking again for the darkness, the dream, the drowsiness.

Complex drawings of trees, branches, time consuming and very slow, with the need that each little line, each twig on a branch, each leaf, helped to attain the void. The void as a positive force, as a form of cure. To exchange a feeling of lack, for a sense of absence. Using the remnants of myself I was enriched, watching time pass by, its dimension, without any commitments, without any pressure. The work was laborious but sure, precise, a personal, painstaking process, with no end in sight, with no clear destination.

I will never know to what extent any of this reaches anybody but surely when something is born out of a need, the dialogue with the spectator unfurls, intensely and full of complicity. I’m not sure why but since then I have often woken up and set up the little table and during days and weeks, in solitude, unfolded those lines of what, despite whatever it may seem, can’t be seen.

I’m here on the roof, watching time pass by, my time and I hold on to it tightly, I try with my work to escape the boredom, that interval of time that never passes by. And this is all I can leave you with, if you can find a use for it.

The important things are always important, or maybe not…

Espai Volart will hold Jordi Fulla’s exhibition ‘Sixteen-Thousand Days on the Roof ’ from the 22nd September to the 18th December 2011.

Espai Volart Carrer Ausiàs Marc, 22 08010 Barcelona Tel. 93 481 79 85 Fax. 93 481 79 84 espaivolart@fundaciovilacasas.com Catalan International View

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A Poem Curated by Enric Bou Chair in Hispanic Studies, Brown University (Providence)

Room in Fall Gabriel Ferrater i Soler The Venetian blind, not quite closed, like A scare held back before dropping, Does not separate us from the air. Look, thirty-seven Horizons open, straight and fragile, But the heart forgets them. Without yearning, The light is dieing on us that was honeyColored, and that now has the color and smell of apples.

How slow, the world; how slow, the world; how slow, The pain for the hours that go by So hurriedly. Tell me, will you Remember this room?

‘I like it very much.

Those voices of workers ... What are they?’

Masons: A house is missing on the block.

‘They sing, And today I can’t hear them. They shout, they laugh, And today it seems strange to me that they are silent’.

How slow, The red leaves of the voices, how uncertain When they come to cover us. Asleep, The leaves of my kisses are covering The shelters of your body, and while you forget The high leaves of summer, the open days Without kisses, the body, In its depth, remembers: your skin Is still half sun, half moon.

(Translated by Johannes Beilharz)

Gabriel Ferrater i Soler (Reus 1922 – Sant Cugat del Vallès 1972) is the author of a highly influential yet small body of poetical work, one of the most important in post-war Catalonia. He published only three books of poetry compiled into a single volume called Les dones i els dies (Women and Days, 1968). In his poetry we recognize very specific traits such as a metaliterary proclivity, and a tendency towards exactitude, imagination, expressing in an apparent conversational voice his dealings with women and the passage of time. The title of his anthology Les dones i els dies epitomizes his main interests. He was also a professor of linguistics and literary criticism at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and wrote essays and articles on linguistics.

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Editorial Board Martí Anglada Former foreign news editor at TV3 (Catalonia television). He has been foreign correspondent in the Middle East, Italy and Great Britain (1977-1984) for the Barcelona newspaper La Vanguardia and United States correspondent for TV3 (1987-1990). He has also been an international political commentator. His latest book is Afers no tan estrangers (Not So Foreign Affairs) published by Editorial Mina (part of Grup 62).

Manel Balcells (Ripoll, 1958). Doctor specialising in Orthopaedics, Traumatology and Sports Medicine. Holds a degree in Health Management from EADA, as well as a degree in PADE from IESE. He is a member of a number of scientific societies. In his long, distinguished career in the health sector he has been Medical Director of Granollers General Hospital (Barcelona); both director and secretary of Coordination and Strategy for the Department of Health of the Generalitat of Catalonia; councillor for the Department of Universities, Research and Information Society; consultant for the Catalan Hospitals Consortium. From the 27th of December 2006 to February 2011 he was president of the board of directors of the Private BioRegion Foundation of Catalonia. At present he is the Director of the Area of Knowledge at Consorci Sanitari de Terrassa (Catalonia), as well as Consultant on Strategic Planning.

