Ethno-regionalist movements and the double myth of EU regionalisation policies The Spanish and Romanian case

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Ethno-regionalist movements and

the double myth of EU

regionalisation policies

The Spanish and Romanian case

M.A. THESIS in European Studies

Graduate School of Humanities

Author: Mathilde Delabie July 1st_{, 2018}

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Chapter I: Introduction

n a conference organised by a Danish University on January 2018, the Catalan separatist leader Carles Puigdemont declared, without mincing his words, about the ‘Europe of the Region’ : “I think, it is a failure”.1_{His stiff words} indicate his disappointment towards the initiative that, once, represented an opportunity for his autonomist political agenda. The idea of ‘Europe of the Regions’ is far from being new and first originates in the early 1970s. In an attempt to respond to its longstanding critiques and tackle its institutional flaws, the European Economic Community (EEC) took the issue of “democratic deficit” seriously fairly early and, in the 1970s already, responded with the long-established though a bit outmoded concept of a “Europe of the Regions”. The resurgence of interest for this concept in the 1990s brought it back to light, both in the media and the academic spheres. This approach aimed at engaging lower tiers of government (e.g. regional and local levels) in the European integration process and decision-making through some degree of devolution while also valorising their economic and cultural potential. In such context, European Integration has acted as a catalyst for a re-examination of the power sharing and the relations between different levels of governments in the Member States. However, beyond this broad and vague wording, the “Europe of the Regions” implies concrete regionalisation policies leading to institutional developments. Among the list appears the Committee of the Regions, articles and clauses in the Founding Treaties recognising the concept of subsidiarity or cultural diversity, the European Structural and Cohesion Fund or minority language protection. These regionalisation policies and the concept of ‘Europe of the Regions’ are all the more important to study nowadays that they are currently being redefined beyond their original intent by regional and local actors, and given a whole new meaning in an ever-changing context. Indeed, the rise of nationalism and regionalism as well as the acceleration of both European integration and globalisation have shifted the focus of domestic debates in Member States and fuelled the rise of what is called ethno-regionalist movements since

1_{Lisbeth Kirk, “Catalonia shows that Europe of Regions’ is dead,” EUobserver, accessed January 24,}

2018, https://euobserver.com/news/140666

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the 1960s.2_{These movements defend the interests of a specific community on a particular} territory by demanding the empowerment of this collectivity through some degree of self-government.3_{Two dimensions are essential to the political parties leading them: 1) a} community culturally distinct with an exclusive group identity based on certain socio-cultural characteristics (language, religion, ethnicity, etc.), and 2) a subnational territorial space which they occupy and identify to.

Generally speaking, and perhaps a bit surprisingly, ethno-regionalist parties (ERPs) seem quite in favour of the EU, an international organisation that, yet, seems to dilute regional power by adding another distant level of decision making. Paying attention to this topic raises a variety of questions on the exact nature of the relationship between the EU and ethno-regionalist movements, what the EU represents for them and what type of EU policies or institutional developments might have impacted them. In the light of the concept of a “Europe of the Regions”, the research question starts to take shape: could the EU recent regional policies have helped the rise of ERPs and promote their agenda? If yes, how and if not, what were the obstacles? The aim of this research is therefore to unveil a potential myth about EU’s “Europe of the Regions” and the opportunities it seems to offer to ERPs. In order to do so, I will use the method of case study throughout the research. The two cases selected are the ethno-regionalist movements in Catalonia, Spain, embodied by the party Convergència i Unió (CiU) and the one in Szeklerland, Romania, embodied by the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (DAHR). Both cases display an important regional minority with specific cultural and political characteristics. Both also feature in the news for their outspoken claim for autonomy and self-governance. As case studies provide richness and wholeness, it is specifically appropriate for highlighting the degree of variance and subtle nuances that are often overlooked in broader studies but still crucial for a comprehensive analysis. Not only does this method allow me to analyse both of them in-depth but it also allows me to identify, test and compare the different variables coming into play in the rise of ethno-regionalism in the two regions. Spain and Romania present very

2_{Saul Newman, “Ethnoregional parties: a comparative perspective,” Regional Politics and Polity 4, no.2}

(1994).

3_{Régis Dandoy, “Ethno-regionalist parties in Europe: a typology,” Perspectives on Federalism 2, no.2}

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different historical, political and social context, Spain being a highly decentralised western European country while Romania is an Eastern European centralised and unitary one. Understanding the cases’ dynamics separately but also in relation to each other will allow me to identify their implications for EU governance and put some recommendation forwards if needed.

My study case analysis will rely on a strong theoretical and conceptual framework using both the theory of Europeanisation and Multi-level Governance (MLG). As I aim to analyse the influence of certain EU policies on ethno-regionalist movements, using Europeanisation seems particularly relevant since it “seeks to understand the influence of the EU and European integration more generally on political, economic and social change within each Member State".4_{Similarly, MLG is particularly relevant for this study in order} to theorise a multi-actor and non-necessarily hierarchical framework of interactions between decision-making in supranational, national and subnational arenas. The theories will be also accompanied by a conceptual framework exploring in depth the concept of nation-state. Although this concept has been theorized, it remains specific to each country, pertaining to a particular historical, political, economic and social environment. In the case of Spain and Romania, different nation-state formation lead to different domestic political system in which the CiU and DAHR tried to find a place, different claims as well as strategies. The two parties will likely react differently to EU regional policies and the opportunities these policies offer may materialised differently to each of them according to their own domestic context.

The expected outcome of this research and hypothesis head towards the direction of a double myth: despite the apparent support of the EU for ERPs through regionalisation policies, the reality does not meet the expectations. There happen to be more obstacles than opportunities for ERPs to be truly helped in their quest for better representation and self-government. Even though European regions are often thought as an homogenous and united group, the case of the DAHR in Romania is expected to break this misconception and reveal a “double” myth, in so far as Eastern European movements are facing additional

4_{Sabine Saurugger, “Europeanization and Public Policy Transfer,” in Theoretical Approaches to European}

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structural obstacles (due to historical and political reasons), thus diminishing the already meagre opportunities available for them.

