Catalonia

March 18, 2022

Ukraine and Ethiopia: The Scourge of Separatism

Donbass, Tigray, Scotland, Quebec, Catalonia, Kosovo….what do all these have in common?  Ethnic separatist movements in these regions that over the years have worked actively to break away from the Ukraine, Ethiopia, the United Kingdom, Canada, Spain, and Serbia.   There are many other examples that could be mentioned: Chechniya, Abkhazia, Kurdistan (in 4 different countries!), Baluchistan, and even more in Africa. 

The current nightmare in Ukraine goes back to the desire for independence in two regions in the east of that country.  They will probably succeed in achieving independence or be annexed by Russia, unlike Catalonia which did not have a Big Brother in the fight to tip the scales in its direction.  Whether most of the people who live in Donbass really wanted to secede is uncertain. Was it a popular uprising or a coup by a small group of plotters? We’ll never know because the vote that took place was suspect.

Media attention has shifted away from Tigray since the fighting started in the Ukraine, but over the past year untold numbers have suffered at the hands of soldiers from Ethiopia and Eritrea who are raping, looting, killing, bombing cities, forcing a famine. The number of people who have fled or are starving is in the millions–all because a Tigrayan separatist party insisted on breaking away from Ethiopia. Why did they want independence? Because they had previously been in power and felt the new ruling party didn’t respect them. Should they be allowed to go? The best solution people could come up with was to get out the guns, shout slogans about patriotism, and see which side could tally up the most corpses.

Of all the problems facing the world, this is the one we should figure out fast. It lies at the root of so many current conflicts and is something we will never be free of in the future. There will always be some group of people who feel oppressed by their current government and believe the answer to their problems is to break away and set up their own.  Hey, we did that in 1776 and it worked out, didn’t it?   Except for all the dead soldiers who never had a chance to live out their lives, but that’s the price of freedom.  Or is it?   Do we really think people have to die in order to have a change in the political arrangements?  In sovereignty? Is it really “Live Free or Die”, as my state’s license plates boldly proclaim?  

The challenge for us in 2022 is how to live free without dying. How can we avoid the bloodbaths that have always accompanied rebel groups trying to break away?  Do we think that the political boundaries that exist today will remain in perpetuity? Ridiculous! Populations change.  Groups will be on the move.  Can’t we acknowledge that this will be something that comes up periodically and have a process in place that will either allow the breakaway region to fulfill its dreams, or convince the break-awayers it’s a bad idea?  Look at Scotland.   A substantial number of Scots wanted to leave the United Kingdom.  There was a verifiable, fair vote in 2014 where each side was able to make its case for staying or leaving.   55% voted to stay with the Union, and that settled it, at least until Brexit threw a monkey wrench into the works. But there again a vote was taken, and a negotiated break up took place with plenty of bluster, but no bombs or bloodshed.

A simple majority is too low a bar for something as weighty as setting up a new country. For one thing, you can easily find ever-smaller subgroups of people who want to secede: the Scottish Highlands might seek to secede from the Lowlanders, then maybe one of the Hebridean Islands might want to break away from the Highlands—where do you draw the line?  But wherever that line is, voting is better than killing your opponents, better than long lines of refugees streaming across borders as their houses burn behind them. 

 No country is immune from the dangers of separatism.  The United Nations should get busy and set up a “Protocol for Secession and Perpetual Peace.”  Here’s a sketch of a starting point:

1) The Request: The inhabitants of a region express their desire for independence by holding a vote at the local level.  If 60% of the inhabitants who have lived there for 25 years or more vote in favor of secession, go to step 2.

2) The Reply:  The government of the nation from which the secessionist region wishes to break away will set down the financial considerations for secession along with a proposal for a border and send them to the breakaway region’s representatives.

3) The Negotiations:  All the conditions for breaking away will be discussed and approved by the representatives of both parties.  The linguistic, cultural, and civil rights of inhabitants on either side of the new boundary will be guaranteed.

4) The Final Vote:  60% of the inhabitants must agree that they want to approve secession and the deal that goes along with it.

5) The New Nation: If the vote passes, the steps to secession go into effect.

January 21, 2018

Turkey, Stop the Attack on Kurds in Syria!

The madness in the Mideast never ends.   If one area calms down, you can bet that another part of the region is heating up.   Now Turkey is charging into what was once Syria in order to quash a Kurdish takeover of the province of Afrin.   The Turkish president Erdogan tells us that the Afrin Kurds are linked to the Kurds in Southeast Turkey who have been fighting for independence from Turkey for years. He is determined to clear the Syrian border of Kurds, not just in Afrin but perhaps all along Turkey’s lengthy southern frontier. He’s setting about doing it this week with airstrikes, artillery barrages, and now tanks on the ground.

If only there were someone with some good sense and charisma who could step in and say, “Let’s stop the bombing, stop the tanks—let’s sit down and figure this out before any more people die!”   There is no one like that apparently, unless it would be Vladimir Putin who commands some respect in the region. It’s hard to think of an American who could step up to the plate. Is there anyone in the Land of the Free who the people of this region look up to enough to listen to? Some movie star? Some Dennis Rodman of the Middle East who has won the hearts of the dictators, demi-dictators, and rebels?