Enric Canela (Barcelona, 1949). Holds a Chemistry degree from the Universitat de Barcelona (UB, 1972) and a PhD in Chemistry with Biochemistry as his specialisation (UB, 1976). Lecturer at the UB since 1974, he is Full Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in the department of the same name in the Biology Faculty of the UB. He collaborates in research on intracellular communication and biochemical theory. He regularly publishes books and contributes to scientific journals of international renown. Between September 2007 and April 2009 he was president of the Society for Knowledge. Between June 2007 and June 2011 he was patron of the National Agency for Quality Assessment and Accreditation (ANECA) for the Spanish state.

Àngel Font (Lleida, 1965). Holds a degree in Chemical Sciences from the Universitat de Barcelona and a diploma in Business Management from EADA Business School. Began his career in an environmental engineering company and subsequently joined Intermón Oxfam where he held the post of coordinator on projects in Latin America, fund-raising and public relations and assistant to the director general. Since 2000 he has been director of the Un Sol Món (One World) Foundation financed by the Caixa de Catalunya (savings bank) where he runs projects for social housing and employment for disadvantaged groups as well as the development of microfinance in Spain, Latin America and Africa. Àngel Font is a member of the Cooperation Council of the Generalitat de Catalunya and was the first vice-president of the European Microfinance Network. He carries out teaching duties related to the management of non-profit organisations at a number of business schools.

Anna Grau Journalist and writer. From 1991 to 2005 she worked as a political journalist in Barcelona and Madrid, where she was the correspondent for the Avui newspaper and numerous programmes for TV3, Catalunya Ràdio, Ràdio4 and COM ràdio. In 2005 she left for New York, where she currently works. Author of El dia que va morir el president (the Day the President Died), Dones contra dones (Women Against Women), Endarrere aquesta gent (Reject These People) and the essay Per què parir (Why have a baby?).

August Gil-Matamala Has been a practising lawyer since 1960, specialising in the fields of criminal and labour law. He has taken part in numerous cases in defence of people on trial for their demands in favour of people’s rights, as well as hearings before the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Gil-Matamala fought the first successful case against the Spanish state for the violation of basic rights. He is a founder member of the Commission for the Defence of Individual Rights of the Col·legi d’Advocats de Barcelona (the Barcelona Bar Association) and the Catalan Association for the Defence of Human Rights, which he presided over from its foundation in 1985 to 2001. Gil-Matamala has also been president of both the Fundació Catalunya and the European Democratic Lawyers organisation. In 2007, coinciding with his retirement, he received the Creu de Sant Jordi (St. George’s Cross, the highest honour awarded by the Catalan government).

Montserrat Guibernau Professor of Politics at Queen Mary College, University of London. Holds a PhD and an MA in Social and Political Theory from the University of Cambridge and a degree in Philosophy from the Universitat de Barcelona. She has taught at the universities of Warwick, Cambridge, Barcelona, the London School of Economics and the Open University. Guibernau has held visiting professorhips at the universities of Edinburgh, Tampere, Pompeu Fabra, the UQAM (Quebec) and the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Currently she holds a visiting fellowship at the Centre for the Study of Global Governance, London School of Economics. Montserrat Guibernau is the author of numerous books and articles on nationalism, the nation-state, national identity, and national and ethnic minorities in the West from the perspective of global governance.