This comparative research will be structured as follow: I will, first, lay out my conceptual framework, explaining the concept of nation-state and its formation both in Spain and Romania. It will be followed by a theoretical framework giving the keys to understand and analyse the rest of the research in the light of Europeanisation and MLG. The third chapter will focus on the rise of ethno-regionalist parties in each of our case, explaining the terminology and the situation in both Catalonia and the Szeklerland. The next section, chapter IV, will proceed with the history of regionalisation policies initiated by the European Union since the 1980s and their implications for the Spanish and Romanian regions. Finally, chapter V will be dedicated to the assessment of these regionalisation policies for ethno-regionalist parties and the double myth they represent: first, how these policies are mostly symbolic and second, to what extent they are even more so illusory for Eastern European movements due to structural obstacles. I will, then, end this analysis with policy recommendations and points for further research.

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Chapter II : Conceptual and theoretical framework

Conceptual Framework: the nation-state

The concept of the nation-state

Before starting my analysis, it is crucial to acknowledge and understand the framework in which ethno-regionalist parties develop. As sub-nationalist movements, their existence implies a more global structure inside of which they occur, a ‘national’ level. The term we are looking for, here, and that will constitute our conceptual framework is nothing else than the nation-state. The concept of nation-state is often associated with the rise of the modern state system, originating in the Peace of Westphalia of 1648. As Philpott noted, through the signing of the Treaty of Münster that put an end to the Thirty Years’ War in the mid-17th_{century, the peace of Westphalia institutionalised new crucial principles in} international relations such as state sovereignty, state equality and non-interference in ones’ internal affairs.5_{Although this turning point in History adds more layers to our} understanding of a state, if not a nation-state, it is not sufficient. When breaking down this concept of nation-state, we face two entities: the nation and the state. According to Giddens, who dedicated his studies to nation-states, the nation is thought as an imagined community, united by cultural or ethnic factors such as language or common descent.6_{In an attempt to} summarize Giddens’ theory, Paul James support this vision by writing “"The Nation-state has consolidated in this century as the predominant form of abstract community".7_{On the} other hand, the state is thought as an administrative power to contain, pacify and monitor space evenly through centralisation policies, the extension of its administrative power and the development of laws and a taxation system. In his definition of Staatnation (state-nation), Meinecke highlighted, however, that the two concepts should not be considered independent phenomena but different dimensions of the same phenomenon. “The nation is formed by and congruent with the territorial and institutional frame of the state”, meaning

5_{Daniel Philpott, “Religious Freedom and the Undoing of the Westphalian State,” Michigan Journal of}

International Law 24, no.4 (2004).

6_{Anthony Giddens, The Nation-State and Violence (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1985).} 7_{Paul James, Nation formation: Towards a theory of Abstract community (London: Sage Publications,}

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that the nation is a demographic substrate of the statehood.8_{Therefore, a territory reach the} status of nation-state when the frontiers of the nation (the “people”) matches the political frontiers of the State. However, the interesting and intricate part of this concept lies beyond the simple definition, it concerns the development of the nation-state itself. Traditional western democracies have usually solved the problem of state and nation building in sequence: (1) Administrative penetration, (2) Cultural standardization, (3) Participation, and (4) Redistribution.9_{However, Stein Rokkan, who devoted most of his work to the study} of this phenomenon, identified specific conditions that might affect specific steps of this sequential process.10_{The location of the centre-building effort for instance, especially its} distance to trade-route belts (like the one going from the Mediterranean to the North sea and the Baltic sea) would be an element explaining a potential delay in nation-state formation. Indeed, the reason why territorial consolidation impulses first came from the edges of empires, like seaward fringes, is that landward cities close and well-integrated to the trade route belt managed to thwart these efforts thanks to their economic strength. A second condition influencing nation-state formation is the strength of the state-building core areas, that is, the domination of the capital city in partnership with societal actors such as the Church supporting the efforts for territorial consolidation. As we will see later, the Church occupies a unique position in Spanish society and will heavily influence the nation-formation process through times. Finally, our third condition is the extent of the resistance to cultural unification and standardization, occurring especially on the peripheries of each territories. What follows briefly explains in more details how country-specific conditions had very different implications for our two study-cases of Catalonia and Transylvania, leading to distinctive processes of nation-state formation.

Nation-State in Spain

Despite diverse historical and cultural legacies, Western European countries enjoyed a rather similar path in their nation-state formation process. Spain almost followed

8_{Rogers Brubaker, Nationalist Politics and Everyday Ethnicity in a Transylvanian Town (Princeton:}

Princeton university Press, 2006), 27.

9_{Wisla Surazska, “Central Europe in the Rokkanian Perspective,” Historical Social Research 20, no.2}

(1995): 232.

10_{Stein Rokkan, State-formation, Nation-Building and Mass Politics in Europe, ed. Peter Flora (Oxford:}

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this sequential path with a successful territorial consolidation but failed at fully achieving the phase of nation-consolidation due to a combination of strong peripheral identities (in Catalonia and the Basques Countries) and long and bitter conflicts over political autonomy. Indeed, Spanish authorities consolidated the territory and created Madrid as a political centre through the mobilization of military power against the Muslims during the Reconquista at end of the 15th_{century and the infidels during the Counter-Reformation} throughout the 16th_{century. While Spain also spent much of its energy on expansionist,} colonialist and missionary activities in America, core cities on the territory could not compete with Barcelona and its surroundings located near the Mediterranean trade belt, which were economically much stronger. Such situation allowed the Catalan periphery to resist to the Castilian centralisation for centuries. While the Reformation in northern Europe made state churches major agencies of nation-building, incorporating the clergy into the administrative services for instance, the radical opposite occurred in southern Europe during the Counter-reformation.11_{The Catholic Church retained its supra-territorial} character and acted as a brake on all efforts to build up strong unified national identities. It allowed the Catalans to reaffirm their distinctiveness, economically, culturally but first and foremost linguistically. Ultimately, the Spanish state accepted to accommodate the peripheries with some level of official recognition, thus resorting to a sort of federal alliance strategy in the conquest of its own territory. To sum up, Catalonia has, historically, been “economically advanced while politically subjected and culturally opposed to the dominant Castilian standard”.12

Nation-State formation from the Transylvanian perspective

In Eastern Central Europe, the narrative regarding the nation-state formation is rather different from the one in the West. For centuries, the eastern part of Europe was under the domination of great empires: the Habsburg, the Ottomans and the Romanov. These empires were multinational and therefore, intricately intermixed in terms of ethnicity, languages and religions, where political boundaries were discrepant, territories highly

Oxford University Press, 1999).

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fragmented and divided between sovereign, semi-sovereign or subordinated units.13_Both Hungarian and Romanian territories remained under the rule of the Habsburgs and Ottomans until late 19th_{century but efforts towards state-nation formation were delayed} once more when the communists came to power after WWII.

