Catalonia and democracy

Beatriz Silva

On September 11, 1973, the palace of La Moneda in Chile burned under a shower of bombs and within a few hours one of the oldest and most consolidated democracies in Latin America disappeared. This is how we usually think that democracies die, with a coup d'etat, through weapons and violence. However, there are other less visible, but equally effective forms, which are addressed by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt in his book How Democracies die, recently translated into Spanish.

What are the warning signs, the indicators that a democracy is being undermined? According to its authors, one of the first symptoms occurs when a democratically elected government begins to reject the democratic rules of the game and denies legitimacy to its political opponents, claiming to represent "the voice of the people".

What is the town? It is never defined clearly. In practice it translates into mine, those who think like me, while political opponents are accused of being "unpatriotic" and denied legitimacy. In many cases, lynching is supported or tolerated tacitly or even the violence exerted on them is justified. Levitsky and Ziblatt recall that these indicators, as well as rejecting the Constitution, expressing their willingness not to abide by it and ignoring the rights of parliamentary or social minorities, is what Donald Trump in the United States or Viktor Orbán in Hungary have done. They review examples from the past, such as the Argentina of Juan Domingo Perón, and other recent ones, such as Vladimir Putin's Russia or Alberto Fujimori's Peru.

The cases of Catalonia and Spain are not analyzed but it is difficult not to recognize many of the symptoms described.

Self-government rules designed by the citizens of Catalonia. We have experienced the attempt to dehumanize the political adversary from the rostrum of the Parliament. The systematic delegitimization of the formations that do not support the partisan theses of independence as well as the attempt to create parallel institutions that only represent a part of the citizenship. Even in some cases, we have seen the justification of lynchings and attacks, something that, by the way, Donald Trump has also done. All this arrogance the representation "of the people" although the election results are stubborn and reveal choice after election that Catalonia is divided into a range of very diverse options but in no case reflect that this supposed people are the majority.

Spain is not exempt from the symptoms either. We see leaders like Pablo Casado or Albert Rivera encourage the application of the 155 "preventively," something they know is not legally possible and that the government of Mariano Rajoy did not. And practice forms of delegitimization of pro-independence politicians, or the way in which assumed the socialist government of Pedro Sanchez, which are not very foreign to those described by this book.

Catalonia and Spain are not free either from the attempt to seize control of the referees who maintain the balances: the judicial system, the police or the ombudsmen. The actors that, according to Levitsky and Ziblatt, can facilitate applying the rules selectively, punishing the adversaries and protecting the allies. Good examples of this are the attempts to influence the different judicial processes but also to politicize the body of Mossos d'Esquadra. Or the reports of the Síndic de Greuges systematically positioning itself with a part of the population of Catalonia, the partisan of independence.

What is the challenge that this situation represents? With a classic coup d'état, like Pinochet's in Chile, the death of democracy is immediate and evident. The presidential palace burns in flames, the president is assassinated and the Constitution is suspended. By electoral route, on the other hand, nothing of this happens. There are no tanks on the streets, the population continues to vote and many arbitrary decisions are sold as measures to "improve" democracy. The independent press continues to be published, the opposition continues to occupy seats and for a large part of the public, the dismantling is imperceptible because the control of opponents or the media is gradual and silent.

One of the ironies of the multiple cases described by Levitsky and Ziblatt in his book is that the defense of democracy itself is often used as a pretext for subversion. Something that makes it hard not to remember that demonstration in the streets of Barcelona with giant letters that said "democracy".

Defending democracy is not that. It is to accept the rules and fight to achieve political objectives without imposing on those who think differently. Democracies demand negotiation, compromise and concessions. The setbacks are inevitable and the victories always partial. The control mechanisms and balances are not straitjackets, it is what guarantees the rights of all citizens.

Democracy works thanks to two fundamental rules: tolerance and institutional containment. We can disagree but we have to accept the legitimacy of our political opponents, the collective willingness to agree not to agree and to change the rules of the game by the democratic procedures that democracy itself has established.

https://cronicaglobal.elespanol.com/pensamiento/como-mueren-democracias_210378_102.html