Guillem López-Casasnovas (Menorca, 1955). Holds a degree in Economics (distinction, 1978) and Law (1979) from the Universitat de Barcelona (UB). He obtained his PhD in Public Economics from the University of York (UK, 1984). He has been a lecturer at the UB, visiting scholar at the Institute of Social and Economic Research (UK), University of Sussex and at the Graduate School of Business at the University of Stanford (USA). Since June 1992 has been full professor of economics at Barcelona’s Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF), where he has been vice-rector of Economics and International Relations and dean of the School of Economics and Business Science. In 1998 he created the Economics and Health Research Centre (CRES- UPF), which he directed until recently. Co-director of the Master’s in Public Management (UPF-UAB-EAPC). In 2000 he received the Catalan Economics Society Award and in 2001 the Joan Sardà Dexeus Award. He is also a member of the Menorcan Institute of Studies, The Catalan Royal Academy of Medicine and a distinguished member of the Economists’ Society of Catalonia. President of the International Health Economics Association and since 2005 one of the Spanish Central Bank’s six independent Council members

Manuel Manonelles Political commentator specialising in international relations, human rights and democratisation processes. Currently director of the Foundation for a Culture of Peace, Barcelona. He has been special advisor to the Co-chair of the UN High Level Group for the Alliance of Civilizations, as well as advisor to the coordinator of the Secretariat of the World Forum of Civil Society Networks (Ubuntu Forum), which is a member of the International Council of the World Social Forum. He has been an international electoral observer and supervisor for the OSCE and the EU on many occasions, and has participated in several international intergovernmental and non-governmental processes.

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Fèlix Martí Former president of the International Catholic Movement for Intellectual and Cultural Affairs (Pax Romana), from 1975 to 1984; director of Catalonia magazine (1987-2002), a publication printed in four different languages, aimed at disseminating Catalan culture; director of the UNESCO centre of Catalonia (1984 to 2002) and later its honorary president (from 2003). From 1994 to 2002 he was editor of the Catalan editions of the yearly reports of the Washington-based Worldwatch Institute, L’Estat del món (The State of the World) and Signes vitals (Vital Signs). He promotes the Declaration on Contributions by Religions to a Culture of Peace, signed by leaders of the great religious traditions in 1994. President of the Linguapax International Institute from 2001 to 2004 and honorary president thereafter. Wrote his memoirs Diplomàtic sense estat (Diplomat Without a State), published by Edicions Proa in 2006. Was awarded the UNESCO Human Rights Medal in 1995 and the Generalitat de Catalunya’s Creu de Sant Jordi (St. George’s Cross) in 2002.

Arcadi Oliveres (Barcelona, 1945). PhD in Economic Science, lecturer in the Department of Applied Economics at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and president of the organisation Justícia i Pau ( Justice and Peace). He is also president of the Catalan Council for the Promotion of Peace, the International Peace University Foundation of Sant Cugat del Vallès, the Federation of Internationally Recognised Catalan Organisations (FOCIR) and the Easy to Read Association. He is an expert on North-South relations, international trade, external debt and defence economics and also lectures on aid and development for a number of master’s and PhD programmes.

Eva Piquer (Barcelona, 1969).Writer and cultural journalist. Works for several newspapers and magazines. Has been a lecturer at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and a New York news correspondent. Won the 2002 Josep Pla prize for her novel Una victòria diferent (A Different Victory). Also author of several books, including La noia del temps (The Weather Girl), Alícia al país de la televisió (Alice in Television Land) and No sóc obsessiva, no sóc obsessiva, no sóc obsessiva (I’m Not Obsessive, I’m Not Obsessive, I’m Not Obsessive). Her latest book is called La feina o la vida (Life or work).

Ricard Planas (Girona, 1976). Journalist, art critic and cultural promoter. Studied Philology and the History of Art at the Universitat de Girona. In 1999 he founded the magazine Bonart, dedicated to the contemporary art scene in the Catalan Countries. More recently he created and directed the Catalan art fair INART in 2005 and 2006. Has worked as the curator for exhibitions by important artists such as Arranz-Bravo, Lamazares, Formiguera, Cuixart, Ansesa and Grau-Garriga. Ricard has collaborated with Ona Catalana, Catalunya Ràdio, iCatfm and Onda Rambla radio stations. Has also worked for the Diari de Girona, El Punt and El Mundo newspapers, among others.