Unlike traditional western democracies, post-communist countries like Romania had to cope with all the steps at once. Besides, this territorial and political consolidation in Romania was all the more difficult given that the northern part of its territory, the region of Transylvania, kept slipping out of its control: as an “ethnic borderland” 14_{at the margin} of the Ottoman and Habsburg Empire in the early modern era, Transylvania played the two empires off against one another for centuries. Back then, within Transylvania, the small territory of the Szeklerland enjoyed much autonomy and had its own jurisdiction, which was even laid out in the Szekler Constitution of 1506. The modern era (20th_{century) saw} a similar pattern in which Transylvania was alternately part of the Hungarian and Romania nation with many variations in the status of the Szeklerland. Until World War one, Transylvania was part of the Hungarian territory before being integrated into Romania for the inter-war period, during which the autonomy of Szeklerland was abolished and regulated in the framework of a minority regime. During WWII, Hitler forced Romania to cede its northern part back to Hungary, where full linguistic rights for Transylvania Hungarians were established. Finally, the territory came back, once again, to Romania after the end of the war. Despites these years of back and forth movements, both nations imagined Transylvania as central to their nationalizing schemes, which eventually foreran future ethnic and political conflicts between them. Yet, these two neighbours adopted different approach when being on control of Transylvania. Under Hungarian rule, “the core nation in Transylvania [the ethnic Hungarians] was numerically weak but economically, politically and culturally dominant so nationalizing policies focused on strengthening the base of the core nation through assimilation”15_{, which translated into a tough policy of} Magyarisation on the territory. On the other hand, under Romanian rule, the Romanian

(1995).

Princeton university Press, 2006), 56

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core nation in Transylvania was demographically dominant but economically, politically and culturally weak so nationalizing policies sought to strengthen the position of the core nation, rather than to assimilate the non-Romanian population. Assimilation was far less urgent for the Romanian government and even less so under the Soviets who, following the Leninist-Stalinist model of territorial autonomy, established the Szeklerland as ‘the Hungarian autonomous region’ in 195216_{, still subordinated to the centralized communist} administration but officially bilingual. The use of the territoriality principle was maintain until its abolishment in 1968, thus explaining today’s strong presence and nationalist feeling of ethnic Hungarian in Transylvania, and especially in the Szeklerland.

Theoretical framework: Europeanisation and MLG

Europeanisation Theory

In order to analyse the influence of certain EU policies on ethno-regionalist movements, using Europeanisation as a theoretical framework seems particularly relevant since it “seeks to understand the influence of the EU and European integration more generally on political, economic and social change within each Member State”.17_Several approaches of the Europeanisation theory have been developed (see box 1.1). Focusing exclusively on the ‘uploading’ approach would depict European integration solely as a transfer of competencies from national level (and regional as well), thus amplifying the democratic deficit and disempowering peripheries. Similarly, choosing the ‘downloading’ approach only would overlook half of the process and miss some important concepts like subsidiarity and the partnership concept. As a result and for the purpose of this study, we will focus on the circular approach of Europeanisation, which seems to reveal itself in the fact that Europeanisation influences both the polity and politics. Indeed, on one hand, European integration encourages constitutional changes, exerting influence on norms, values, and democracy itself at the macro level (EU) and meso level (member states). For instance, European Integration has triggered the creation of new parliamentary committees,

Princeton university Press, 2006).

17_{Sabine Saurugger, “Europeanization and Public Policy Transfer,” in Theoretical Approaches to}

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new ministries but also the establishment and institutionalisation of regions as fully-fledged actors of the EU decision-making process, thus pushing for a more multilevel type of democracy.

On the other hand, European integration seems to have influenced the way politics is practiced. By providing lower-tiers authorities with new responsibilities, the EU has unlocked new channels of communication and opened up new venues for political opinions from all levels to be expressed. The European arena now represents an important discursive opportunity structure in which domestic agents can voice their claims (that may be ignored by their national government) by capturing EU public debates and

agenda-setting process through certain discourses or narratives. These discursive strategies, identified as the “Usages of Europe” by Bourne, illustrate how the EU turned into a vector of change for many domestic agents and drastically changed the way of ‘doing politics’ by

Europeanisation looks at the way in which European Integration affects politics, policies and institutions within member states. Three conventional approaches can be found: bottom-up (uploading), top-down (downloading) and circular Europeanisation. Uploading: Until the end of the 1990s, national policies and governmental

preferences were the independent variables used to explain how European policies and institutions evolved.

Downloading: European integration becomes the independent variable, a causal factor reshaping national preferences and national public policies. EU political and economic dynamics become part of the organisational logic of national policy-making.

Circular approach: European integration influences national levels, which, in turn, influence European integration anew. It focuses on the interactions between the two levels (construction and institutionalisation of formal and informal rules, procedures, norms, shared beliefs…)

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providing new resources, allies, references, set of images and policy frames.18 Ethno-regionalist movements in particular tend to strategically use European integration in their discourses and narratives in order to, ultimately, by-pass the national level and tilt the debate at their advantage in EU spheres directly.19_{We can identify the legitimization usage,} which refers to when actors use EU politics as elements to legitimize or delegitimize political decisions at the domestic level, while the cognitive usage refers to a situation in which European integration is used to politicize public discourse and interpret each social fact as a political debate.20_{For instance, during the financial crisis in 2012, the CiU framed} the economic hardships hitting the Spanish economy as a failure of the national government. The party blamed the regime for austerity measures that were initially recommended by the ECB, claiming that Catalonia would have dealt with the situation better on its own. The aim of the CiU was to politicise even more the economic situation and frame it into an argument for secession. This example highlights the circular movements created by European integration, as the economic policies of the EU and the ECB first impacted the Member States, whose population, in turn, protested and lobbied to influence the process back.

However, the field of Europeanisation has, for long, predominantly focused on western Member States. Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier have highlighted the importance of including Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs) in order to make the empirical picture more complete and to be able to establish the findings in a new context. While they define Europeanisation as “the process in which states adopt the EU rules”, the authors have identified three different forms of rule adoption in the CEECs, that is, three different ways the candidate countries had implemented and enforced EU rules: the formal, the behavioural and discursive conception.21_{The formal conception means the transposition} of EU rules into national laws or the establishment of formal institutions and procedures in

18_{Angela K. Bourne, “Europeanization and Secession: The Case of Catalonia and Scotland,” Journal on}

Ethnopolitics and Minority Issues in Europe 13, no.3 (2014).

