Social conflict and alternative mass communications: public art and politics in the service of Spanish-Basque nationalism

Abstract. Mass communication is multi-dimensional. One often overlooked alternative medium of mass communication, when it is systematic and not random, is public art - murals, graffiti, wall painting and posters. The linking of art and politics has precedents in Basque culture. It is the thesis of this article that public art is an important factor in the political communication process in the Basque region, that Basque nationalists, especially radical Basques revolving around the ETA movement, have used public art as one source for increasing visibility, raising consciousness, and building a mass based movement. What is particular about Basque nationalism is that it is a cultural-political movement, a reawakening from a 'culture of silence' induced by the Franco regime. Today, public art is an accepted channel for communicating the gamut of socio-political issues relevant to the social conflict in the Basque homeland.     

National identity and political violence in the Basque country

Abstract. The phenomenon of ETA derives from the interaction of two factors: Basque nationalism and Francoism. The fundamental elements of ETA, both ideological and strategical-political, were already well defined and developed in the Basque nationalism of the pre-war period, particularly in its intransigent and radical sector represented by Aberri and Jagi-Jagi groups. Later, ETA acquired characteristics of its own which separated it from the traditional nationalism. The regime of terror and repression imposed by Francoism exerted a fundamental influence on this state of affairs, inclining ETA definitively towards extremely radical and intransigent postures. In this way the activism of ETA arose. This activism should be understood as the sublimation of praxis to the detriment of theory, and the structure of ETA as an armed group and the adoption of a third world, anticolonialist-style guerrilla strategy.     

Language and politics in Spain's Basque provinces

Since its inception in the 1890s, the Basque nationalist movement has put great emphasis on the Basques’ distinctive language, Euskera, to draw clearly the dividing line between Basque and Spanish political interests. This article discusses the extent and patterns of Euskera usage today, and analyses factors affecting contemporary usage of Euskera. The article concludes with an analysis of the four post‐Franco elections in the Basque country. It would appear that the Basque Nationalist Party is growing only slightly in areas where Basque is widely spoken, but is making significant gains in areas of low usage, a fact that seems to portend a reversal in traditional Basque political patterns.     

Measuring issue-salience in voters' preferences

We provide a new approach to the measurement of issue salience that explains how the salience of an issue among voters and the position of the parties on a given issue interact to each other and determine vote choices and aggregate election results. Analyzing the spatial model of voting, we show how voting probabilities can be estimated by a multinomial logit regression where the ideal policy locations of voters on each issue dimensions are independent variables, and where no individual specific perception about the location of the political parties is used in the regression. The pieces of survey information that are used to calculate issue-salience are: i) specific position of respondents on each issue dimension, ii) vote choice, and iii) the policy position of parties on each issue dimension, which is measured by the mean perceived position. Rather, only an aggregate estimate of party positions on issues is needed. To demonstrate the mechanics and value of the approach, we analyze regional elections in the Basque province of Spain. In that region, we find that the left-right dimension is about two times more salient than nationalism. The nationalism issue is, however, more divisive than the left-right issue. This shows that the issue that voters care more about, may not coincide with the issue on which the parties offer more distinctive policies.     

Citizenship,Multiculturalism and Cross-National Muslim Minority Public Opinion

Do institutions of citizenship shape public opinion among Muslims in the West? Pitched debates about the future of multiculturalism give strong theoretical reason to think that institutions would cause cross-national variation in minority opinion. Institutions set rules for national integration and communal recognition and send signals regarding social views of diversity. Testing these theorised links, however, requires two steps. First, careful conceptualisation of citizenship, both in individual and communal dimensions, categorises states’ citizenship regimes. Second, unique cross-national polling of Muslim minorities in France, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States permits analysis of the relationship between institutions and minority political attitudes. Findings demonstrate strong institutional effects on attitudes. However, these effects vary depending on the question asked. Institutions impact on cross-national variation in opinion regarding national identification and women’s place in society. There is no evidence of institutional roots of support for suicide terrorism.     

