Selfishness of the affluent? stateless nationalist and regionalist parties and immigration

ABSTRACT

This paper examines stateless nationalist and regionalist party (SNRP) discourses on immigration through an exploration of the economic dimensions of the centre-periphery cleavage. Using qualitative document analysis, the Republican Left in Catalonia (ERC) and the Scottish National Party (SNP) in Scotland are studied in order to see whether and how the relative economic position of a region shapes SNRP discourses on immigration. The period of analysis encompasses the last three terms of office for both parties, during which immigration and decentralisation have been very salient issues in Catalonia and Scotland. Results suggest that the relative economic situations and the economic crisis do not seem to affect general stances, which are positive in both regions. However, the economic contexts have an influence on how each party selects its main issues for debate, and the ways in which these are managed.

KEYWORDS:

• Catalonia
• immigration
• integration
• economy
• scotland

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. See Kymlicka (2001) and Zapata Barrero (2009) for overviews on the theoretical and policy implications.

2. Exceptions include Triadafilopoulous and Zaslove (2006) and Alonso and Claro da Fonseca (2011).

3. One exception is Hepburn and Rosie (2014).

4. This was, precisely, the main slogan of the Plataforma x Catalunya (PxC), the extreme-right party in Catalonia.

5. Examples of this can be found in Connor (2001) on ethnonationalism, Dietrich (2013) on secession and Conversi (2014) on globalisation.

6. Scholars have explored how aspects of identity construction emerge from discourses. See Hepburn (2009a) and Kleiner-Liebau (2009).

7. See Barker (2012) for an exploration of how distribution of powers affects the saliency of the immigration issue.

8. This was expressed by Harvie (1994), quoted in Massetti (2009, 194)

9. These components have been inductively generated through a first open codification of the materials.

10. That is, showing what Sartori (2005) called blackmail and coalition potential.

11. ERC did so as a part of a tripartite coalition.

12. On a global basis, one could argue that both Catalonia and Scotland are wealthy countries. However, we can also agree with Connor (1984) that the economic dimension of these peripheries is to be considered in relation to their centres. As he argues, ‘it is not what it is but what people perceive as is that has political consequences’ (2001, 116).

13. 223 documents were analysed (all translations by the author). Citations included in the database are labelled ‘S’ for Scotland and ‘C’ for Catalonia followed by the number of the document and the starting line. For example: S-P2:300 signifies that the quotation can be found in the second document of the Scottish database at the 300th line.

14. Interviews were done with two types of party members: the parliamentary representative responsible for immigration issues and the party staffers responsible for immigration issues. The interviews were carried out between March and May 2012 in Barcelona (Catalan) and Edinburgh (English), respectively.

15. That is, coding was implemented when a topic relating immigration and any of the aforementioned components emerged, and counted as one. Sources were weighted equally except from interviews, that were coded but not counted.

16. Discourses were counted as aggregated number of quotations.

17. Specific data can be found at INE's web page, www.ine.es.

18. Catalonia's fiscal deficit has been estimated at between 5 and 10% every year since 1996 depending on the method of calculation (Generalitat de Catalunya 2009). See also Tremosa (2013) for an overview.

19. However, while independence-seeking SNRPs tend to espouse positive stances towards immigration at the autonomous community level in Catalonia, notice must be taken that the more central parties, the socialist (PSC) and the right-wing nationalist (CiU) parties exhibit variance at the local level (Garcés-Mascareñas, Franco-Guillén, and Sánchez-Montijano 2011).

20. For an overview of these figures, as well as a discussion of the complex allocation of the oil revenues, see Johnson and Phillips (2012).

21. There is a certain amount of confusion around the distribution of resources between the UK and Scotland. In fact, despite the belief that Scotland is a net receiver of transfers, the way oil revenues are accounted influences the final results. See Maxwell (2011).

22. See www.ons.gov.uk/

23. See http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/

24. Catalonia started managing immigration in the early 1990s when immigrants represented less than 3% of the population, but in Scotland there has been no equivalent planning or legislation.

25. Immigration was politicized in Catalonia by 2000, even though the foreign population amounted to 2.9% of the total. This casts doubt on the argument that Scotland's relatively small immigrant population explains the political consensus.

26. See Franco-Guillén and Zapata-Barrero (2014) for an in-depth discussion on this idea.

27. The analysis reveals that the other SNRP in Catalonia, CiU, has also expressed similar arguments.

28. Although it is not the main objective of this paper, it is important to note that the ERC makes frequent references to granting political rights and access to nationality. The party considers the Spanish nationality laws unjust.

29. Following Masseti's suggestion (2009, 511), which referred to right-wing parties, the examination of the CiU becomes especially relevant. However, in the case of CiU discourses, examples of the selfishness of the affluent have not been found at the autonomous level and in fact the Catalan government, currently governed by the coalition, has recently rejected and disobeyed a Spanish ban on offering health services to irregular immigrants.