19_{Sabine Saurugger, “Europeanization and Public Policy Transfer,” in Theoretical Approaches to}

European Integration (Macmillan International Higher Education, 2014).

20_{Ibid., 134.}

21_{Frank Schimmelfennig, Ulrich Sedelmeier, “ Conceptualizing the Europeanization of Central and Eastern}

Europe,” in The Europeanization of Central and Eastern Europe, ed. Frank Schimmelfennig, Ulrich Sedelmeier (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005).

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line with them. The behavioural conception measures rule adoption by the extent to which the behaviour is rule-confirming. Finally, for the discursive conception, the adoption of EU rules is indicated when it is positively incorporated into domestic actors’ discourses, either showing that they are truly persuaded of a norm or that they are simply paying lip service to it. Because of the communist historical and political legacies, the CEECs make an interesting case of Europeanisation, during which the main Europeanising tool, EU conditionality, showed itself very persuasive in pushing candidates countries to meet the Copenhagen criteria (successful democratisation, a functional market economy and legislative alignment with the acquis communautaire) during the enlargement process. Whether the focus was on ‘democratic’ conditionality or ‘acquis’ conditionality, the key variables for a successful Europeanisation were credibility of the conditionality and the adoption costs. In the end, “it appears as if Europeanization in Central and Eastern Europe not only proceeded at a much quicker pace than in the Member States, but also produced more homogeneous and convergent outcomes”.22

Multi-Level Governance

Complementary to Europeanisation theory, Multi-level governance (MLG) will also be of great use for this paper. According to Marks, Hooghe and Blank, Multilevel governance concerns network relationships between decision-making in supranational, national and subnational arenas, stressing the possibilities for multi-actor and non-hierarchical framework of interactions.23_{This theory depicts the fact that states no longer} monopolise European level policy-making as they face the increasing presence and participation of non-state actors in the process. MLG analyses the increasing pressure to share authority and policy-making among subnational, national and supranational levels. On the supranational level, EU’s institutions and collective decision-making diluted to a certain extent states’ authority. Meanwhile, on the subnational level, “states are losing their grip on the mediation of domestic interest representation in international relation”, meaning

22_{Frank Schimmelfennig, Ulrich Sedelmeier, “ Conclusions: the Impact of the EU on the Accession}

Countries,” in The Europeanization of Central and Eastern Europe, ed. Frank Schimmelfennig, Ulrich Sedelmeier (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005).

23_{Gary Marks, Liesbet Hooghe, Kermit Blank, “European Integration from the 1980s: State-Centric v.}

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that states don’t monopolise the link between domestic and European actors anymore.24 Although states remain the most important decision-making actors, non-state actors are now increasingly given a voice and recognised as fully-fledged actors capable of influencing the European decision-making process. This multi-level governance stands out against the state-centric model and seems to involve a lot more “unstructured” interactions imposing priorities other than those of Brussels or formal national actors on policy (the “structured” ones).25_{According to Hooghe and Marks, “Uniform governance within} countries has become the exception rather than the rule”26_{, as illustrated by the demands} for self-government in territorial communities like the Catalans or Hungarians in the Szeklerland. These territorial communities break the idea that states exert homogenous authority on their territory, thus altering governance and governmental structure the way we know it today.27

What makes the particular strength of this theory is the existence of the principle of subsidiary and proportionality, which, ultimately, provides a theoretical apparatus asserting and motivating MLG claims. These two principles are considered as two of the founding principles of the European Union and are formally enshrined in the Treaty of Maastricht

24_{Gary Marks, Liesbet Hooghe, Kermit Blank, “European Integration from the 1980s: State-Centric v.}

Multi-level Governance,” Journal of Common Market Studies 34, no.3 (1996).

25_{B. Guy Peters, Jon Pierre, “Governance Approach” in European Integration Theory (Oxford: Oxford}

University Press, 2009), 96.

26_{Liesbet Hooghe, Gary Marks, “Scale and Community,” in Community scale & regional governance : a}

Post-functionalism theory of governance, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 17.

27 _{Liesbet Hooghe, Gary Marks, Community scale & regional governance : a Post-functionalism theory of}

governance, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).

The multi-level governance (MLG) model not only takes into account the role played by national governments but also emphasises sub-national actors’ influence in the European decision-making process. MLG recognises lower level governments as fully-fledged actors (like German länder, for example), along with strategic, cognitive and normative variables influencing the agenda-setting process. Recognising sub-national actors empowers them and may help to legitimate the EU, given that it involves entities which tend to have greater legitimacy (especially in multi-ethnic countries) than national governments.

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(also in the Treaty on European Union, TEU). According to the official definition given by the EU itself, the principle of subsidiarity defines the circumstances in which it is preferable for action to be taken by the Union rather than the Member States, in areas in which the EU does not have exclusive competence, for more efficiency.28_{Complementary to this and} taking the opposite approach, the principle of proportionality regulates the exercise of powers by the EU and limit its action to what is necessary to achieve the objectives of the Treaties.29_{These principles, thus, recognise the EU as the most competent actor for some} policies and sectors, especially those which require large scale coordination and/or implementation. However, it also recognises that some other policies or projects cannot be handled by the continent-wide organisation and require a lower-scale approach. These efforts to reach a balance in EU governance demonstrates two things: 1) there were at least two actors involved in the process when these principles were drafted, the MS and the Union itself; but above all, 2) it hints at a multi-layered governance in which each actor has clear delineated powers, later leaving room for more actors to participate in the process. These two principles were particularly captured by regional or sub-national actors who interpreted them as a legal basis for their claim to representation and participation in EU institutions and EU affairs.