Trajectories of Administrative Reform: Institutions,Timing and Choices in France and Spain

The influence of national administrative institutions on contemporary reforms has often been noted but insufficiently tested. This article enriches the comparative perspective of administrative reform policies by focusing on four interrelated dimensions: the choices of reformers, institutional constraints, timing and sequencing and long-term trajectories. This article tries to determine whether most similar administrative systems exhibit analogous contemporary reform trajectories in content, timing and sequence. By comparing the administrative reform policies of two ‘most similar’ Napoleonic countries, France and Spain, this article analyses the commonalities and divergences of decentralisation, territorial state reorganisation, civil service reforms and policies that focus on performance management and organisational design. The article identifies the ‘causal mechanisms’ that characterise the specific role of institutions and considers both the role of context and the importance of policy intersections.     

Nationalism and party competition in the Basque country and Catalonia

The party systems which have developed in Catalonia and the Basque Country since Franco's death are distinguished from the Spanish one, and also from each other, in three areas: the leading role of the largest nationalist member of each; the secondary one of Spain's ruling Socialist Party; and the presence of smaller nationalist parties. Analysis of these three factors shows that, despite appearances, the systems’ initial structures did indeed reflect the historical nature of nationalism in the two regions. It also indicates how the dynamics of competition within them have in turn affected the nature of contemporary nationalism.     

Political mobilisation and place‐specificity: Radical nationalist street campaigning in the Spanish Basque country

The political context of Spanish Basque nationalism has changed dramatically during the last decades. As a consequence, moderate and radical nationalist groups have turned bitterly against one another. The internal power struggle is fought most visibly in the street, which is traditionally the central place of Basque political mobilisation. Particularly the radical nationalists use graffiti and mass demonstrations to question the legitimacy of the existing power structures. This paper examines the radical nationalist methods of mobilisation in the changing overall context of Basque politics. It is argued that the campaigns ought to be discussed as both instruments and expressions of local discontent, relevant at several geographical scales. The aim is to demonstrate the significance of local political activity for politics at regional, national and continental levels. Exactly this connection makes local public resistance an important subject of geographical study.     

Protesting with the ballot: Diffusion of methods of electoral protest in Spain

This paper shows the pattern of diffusion of a tool of protest – blank and null voting (BNV)– in the context of Spanish national elections. It shows how the 2004 protest mobilization by Batasuna (a Basque nationalist party) predicts null voting by identifying the relationship of this form of protest with both the level of grievance of the population and the political resources of the mobilizers. The paper then demonstrates that this large and visible use of a protest tactic is followed by a heterogeneous diffusion process after the main mobilized protest event and beyond the supporters of the original mobilizer. In the 2008 national election, across Spain, citizens with grievances toward the political system and, most importantly, with political affinity with the initiators were the ones to update their individual protest repertoire with this electoral protest tool.     

From nation-building to building identification with political communities: Consequences of political decentralisation in Spain, the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia, 1978–2001

Abstract. Many multiethnic polities suffer from a deficit of citizens' support for their political communities. Hence, their governments may think of political decentralisation as a solution. This article analyses the effects of that policy on citizens' identification with their political communities in Spain: on identification with the Basque Country, Catalonia or Galicia (its most conspicuous 'nationalities') once they have become 'autonomous communities', and on identification with the overall Spanish political community. To study the processes of transformation of such attitudes, nation-building theories are interpreted from the political socialisation approach and applied to the autonomous institutions. It is also suggested that the state strictu senso , by contrast, may be developing an alternative method of forging identification with its own political community. Survey time-series evidence shows that although those autonomous communities are engaged successfully in a local but standard nation-building, the whole political system may be fostering its own diffuse support by recognising and institutionalising cultural diversity and self-government.     

The evolution of Swedish fascism: self-identification and ideology in interwar Sweden

ABSTRACT

Historians and social scientists generally understand nationalism to be the defining feature of fascism. Kunkeler's study challenges that assumption with his examination of Swedish fascist movements through the notion of self-identification. Using fascist periodicals, he traces the development of Swedish fascists' identification with the movement—in relation to matters of race, nation and the signifiers of ‘fascism’ and ‘National Socialism’—from the early 1920s, when an overt attachment to Mussolini's project was evident, through a National Socialist phase showing cautious commitment to Nazi Germany, and ending with a final phase of strategic anonymity. In the face of criticism that fascism was an alien import, Swedish fascists adapted their public profile to accommodate such national sensitivities, developing a racialist ideology that was not confined by national borders and was believed to be more in tune with Swedish political culture at the time. When public opinion turned decisively against ‘international fascism’ in the mid-1930s, they were forced to discard the name and image of ‘fascism’ altogether and enter a final phase of public anonymity that, in any case, involved no significant ideological metamorphosis.     