But isn’t it clear to everyone what the best outcome would be?  Let’s look at what the various parties want:  The Kurds want self-determination for the regions where they are a majority. They’ve already got it in Iraq (though they almost blew it with a demand for absolute independence recently). The Turks want to keep their borders as they are, and they want to stop Kurdish militants from acts of violence within those borders.  OK, so let’s try giving the Kurds autonomy, lots of autonomy over there in the Southeast….maybe that would be enough self-determination for them to stop their attacks. As for Assad in Syria, he wants his country back intact, and the only way he’s going to get it without an even lengthier bloodbath is by granting autonomy to the Kurds in the lands they currently control. And then, the Syrian rebels, who come in different varieties– well,….OK, they will be left out of this particular discussion because there are only so many complications that can be dealt with at one time.

So given all this, my imaginary charismatic hero would say: “The key is to keep the borders as they are, but guarantee more autonomy for ethnic groups within those borders. That’s what’s happening in the Kurdish regions of Iraq, and that’s what is happening in places like South Tyrol, Scotland, Quebec, and was happening in Catalonia until the latest rise in tensions. Grant the Kurds in Syria autonomy in provinces and villages where they are a majority, guaranteeing the rights of other ethnic groups within those regions as well.   Grant the Kurds of Turkey the same autonomy, while denying them independence. If the Turks are worried about the potential for terrorism, let’s set up a UN force that will police the area for a while. It would be cheaper than years of war, thousands of deaths, decades of anger and vows of revenge that the current direction will inevitably bring.

If the parties won’t come to the table or won’t agree once they’re there, let’s bribe them with a sizeable chunk of money that would go to infrastructure, rebuilding what has been destroyed, and upgrading what has survived.    It would be money well spent.

January 13, 2018

Autonomy vs. Sovereignty: the Case of South Tyrol

Let’s take a look at a place where terrible decisions made after World War I resulted in a map that left an ethnic group divided by an international border instead of united under a single flag—and no, I’m not thinking of the Middle East where the Kurds were spread over four countries without a nation of their own. The place I have in mind is South Tyrol, a German-speaking Alpine district, once part of the Austrian Empire, but in 1918-9 handed over to Italy (some would say stolen) where it remains today.

In Woodrow Wilson’s 14 points for world peace, number 9 was about adjusting the borders of Italy along lines of nationality.  Well, they blew it big time. Even though 90% of South Tyroleans were Germans, they now had to pledge allegiance to Italy. Their language was no longer taught in schools, their names were changed (from Josef to Giuseppe, for example). They were the American Indians of the Alps, given the raw end of the stick in many ways as their culture was gradually suppressed. World War II changed some of that briefly, but the Allies let Italy have the province again in 1945 so it was back to being second-class citizens with attempts to de-Germanify the entire population, a feat France accomplished so successfully in Alsace-Lorraine.

A terrorist group of Germans rose up in the 60s, protesting their treatment, and the Italians, to their credit saw the error of their ways. They worked with the Austrians and locals to resolve the tension. What was the answer? Greater autonomy. Now German is spoken almost everywhere again, it’s the most prosperous area in Italy, and people get along just fine for the most part.

Is everything good in South Tyrol?   There are still reports of dissatisfaction with some still wishing for independence or to rejoin Austria. Then at the end of December, the leader of the Freedom Party in Austria, now a partner in the government, stirred things  up by pledging to allow the German South Tyroleans dual citizenship.   That got some Italians living there pretty mad, but by and large things are peaceful there on top of the Alps, as far as anyone can tell from this distance.

The moral of the story is that you’re never going to satisfy everyone when it comes to questions of freedom and sovereignty.   Get used to that idea—there will always be those who are unhappy.   But perhaps the best answer to solving the tension is more autonomy and less concern about sovereignty; more focus on getting along and building bridges and avoiding divisive gestures.   Maybe more autonomy might be all that Catalonia and the Kurds and the Karens, the Northern Cameroonians and the many other ethnic groups who feel slighted would need to stop protesting, or stop killing each other and to channel their energies into more productive avenues than chasing the elusive bubble of sovereignty.

 

 

September 27, 2017

Let the Kurds and Catalans Go!

The Kurds in the former Iraq have voted–let them go!  The Catalans want to vote–let them! What is this mentality that the borders are sacrosanct?   By all means, split these “countries” up into viable entities that can thrive and be trading partners and good neighbors to the Arab part of Iraq, to the rest of Spain, the rest of Europe.  Think outside the box!  Split Libya up, split up the South Sudan, Syria, the Ukraine and yes, Turkey, the UK, the USA if that’s what the people in one region want.  It will be expensive and confusing at first, but then, with good will on all sides, it will be better.

Self-determination has been a watchcry of democracy for eons.   The problem is defining at what level the self-determination will take place:  the city? the county? the province?  There will always be a tension there, but this bullying, chest-thumping attitude has no place in the 21st century.   I had a Spanish student who told me that if the Catalans tried to break away he would be there with a gun to make sure they did not.   Is it worth even one life to keep the border as it is now?  Do we think we’re locked into the political map of the world that exists today?  Folks, get out a historical atlas and take a look at the shifting borders over the centuries.  There will always be changes and the question should be, how will we facilitate them so that no one gets hurt, no wars flare up, no dictators seize power in wars of aggression.