28_{Roberta Panizza, “The principle of subsidiarity” last modified May, 2018.}

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/atyourservice/en/displayFtu.html?ftuId=FTU_1.2.2.html

29_{“proportionality principle,” EUR-Lex, accessed on May 23, 2018.}

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Chapter III: The rise of ethno-regionalist parties

Since the 1990s, several political and economic milestones have marked European History and permanently changed the political and territorial landscape of Europe. From the collapse of communism in the 1990s, to the breakdown of Yugoslavia, to the recent economic crisis, without forgetting European Integration, the Old Continent successively went through phases of de-territorialisation and reterritorialisation, borders being transcended, redefined and restructured.30_{While material and immaterial, political,} economic or social barriers were dismantled between member states, the evolution of the European Community also brought with it some instability : the constitutional decentralisation, the destabilisation of relations between national and subnational governments or even the division of citizen loyalties between local, regional, national, and supranational levels.31_{In the light of this fragmentation of the hierarchical political order} within states, regimes and territories were pushed into internal retrenchment. European integration has definitely acted as a catalyst for a re-examination of relations between different levels of government in both Western and Eastern European states, thus allowing the assertion of distinctiveness and new identities (especially those trapped inside existing national states) in new political arenas.32_{For some local elites, especially in historical} regions, it paved the way to re-negotiate their position within the new order and reaffirm their identity.33_{These recent developments found their expression in both the surge of} identity politics and the defence of ethnic boundaries. Throughout Europe, the blooming of new territorially-limited social movements went hand in hand with the re-emergence of ethnic cleavage and seemed to have given birth to a new type of party, namely

30_{Stefano Bartolini, Restructuring Europe: Centre Formation, System Building and Political Structuring}

Between the Nation-state and the European Union (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007).

31_{William M. Downs, "Regionalism In The European Union: Key Concepts And Project Overview,”}

Journal of European Integration 24, no.3 (2002).

32_{Brigid Laffan, “The Politics of Identity and Political Order in Europe,” Journal of Common Market}

Studies 34, no.1 (1996).

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regionalist parties (ERPs), representing both a territorial issue and latent ethnic cleavages.34 The following chapter aims at unpacking the term ethno-regionalism and the relevant surrounding terminology before studying in depth two ethno-regionalist movements that constitute our case studies, one in Catalonia and one in Transylvania.

Definition and terminology

As the name suggests, ethno-regionalism combines two interrelated dimensions: an ethnic and territorial one. The ethnic dimension relates to a community based on some common socio-cultural characteristics such as language, religion or ethnicity. Members share an exclusive group identity and are conscious of their own membership. An ethno-regionalist party has, thus, an ideological and programmatic identity in so far as it represents this culturally distinct population. The second complementary dimension is a territorial one as the ethnic group occupies a territory and identifies to it. The ERP’s main arena is (usually) geographically limited to this same territory and their main focus is to addresses issues faced by the named community, thus creating some sort of subnational territorial division.

Based on what have been said, ERPs could, thus, be defined as parties defending the interests of a specific community on a particular territory.35_{However, this simplistic} definition does not fully get the intricacies of this type of party. ERPs existence is defined by the cleavages and issues that give rise to their birth, in other words they stand for something that defines their identity.36_{Lipset and Rokkan have identified both the cleavage} and the issue defining ERPs’ raison d’être: the cleavage being the centre vs. periphery cleavage and the issue being the demand for the re-organisation of the national structure.37 Indeed, ERPs and the community they represent may feel at the “periphery”, figuratively

34_{Huri Türsan, “Introduction: Ethnoregionalist parties as ethnic entrepreneurs,” in Regionalist Parties in}

Western Europe, (London and New York: Routledge, 1998): 1-16.

(2010).

37_{Lipset Seymour Martin, Rokkan Stein, Party systems and voter alignments: cross-national}

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due to their cultural, historical or linguistic distinctiveness that oppose them to the more mainstream national culture, as well as literally due to their geographical position as an enclave inside the territory or at the outskirt of it, far from political centres. Besides the cleavage comes the issue, which, for ERPs, corresponds to the demand for some kind of self-government. Indeed, these parties stand for the empowerment of their ethno-regional group they claim to represent (through either decentralisation, autonomy, independence…) by challenging the existing state and its political-territorial order, lobbying for a change in the structure of the political system and the boundaries between centre and periphery. Taking into consideration all of the above, ERPs can therefore be defined as “ referring to the efforts of geographically concentrated peripheral minorities which challenge the working order and sometimes even the democratic order of a nation-state by demanding recognition of their cultural identity”.38_{The meeting between ethnicity and} self-government demands led ERPs to earn the title of “ethnic-entrepreneurs”: they mobilize ethnic sentiment and pragmatically use it in order to either regulate, mitigate or instigate political conflict, thus acting as “brokers of ethnicity”.39

Despite divergent visions on the future of the EU, ERPs tend to be pro-European and in favour of a federal Europe, a model which would fit into the framework of a ‘Europe of the Regions’ and serve as a basis for their regionalist movements.40_{Such pragmatism} reflects the idea that the EU is an important opportunity structure for all types of organisations with interests (political parties at all levels, civil society’s actors, corporations or citizens themselves). Theoretically, the EU made it possible for small states to survive and prosper within the institutional framework of the Union, as proven by the Benelux countries for instance.41_{The EU seems to have weakened the traditional argument} against the system of mini-state, also known as Kleinstraaterei (a pejorative historical

38_{Ferdinand Müller-Rommel, “Ethnoregionalist parties in Western Europe, Theoretical Considerations and}

Framework of Analysis,” in Regionalist parties in Western Europe, (London and New York: Routledge, 1998): 19.

40_{Lieven de Winter and Huri Türsan, Regionalist parties in Western Europe (London and New York:}

Routledge,1998): 205.

41_{Eric John Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism Since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality (Cambridge :}

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concept to describe the territorial fragmentation of the Holy Roman Empire from the 15th century on). Indeed, the institutional context and level of internal cooperation of the EU represents an answer to small nation-states incapable to guarantee their physical and economic security, but it also reduces the economic and military costs of independence. The prospect of maintaining membership in the common market and the common defence policy have reduced the cost of secession and thus made regional claims for independence and sovereignty more realistic. In more concrete terms, the EU now represents a financial and political opportunities to bypass the central state and address EU spheres directly, often in the name of subsidiarity.42_{The political opportunities are numerous for the mobilisation} of ERPs, especially when looking at the European elections in which they tend to perform better than at national ones.43_{European elections are second order elections: the average} turnout is lower than in national elections, issues at stake are thought as less salient and less relevant than national concerns (health care, education, social benefits, etc.) and the voters are more prone to vote for other parties than the national and often mainstream incumbent (protest vote). As a result, second-order elections are often used by voters to either reward or punish the current governing parties, usually to the advantage of protest parties or niche parties like ERPs in the latter case. Moreover, European elections represent a real springboard for these parties as they facilitate the formation of cartels between ERPs of different regions that necessarily run separately for the general elections.44_The European election of 1999 offers a particular good example as Spain witnessed the formation of two ethno-regionalist cartels: the Coalicion of Europa and Coalicion Nacionalista Europa de los Pueblos, comprising parties from Andalusia, the Basque Countries, and Catalonia among others.45_{While Belgium, France, Ireland, Italy, Poland} and the United Kingdom are divided into several constituencies for EU elections, other Member States only have a single national one. Since Spain has a unique nationwide constituency, the creation of ERPs coalition was the most effective way to prevent the

42_{Eric John Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism Since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality (Cambridge :}

Cambridge University Press, 1992): 31.