The Rise and Fall of Political Engagement among Latinos: The Role of Identity and Perceptions of Discrimination

This study analyzes how perceptions of discrimination against oneself and/or one’s group and whether one self-identifies in national (American), national origin, or panethnic terms affect levels of political engagement among Latinos in the United States. The findings show that perceptions of discrimination against oneself are particularly damaging in that they promote both behavioral and attitudinal alienation (e.g., non-voting and lack of trust), especially among Latinos who identify primarily as American. Behavioral alienation can be mitigated, and even overcome, when perceptions of discrimination are accompanied by a panethnic or national origin self-identification. However, the attitudinal alienation created by perceptions of discrimination is not mitigated by any type of self-identification. These findings shed light on understudied factors that affect political engagement that are going to become more important to understand as the American population continues its ethnic diversification. In addition to expanding our knowledge of political engagement generally, this study also raises important questions about whether the adoption of an American self-identification is in fact beneficial for the health of our participatory political system as a whole.     

Domino effect or internal developments? The influences of international events and political ideologies on Catalan and Basque nationalism

Although comparative studies of nationalism have recently experienced a resurgence, few attempts have been made to analyse the reciprocal influences exerted upon one another by nationalist movements. This article distinguishes between a domino effect which denotes a concrete change at the governmental level, and a demonstration effect which signifies more general influences on nationalist movements exerted by ‘external’ models. A comparative analysis of external ideological influences on Basque and Catalan nationalism reveals that the domino effect metaphor does not easily apply to nationalism, while demonstration effects are often confined to certain sectors of these nationalist movements, generally the most radical ones.     

Why might constructed nationalist and ethnic ideologies come into confrontation with each other?

The paper develops a model for examining ethnic conflict in Southeast Asia, using Indonesia as an illustrative case. Ethnic conflict is explained as arising not out of the facts of ethno-cultural pluralism, but rather out of the disentwining of the three visions of the nation: as civic community, as ethno-cultural community and as multicultural community.This disentwining occurs particularly in the context of pressures for democratization. Three aspects of politics are identified as promoting the disentwining so as to engender the weakening of the civic nationalist vision, and thence the confrontation between a majoritarian ethno-cultural nationalism and a minority-focused multicultural nationalism. First, the spread of ideas related to democracy generates the spread of liberal forms of the three nationalist visions, alongside the authoritarian forms, and puts the spotlight on the divergences between these visions. Ideas of democracy are then highjacked by ethnic majorities claiming majority rights, and by ethnic minorities claiming minority rights. Second, the patrimonial basis for politics in much of Southeast Asia means that ethnic majorities and minorities alike perceive democratization as the search for responsive patrons, rather than as the search for civic equality. Third, civic nationalism is further weakened by the erosion of faith in the social justice promises of state elites. While these features of politics promote ethnic tensions, they also generate countervailing factors that ensure the political disunity of ethnic minorities, and thereby inhibit the extent of ethnic conflict.     

Rights and Wrongs across European Borders: Migrants,Minorities and Citizenship

Among the key issues in contemporary political debates across Europe are questions relating to migration, to the social and political rights of migrants and minorities and how these questions relate to new forms of citizenship in specific national contexts as well as across Europe as a whole. In this paper we want to explore the changing dynamics of debates about citizenship, migration, inclusion and exclusion in four European countries--Britain, France, Germany and Italy. Drawing on recent research we have carried out in each of these countries we analyse some of the key dimensions of recent debates and their impact on policy agendas, arguing for an analysis that reflects the various types of migration and movements of people that are shaping the current situation in many societies.     

How Safe Do Majority Group Members,Ethnic Minorities,and Muslims Feel in Multicultural European Societies?