 

April 11, 2017

Murdering Your Way to Freedom and Power

It’s a momentous day in Europe. The last armed rebel group on the continent has laid down its weapons and disbanded. ETA, the Basque independence fighters will no longer be blowing people up or kidnapping and shooting them. Hundreds have died in the name of Basque freedom, thousands have been injured. Now they realize it wasn’t and isn’t worth it.

Their reasoning was this: we want an independent Basque region. Spain will not give it to us. But if we make life miserable for the ordinary Spaniard, they will eventually say, “Get out, and take your damned region with you. Just leave us alone.” And the way to make life miserable is to set off bombs in random shopping centers, detonate cars for assassinations–the usual formula for mayhem and murder. It’s a harsh calculus, trading the lives of many hundreds of innocent people for political sovereignty, and it didn’t work.

There’s hardly a country in Europe that does not have some group agitating for autonomy or outright secession. Catalonia and Galicia in Spain, Scotland, and Wales in the UK, some in Belgium want to split that country up into Flanders and Wallonia. It makes you ask yourself, is life so onerous under the yoke of these existing nations that all these people want out? The grass seems always greener on the other side, and yet, is it? And is it worth anyone’s life to get it? Let’s hope everyone keeps cool and the issues can be resolved peacefully.

The other good news is that the rebel group FARC in Columbia is in the process of disarming as well. They, too, seem to have realized that their goals might be more easily achieved in a different way than through armed conflict.   But, alas, a renegade group has rejected the peace deal, and this week blew up a car full of soldiers. Once violence becomes habitual, it’s never easy to stop it. A single disgruntled combatant can cause a lot of damage.

This brings us to the Middle East where the violence goes on and on. This week in addition to the marketplace bombings that have become commonplace, we had the bombings of two Egyptian Christian churches, killing dozens on Palm Sunday. You can’t help but ask yourself, what would it take for these deluded killers to see what the Basques and FARC have seen?   The answer, unfortunately is, it would take a lot: a whole new worldview, a whole new religion, replacing the death cults that currently reign.   For the Basques, the violence stemmed from a political ideal, but in the Middle East, it comes from leaders who claim it’s what God wants.

One of the hallmarks of what it means to be human is to recognize that death is  sacred, and to deprive someone of their life randomly,  in the name of a deity is to have gone over to the Dark Side.  Deprograming the thousands who have signed on to this bloodthirsty agenda will be the work of many years.    God help us.

September 14, 2016

You Want Peace? Split Those Countries Up!

The news is out that the leaders of the newest nation, South Sudan, have not wasted any time in showing what they’re made of. Thanks to a film by George Clooney’s watchdog group, The Sentry, we now know that they have been amassing hidden caches of personal wealth and buying mansions abroad at the expense of their impoverished people. They are in no hurry to end the civil war because they and their families are profiting from it.  Enormously. Thousands are dead, thousands more will die, and millions displaced as these people squirrel away the revenues that they are supposed to be distributing. Meanwhile world leaders are trying desperately to find a road to peace by bringing the two sides back together.

Why not go the other way and make the separation permanent? We just created South Sudan 5 years ago, so why not Southeast Sudan and Southwest Sudan? Make it a looser federation, or confederation, or try something new for crying out loud! Are these people ever going to trust each other again? Split ‘em up!

What is this obsession we have with maintaining borders as they are? Does anyone think that in a hundred years we will be looking at the same map of the world that we see now?   For one thing, a lot of what today is coast will be under water—where are all those people going to go? But the larger point is that conditions are always changing–environmental, social, political, philosophical—and to say that the borders in 2016 will be the same in 2116 is as absurd as to think there would be no change from 1816 to 1916.

Surely the wiser course would be to figure out a way to divide countries up when conditions indicate that the time is ripe. Czechoslovakia did an excellent job of this in 1993.   The Scots have almost reached escape velocity, and the Catalans are right behind them. If we could only have a procedure ready to hand, so when things heat up we could say, “OK, we recognize there’s a movement for change. Here’s what we do now: First A, then B, then C….” and on to the split.

What stands in the way of peaceful change is nationalism. Too many people equate pride in their country with some notion of the Motherland or Fatherland with inviolate frontiers.  When I asked one of my students from central Spain what he would do if Catalonia voted to secede, he said without hesitation,

“I would go fight them.”

“You mean, join the army and kill people?”

“Yes, absolutely.”

To him and everyone else with this mentality I say our slogan should be: more pragmatism, less patriotism. Focus on well-being, not real estate. Syria, South Sudan, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey—so many countries could benefit from partition. And the world would benefit because there would be less war, less displacement of peoples, less need for emergency food supplies, and all that goes along with civil unrest.

Of course there are problems. There are always opportunists, provocateurs, warlords….but isn’t it worth a try when you have such a clear indication in some of these cases that the majority of people in certain districts want a change?   Do we believe in self-determination or not?