43_{Lieven de Winter and Huri Türsan, Regionalist parties in Western Europe (London and New York:}

Routledge,1998): 205.

44_{Peter Lynch, Minority Nationalism and European Integration (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1996).} 45_{Lieven de Winter, “The impact of European Integration on ethnoregionalist parties,” Working paper 195}

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dilution of their votes. Each coalition obtained two seats among the sixty-four at stake during these elections. The fact that the number of constituencies is smaller during the European elections also plays in favour of the ERPs in so far as it makes campaigning comparatively cheaper than for general elections. Indeed, the parties have to recruit fewer candidates and can, therefore, concentrate their efforts on a few top leaders. The generous EU subsidies available to parties obtaining seats in the Parliament can also help attenuate some imbalances created at the national level by the lack of a system of public party finance.46

However, the rise of ERPs remains a country-specific phenomenon, embedded in a specific context, culture and political landscape. The following sections will contextualise the rise of the DAHR in the Szeklerland and the CiU in Spain in order to better assess later the impact of EU regionalisation policies on them.

The case of the Szeklerland and the DAHR

Romania counts among its population numerous minorities, the biggest one among them being the Hungarians. Ethnic Hungarians amount to 6.5% of the Romanian population and make-up about 20% of the total population in Transylvania, a region located in the north-western part of the country.47_{Itself divided in three sub-regions, Transylvania} is composed of the sub-region Partium, the Centre and the historical area of the Szeklerland. Our study pays particular attention to the latter sub-region, the Szeklerland, as the concentration of ethnic Hungarians is much higher there than the rest of Transylvania, accounting for almost half of the Hungarian of the whole country (49,41%). The Szeklerland consists of the counties of Harghita, Covasna and Mures, and is a traditionally multi-ethnic and multilingual area juggling with Romanian, Hungarian, German but also Romani dialects. However, with 609,033 ethnic Hungarians living there, being 56,8% of

46_{Lieven de Winter, “The impact of European Integration on ethnoregionalist parties,” Working paper 195}

with the Institut de Ciències Polítiques i Socials (ICPS), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, (2001): 13.

47_{Zsombor Csata and László Károly Marácz, “Prospects on Hungarian as a Regional Official Language}

and Szeklerland’s Territorial Autonomy in Romania,” International Journal on Minority and

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its total population, the Hungarian represent the absolute majority in most of this sub- territory.48

Despite these impressive data, neither the Szeklerland nor the Hungarian language is officially recognised by the State. One of the main reason for that lies within certain articles of the country’s Constitution : Article 1 declares Romania an “indivisible and unitary nation state” while Article 13 declares that Romanian is the only official language of the country. 49_{The first article puts a curb on regional claims for decentralisation, let alone} autonomy. The second article above-mentioned prevents the official recognition of regional languages or dialects and, thus, the protection or at least the upholding of cultural distinctiveness. Schwellnus describes the relations between the State and its minorities as a “conceptual clash” as the state’s centralised model fundamentally conflicts with the Hungarian minority’s claims to collective protection.50_{Indeed, in its quest for centrality,} Romanian state applies the personality principle instead of the territoriality principle when it comes to the recognition of minority rights. The personality principle stipulates that “individuals carry language rights with them wherever they move” while the territoriality principle states that “languages and language groups should be territorially accommodated, thus language rights should vary from region to region”.51_{Romania’s preference for} protection at the individual level rather than at the community one also appears through Article 6 (1) of the Constitution, which defines national communities or minorities in terms of individuality with the particular wording “person belonging to a national minority”.52 Concretely, what does this imply for the ethnic Hungarians in Romania? Taking the example of minority language rights, Hungarian speaking minorities are guaranteed the rights to use their language in administrative authorities and public services (healthcare,

Group Rights 23 (2016): 535.

49_{Constitution of Romania (1991), art. 13. Retrieved from}_{http://www.cdep.ro/pls/dic/site.page?id=371}_. 50_{Guido Schwellnus, “The adoption of Nondiscrimination and minority protection Rules in Romania,}

Hungary and Poland,” in The Europeanization of Central and Eastern Europe, ed. Frank Schimmelfennig, Ulrich Sedelmeier (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005).

Group Rights 23 (2016): 531.

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courtrooms, education, etc.) according to the 2001 Law on Local Public Administrations (which was also incorporated in article 120 of the Constitution). However, a provision specifies that this law is subject to a twenty per cent threshold.53_{Thus, communications} with representatives of public administration, street or road signs in a particular administrative-territorial unit (counties and municipalities) may be written in both language if and only if at least 20% of the total inhabitants of that unit speaks Hungarian. While the territoriality principle would make the Hungarian language obligatory for everyone in these counties, the personality principle in use allows Romanians living in these units not to learn Hungarian, thus creating an asymmetric bilingualism. To make matters worse, the bilingualism is, ultimately, hardly implemented even when the threshold is met.54

Given such struggle for cultural, linguistic and political recognition of the Hungarian minority, it is hardly surprising that some movements and political parties defending this cause emerged in Romania in the recent years. The most vocal one is without any doubt the Hungarian political party, the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (DAHR) (Romániai Magyar Demokrata Szövetség - RMDSz in Hungarian and Uniunea Democrată Maghiară din România – UDMR in Romanian). For the rest of this study, I will mention the party using the English acronym only. To fully understand the rise of the DAHR, it is necessary to re-contextualised the late 1980s, when the party was founded. The Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania was created in 1989 during a context of “a repoliticized Hungarian ethnic consciousness and a concomitant intensification of the Hungaro-Romanian conflict”.55_{Indeed, from the early 1970s on, Romanian communist} leader Ceaușescu undertook a policy of de-Hungarianisation through the systematic destruction of Transylvania’s villages and interethnic past, thus fuelling the already

Group Rights 23 (2016).

55_{László Kürti, “Transylvania Reimagined: Democracy, Regionalism, and Post–Communist Identity,” in}

The Remote Borderland: Transylvania in the Hungarian Imagination, (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2001).