Vicent Sanchis (Valencia, 1961). Holds a degree in Information Sciences from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. In his career as a journalist it is worth highlighting that he has worked and collaborated on many publications and with numerous publishers; he has been editor and director of El Temps magazine, director of Setze magazine, the Catalan supplement of Cambio 16, and director of the newspapers El Observador and Avui. He has also excelled as a scriptwriter and director on different TV programmes. At present he is president of the editorial board of Avui, and vicepresident of Òmnium Cultural. Vicent is also a lecturer in the Faculty of Communication Sciences at Universitat Ramon Llull in Barcelona.

Pere Torres Biologist and environmental consultant. After some time spent on research (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona), he joined the Government of Catalonia in 1991. He was in turn secretary of the Catalan Inter-university Council (1991-1993), Head of the Environment Minister’s staff (1993-1995), general director of Environmental Planning (1995-2000) and secretary for Regional Planning (2000-2003). Since 2004 he has done consultancy work in public management, sustainability and land use planning and has been a regular contributor to the International Institute for Governability and the Institut Cerdà.

Carles Vilarrubí (Barcelona, 1954). Businessman. He is currently Executive Vice-President of Rothschild Spain Investment Bank, specialising in key mergers and takeovers in the financial sector on an international scale. President of CVC Grupo Consejero, an equity and investment advisory firm, with a portfolio of shares in consulting and service companies from the world of communications, the media, marketing, technology and telecommunications. President of Doxa Consulting Group, independent consultants on technology, media and telecommunications, leaders in the sector and with a presence in Spain and Portugal. He is a member of the advisory board of the Catalan confederation Foment del Treball Nacional (National Employment Promotion) and patron of the Fundació Orfeó Català - Palau de la Música. He has also been a member of the governing council of ADENA WWF (World Wild Fund for Nature), and sat on the boards of the Fundación Arte y Tecnología, Fundesco and Fundación Entorno. He is also member of the F.C Barcelona.

Vicenç Villatoro (Terrassa, 1957). Writer and journalist. Holds a degree in Information Sciences. Former president of the Ramon Trias Fargas Foundation.

As a journalist he has worked for numerous organisations. He was the editor of the Avui newspaper from 1993 to 1996 and head of the culture section of TV3. Between 2002 and 2004 was director general of the Catalan Radio and Television Corporation. He has contributed to a range of media companies, such as Avui, El Periódico, El País, El Temps, Catalunya Ràdio and COM ràdio. As a writer he has written a dozen novels. Currently he is the president of the Institut Ramon Llull.

Francesc de Dalmases (Director) (Barcelona, 1970). Journalist, logistician and consultant in humanitarian aid and cooperation and development. Has been president (1999-2006) of the Association of Periodicals in Catalan (APPEC); coordinator for the delegation to the Spanish state of European Bureau for Lesser-Used Languages (1995-1999); coordinator for the third conference of the CONSEU (Conference of European Stateless Nations) (1999); and coordinator for the publication Europa de les Nacions (1993-1999). Has acted as a foreign expert in aid projects in such diverse locations as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Mongolia, Kosovo, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mexico, Guatemala and Morocco. He is a member of the Cooperation Council of the Catalan government.

Víctor Terradellas (Editor) (Reus, 1962). Entrepreneur and political and cultural activist. President and founder of Fundació CATmón. Editor of Catalan International View and ONGC, a magazine dedicated to political thought, solidarity, aid and international relations. Víctor has always been involved in political and social activism, both nationally and internationally. The driving force behind the Plataforma per la Sobirania (The Platform for Self-Determination) as well as being responsible for significant Catalan aid operations and international relations in such diverse locations as Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Albania, Afghanistan, Mongolia, Pakistan and Kurdistan. Currently he is General Secretary of International Relations for the Convergència Democràtica de Catalunya party.

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