London elected a Muslim mayor in 2016, less than a year after Germany took the lead in welcoming Syrian refugees. What accounts, then, for political leaders’ public assertions of the death of multiculturalism and the resurgence of far-right parties? We examine the possibility that some areas of multicultural policy foster a sense of discrimination on the part of majority populations and reduce their sense of safety, putting pressure on political leaders for assurances and providing the impetus for populist political party agendas, even to the point of Brexit. Data from the Banting/Kymlicka Multiculturalism Policy Index project and from the European Social Survey allow us to explore the impact of specific areas of multicultural policy on those who identify as majority group members, ethnic minorities, and Muslims in fourteen European states. We provide a quantitative multivariate analysis of the influence of key areas of state-level multicultural policy on individuals’ sense of being in a group that is discriminated against, as well as their feelings of safety, satisfaction with life, and satisfaction with the national government. Background factors, including respondents’ education, are controlled. For each of the three groups of respondents, the article offers conclusions as to which areas of multicultural policy seem to contribute to the most adverse reactions. Our findings help to explain the backlash against multiculturalism and the shift in focus in European states toward “mainstreaming” integration programs. They also provide a contextual background for understanding the increasing sway of rightist party demands and cautions for the development of programs to counter violent extremism.     

Federalism Outcomes and Ideological Preferences: The U.S. Supreme Court and Preemption Cases

The record of the U.S. Supreme Court in decisions affectingfederal-state relations has been one of inconsistency betweenstates' rights and national supremacy. This inconsistency hasperplexed both legal and political science scholars who havehad great difficulty placing decision-making regarding federalismoutcomes by the Court in any sort of theoretical context. Contraryto much conventional wisdom, ideological preferences do notautomatically translate into federalism outcomes. We extendmodels of judicial decision-making in political environmentsby including state policy. State policy outcomes may be eithermore liberal or more conservative than the policy would be underfederal control. Thus, the ideological preferences of the justicesmay contradict their preferences toward nationalism or statesrights. Testing the model using 94 preemption cases, we findthat individual justices and most Courts are willing to sacrificetheir federalism values in the pursuit of some other policygoal. This finding has implications for both the federalismliterature and strategic models of Court behavior, as well asfor cases the Court is currently reviewing.     

Minority rights and the dialectics of the nation: Otto Bauer’s theory of the nation and its contributions to multicultural theory and globalization

Conclusion This article analyzed Otto’s Bauer idea of the nation and assessed its meaning and significance qua liberal nationalism and the expansion of national minority rights in Europe. It argued that Bauer's formulation of the same rights for all minorities exposed certain limitations of multicultural theory, namely the failure of liberal multicultural theorists to adequately address the consequences of special minority rights and the potentially transformative role of labor in liberal societies that necessarily seek to be inclusive. Further, Bauer's idea of cultural autonomy raised important and relevant implications for advancing national minority rights in Europe. In particular, his initiative exposed possible ways to promote the social of cultural rights of EU Charter on Fundamental Rights. Given this and the EU's commitment to labor rights, it is curious that Bauer’s theory has not received the attention it deserves. Indeed, even if Bauer's ideas prove somewhat non-conventional by liberal standards, it is still important that we see his ideas as serving some elemental purpose in linking the advancement of national values and sentiment with the EU goal of integration.     

Cross-border Policy Networks in the Basel Region: The Effect of National Borders and Brokerage Roles

This paper provides evidence of how national borders affect the structure of policy networks. Our analysis of the Basel cross-border metropolitan region located across Switzerland, France and Germany considers the case of public transportation in border regions. Using a social network analysis of the relationships between 44 actors, we show that national borders play a diminishing role in the formation of policy networks for both information exchange and decision making. Local actors develop different brokerage roles according to their country of origin: Swiss actors function as coordinator and representative brokers vis-à-vis actors located in France and Germany.     

Consuming Part-time Nationalism: China as an Immigrant in the Global Society

If Chinese foreign policy is to continue enjoying legitimacy, one must not allow globalization to overwhelm, penetrate, or obscure the boundary of the Chinese state. However, if the contemporary goal of Chinese foreign policy is to globalize, the process of integrating unavoidably questions the very foundation of Chinese foreign policy. By reinterpreting and psychologizing China's foreign policy, this paper tackles the discursive strategy, pertaining to nationalism, to make China's entry into globalization emotionally more manageable and less felt as a loss of identity. While there is worry that Chinese nationalism, if mismanaged, may lead to confrontation with the United States, nationalism today is no longer the same nationalism as before. Most importantly, the commercialization of nationalism and the bifurcation of its meanings have granted some agency to individual Chinese to interpret and practice nationalism as each sees proper. This citizen agency exists in various forms with those in the countryside ready to answer the call by the government and those in the cities acting more spontaneously. These individuals can together, without them necessarily planning collectively, bring out interpretations and practices that are difficult to anticipate beforehand.