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growing hostilities between Hungarians and Romanians and aggravating the insecurities of living in Transylvania.56_{The situation shifted radically at the end of 1980s when} widespread riots precipitated the rapid downfall of Ceaușescu on December 22nd_{, 1989. A} few day after these events, the DAHR was founded and even secured 7.2% of the votes during the 1990 elections, receiving the most votes from the county of Harghita (85%) and Covasna (77%), two of the three counties making up the Szeklerland area. 57_{In addition} of allowing the DAHR to earn the title of second largest opposition party in the Romanian Parliament with forty-one deputies to both houses, this election essentially re-politicised the Hungarian identity in Transylvania and boosted regionalist sentiments there.

The DAHR presents itself as the Hungarian political party dedicated to promoting the interests of all Hungarians living in Romania, in all spheres of life. Not only is it expected to address issues specific to Hungarian culture and politics (language, schools, representation) but also more general topics varying from health care, to jobs to social services.58_{The DAHR’s ideological and programmatic identity succeeds in gathering a} relatively strong electoral base as voting for them is believed to reflect ethnonational identity. “Most Hungarians take it for granted that, come election time, they will support the DAHR”, thus almost turning the vote for the party into an ethnic obligation for Hungarians.59_{The party is a fervent supporter of financial and administrative autonomy of} the Szeklerland but publicly rejects full independence. According to Dandoy’s party classification based on ideology, such claims place the DAHR in the category of “decentralist” parties, in other words, parties with mild demands for structural reordering the state’s organisation, its institutions and internal borders.60_{More precisely, the DAHR} belongs to the “autonomist” sub-category in which case the party efforts benefit one region

56_{László Kürti, “Fieldwork on Nationalism: Transylvania in the Ethnographic Imagination,” in The Remote}

Borderland: Transylvania in the Hungarian Imagination, (Albany: State University of New York Press,

2001): 67.

57_{László Kürti, “chapter 3,” in The Remote Borderland: Transylvania in the Hungarian Imagination,}

(Albany: State University of New York Press, 2001).

Princeton university Press, 2006).

Princeton university Press, 2006): 343.

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in particular, usually a historical one with a specific cultural identity, as opposed to a federal framework (“Federalist”) or a confederal one (“Confederalist”). Its first participation in a government coalition occurred in 1996 after the replacement of the former government with a more democratic and pro-western coalition. Significant improvements occurred after that, leading to increased political participation, extended language rights, considerable network of educational, cultural and media institutions operating in Hungarian.61_{However, despites these improvements, the deeply-rooted conflicts between} Hungarians and Romanians as well as with the central state still endured.

The period from 2003 onwards was crucial for the DAHR and the ethnic Hungarians of the Szeklerland as the most substantive bills and efforts to further the debate came into being. 2003 saw the birth of the Autonomy Statute of Szeklerland drafted by the Szekler National Council (SNC), then followed by a newer version on June 2006, drafted in partnership with the DAHR which aimed at being voted by the Romanian Parliament. The document’s very first article declares that “to express its historical self-identity, to guarantee equal opportunity to its citizens and to safeguard its Szekler-Hungarian identity, Szeklerland’s population will be transformed into a self-governing community”.62_{In the preamble} already, the document legitimises the claim for decentralisation and autonomy by mentioning European Integration and the principle of subsidiarity, according to which the regional level seems an appropriate level of authority. Similarly, the DAHR published its own statute later on, titled “The Special Statute of the Autonomous Region of Szeklerland in Romania” in 2014, recommending autonomy for the region through the creation of its own government and council.63_{In order to avoid antagonising the Romanian government,} both documents make sure, however, to respect the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of the State. The SNC statute reaffirms that “recognition of regional self-government entails loyalty towards the State to which the regions belong” while the DAHR clearly

61_{Levente Salat, “Prevailing Identity Structures and Competing Ethnopolitical}

Strategies in Transylvania,” Hungarian Studies 21, no. 1-2 (2007): 31.

62_{“The Autonomy Statute of Szeklerland,” Szekler National Council, June 2006.}

http://sznt.sic.hu/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=15:the-autonomy-statute-of-szeklerland&catid=10:statutum&Itemid=14

63_{“The Special Statute of the Autonomous Region of Szeklerland in Romania,” RMDSZ, accessed on May}

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mentions autonomy “within the unitary and indivisible Romanian State”. 64_{Both Statute} accept the application of the personality principle for the rest of the country but advocate for an unrestricted use of the Hungarian language in the area by removing the twenty per cent threshold, thus transforming the Szeklerland into a bilingual autonomous region. Article 10 (1) of the SNC Statute proposes “[i]n Szeklerland the Hungarian language has the same rights as the official language of the State” while the proposal of the DAHR reads “[n]ext to the Romanian language the Hungarian language counts as an official language” in article 87(1).65_{The Romanian government categorically refused to even contemplate the} SNC’s Statute in 2006 and seemed to adopt the same approach with the 2014 DAHR proposal that had never been submitted for a parliamentary discussion. However efforts towards this goal did not cease and the DAHR actively continue its lobbying towards the Romania government. Thus, in early January 2018, DAHR chairman Kelemen Hunor gathered with two other Hungarian party leaders, Bíró Zsolt (Hugarian Civic Party - PCM) and Szilágyi Zsolt (Hungarian People’s party of Transylvania – PPMT) and signed a joint statement in Cluj calling for territorial, local and cultural autonomy. Already in 2013, Kelemen Hunor had emphasised the need to amend the Constitution which, at that time and still now, only recognises the territorial organisation of the county, commune, municipality and city but excludes completely regions, and thus, the possible status of the Szeklerland. Nowadays, the DAHR keeps fighting for the autonomy of the Szeklerland: it holds seats in the Romanian Parliament (21), the Senate (9) as well as the European Parliament (2) and employs these political venues to lobby for minority rights, including autonomy.

The Catalan autonomist movement and the CiU

The struggle for self-government in Catalonia presents a much different pattern than its counterpart in Romania. Unlike the Szeklerland and as explained in a previous

64_Ibid.

65_{“The Special Statute of the Autonomous Region of Szeklerland in Romania,” RMDSZ, accessed on May}

17, 2019. http://www.udmr.ro/page/statutul-special; “The Autonomy Statute of Szeklerland,” Szekler National Council, June 2006. http://sznt.sic.hu/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=15:th e-autonomy-statute-of-szeklerland&catid=10:statutum&Itemid=14.

