Publié à l’origine en espagnol. Jorge San Miguel. Medium On est arrivé au Penedès à midi. On a dit à la propriétaire de la maison qu’on a loué, qu’on venait pour assister à un mariage. Au cas où. On exagère, très probablement. Il s’agit d’une ancienne maison rurale [masia] restaurée, qui a une tour en […]
Categoría: Voices From Spain
The Credit
Originally published in Spanish. Arcadi Espada. El Cultural In the autumn of 1950, the psychologist Leonard W. Doob published an important article systematizing the 19 principles of Nazi propaganda. The whole analysis, classic and strict, is highly interesting. The 16th principle stands out: “Propaganda to the home front must create an optimum anxiety level”. This […]
Il rumore e la furia della Catalogna dei meceni
Originale: “El ruido y la furia de la Cataluña de los mecenas”. Manuel Jabois. El País La forza sociale del processo indipendentista è quella di Omnium e dell’ ANC, due associazioni di diversa provenienza che difendono la tabella di marcia del processo d’independenza. Joan Baptista Cendrós fu un personaggio talmente importante in Catalogna da […]
Foucault in Teheran: Revolution Makes Strange Bedfellows
Originally published in Spanish. Ramón González Férriz. El Confidencial. The consideration of any imaginable alternative as a better scenario than the real, present one is a constant feature of human psychology. Interestingly, so is the opposite —preferring the mediocre certainty of the present to the uncertainty of breaking its balance—. In political terms, the former […]
The Catalan Question and the Contradictions of Prosperity
Originally published in Spanish. Luis Abenza. Politikon. Where does the support to nationalism come from? Is this the result of a clash of legitimacies, of conflicting ideas about democracy, of a constitutional crisis? Or is this the expression of antagonisms structured by deeper factors? The 2006 Estatut, the “Scam Theory” and the “Clash of Legitimacies” […]
The Revolution of the Rich
Originally published in Spanish. Ignacio Vidal-Folch. The Objective While we are busy with our trifles, real life goes past. Then, as the years go by, we look back and say: “How could we be so thoughtless! How could we be so blind!” Now, while Galicia and Portugal burst into flames, deepening the ecological disaster and […]
The Nationalisms that Poisoned Europe
First published in El País (print edition) on October 15th, 2017. Online version. Guillermo Altares. El País. The whole history of Europe runs in a sense: the construction of states where rights are political and therefore correspond to all citizens, against those nations in which rights depend on belonging to an idea, an ethnicity, a […]
Catalogne, les offenses et la détresse
Publié à l’origine en espagnol. José Andrés Rojo. El País Quand on ne sait pas ce qui se passe, il est difficile de communiquer, tout devient confus, l’anxiété apparait, les soupçons sont agités. C’est arrivé il y a quelques jours au « Parlament » de Catalogne. Le président Carles Puigdemont a fait un discours solennel […]
L’Europa come soluzione?
Originale: “¿Europa como solución?”. Sandra León. El País «La Spagna è il problema. L’Europa è la soluzione». Questa frase di Ortega y Gasset pronunciata all’inizio del ventesimo secolo e facendo riferimento alla Spagna potrebbe servire oggi per illustrare gli sforzi dei partiti indipendentisti catalani per vedere l’Unione europea come un alleato per gestire il conflitto […]
Il ‘Volksgeist’ catalano
Originale: “El ‘Volksgeist’ catalán”. Enrique Krauze. El País «Non ci sono più persone oltre alle persone fisiche. È sempre la prima persona singolare quella che parla come la prima persona plurale. È sempre un io quello che dice noi». Gabriel Zaid Isaiah Berlin, uno dei grandi liberali del ventesimo secolo, credeva nei singoli individui (uniche […]