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chapter, Catalonia benefits from the advantage of being officially recognised and granted the status of autonomous regions, along with the sixteen others, by the Spanish central state. The region created the instrument for regional self-government in 1979 with the establishment of the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia (Estatut), which was approved in a popular referendum by 88% of the votes.66_{As a result, Catalonia achieved an autonomous} government (the Generalitat) and its own parliament. The political movement studied in this section is Convergència i Unió (CiU), a center-right federation of two constituent parties, the larger Democratic Convergence of Catalonia (CDC) and its smaller counterpart, the Democratic union of Catalonia (UDC), that officially united in 2001 although the two had partnered each other for elections since 1978. The federation dissolved on June 17, 2015 and, for that reason, this chapter will study elements and events up to 2015 only. Despite its dissolution, the CiU remained one of the leading Catalan nationalist parties, alongside Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (Republican Left of Catalonia, ERC). Indeed, Convergència i Unió won its first election in 1980 and had continuously been in power until 2003 under the presidency of Jordi Pujol (one of the founder), obtaining three absolute majorities in 1984, 1988 and 1992. Thus, one can safely affirms that Catalan nationalism had been represented by a single main party for the period 1980-2003 and a notable one since the CiU stance towards self-government issues and the Spanish state was complex yet well-manoeuvred.67_{Similarly to the DAHR, the CiU is in the category of “decentralist”} parties according to Dandoy’s classification68_{, that is, mild demands for structural} reordering the state’s organisation. The party had always been in favour of greater autonomy for the Catalan region and combined a strong assertion of nationalism with, however, a lack of interests in full separatism. For long, the Catalan ruling party has played a full part in Spanish state politics and was, broadly speaking, “accepting the game, trying

66_{Daniele Conversi, The Basques, the Catalans and Spain: Alternative Routes to Nationalist Mobilisation}

(London: C. Hurst & Co. Publishers, 1995): 145.

68_{Régis Dandoy, “Ethno-regionalist partino.es in Europe: a typology,” Perspectives on Federalism 2, no.2}

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to improve its rules, but not to change the game”. 69_{In other words, the CiU stayed} fundamentally autonomist but, instead of considering secession or ‘independence in Europe’ in its agenda, the leader Pujol focused his strategy on two main axes: 1) enhancing the political and cultural role of Catalonia in Spain, and 2) building and leading European regionalism.

One of the chief marker of Catalan cultural identity is, without any doubt, its language and the adoption of a very accommodative and inclusive nationalism in which language is used as an instrument for nation-building.70_{On the other side of the spectrum, for instance, are} located the Hungarians of Transylvania who cultivate, on the contrary, a very exclusive identity based on ethnic particularism and language as an ethnic marker. Indeed, Hungarians’ determining factors of their identity is not their Hungarian ethnic roots nor their Romania nationality but lies within their ability to speak Hungarian, differentiating themselves from the rest of the Romanian population who mostly can’t. Catalonia has a very different approach as anyone willing to learn Catalan and live in Catalonia is broadly considered Catalan. Following the downfall of Franco and the re-establishment of democracy in the mid-1970s, Catalonia experienced a high degree of immigration and used the promotion of the Catalan as the main tool for assimilation, promoting it in the parliament, school system, television channels as well as social welfare. The region is officially recognised as bilingual in both the Estatut and the Spanish Constitution: Catalan is the “proper language” (llengua propria) but has to share the status of “official language” (llengua oficial) with Castilian as well.71_{Given the already official status of Catalan, the} twenty-three years of CiU governance focused on its extensive promotion, making of it the Catalan soft power by excellence and a key discursive element in their autonomy narrative.

69_{Klaus-Jürgen Nagel,}_{“Transcending the National / Asserting the National: How Stateless Nations like}

Scotland, Wales and Catalonia React to European Integration,” Australian Journal of Politics and History 50, no. 1 (2004): 65.

70_{Michael Keating, “Stateless nation-building: Quebec, Catalonia and Scotland in the changing state}

system,” Nations and Nationalism 3, no.4 (1997); Daniele Conversi, The Basques, the Catalans and Spain:

Alternative Routes to Nationalist Mobilisation (London: C. Hurst & Co. Publishers, 1995).

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However, the autonomist agenda of the CiU also takes place outside of Spain. For long, Catalan President Jordi Pujol led the regionalist movement at the European level during his fight for the institutional representation of the regions and their inclusion in the treaties.72_{From 1992-1996, Pujol assumed the role of President of Assembly of the} European Regions (AER) and actively lobbied for the creation of the Committee of the Regions until its establishment in 1994. In his eyes, the CoR represented a real opportunity for Catalonia to lead a European pan-regional movement and tried to enhance the Committee’s powers, quite unsuccessfully, however, in the light of the Treaty of Amsterdam that only brought minor changes. Several times in interviews, Pujol expressed his discontent regarding the relative decline in powers and weigh of the CoR and mentioned the “four motors of Europe” (cuatro motores de Europa) as another alternative for Catalan leadership not to discard.73_{The “four motors of Europe” refers to an interregional network} of four highly industrialised and research-oriented regions including Catalonia, Lombardy (Italy), Rhône-Alpes (France) and Baden-Württemberg (Germany). This agreement signed in 1988 encompasses economic cooperation but also a political aspect in so far as it aims at increasing the role of European regions in the Union. Catalan ambitions for political autonomy are also visible at the European Parliament where its MEPs are extremely active. However, interestingly enough, CiU MEPs always refrained from using international institutions (CoR, AER or European Parliament) to form an independentist international. Instead of joining the Greens-European Free Alliance, a European party gathering stateless nations, regionalist and minority political interests, CiU MEPs refused this symbolic (but full of meaning) association and either stayed with liberals if from CDC or with Christian democrats if from UDC.74_{Such behaviour highlights the desire to embrace autonomist} ideas while not being identified with independence movement and, thus, fully splitting from the Spanish State.

72_{Klaus-Jürgen Nagel,}_{“Transcending the National / Asserting the National: How Stateless Nations like}

Scotland, Wales and Catalonia React to European Integration,” Australian Journal of Politics and History 50, no. 1 (2004).

73_{Jordi Pujol i Soley, interview by Cristina Blanco Sío-López, CVCE, March 19, 2010.}

74_{Klaus-Jürgen Nagel, “Transcending the National / Asserting the National: How Stateless Nations like}

Scotland, Wales and Catalonia React to European Integration,” Australian Journal of Politics and History 50, no. 1 (2004): 64.

Ethno-regionalist movements and the double myth of EU regionalisation policies The Spanish and Romanian case