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Spanish officials have offered reassurances that a “new era” will begin for the country after elections in May 2024. Catalan separatist parties have lost their parliamentary majority, essential for governing the region, since 2015 and for the first time in decades have failed to secure a majority in the regional parliament. Meanwhile, Spain's ruling Socialist Party has emerged as the largest party in Catalonia.
Madrid's political interest in Catalonia has intensified since 2017. After holding an independence referendum that Spanish authorities deemed illegal, the Catalan president and other officials fled to Belgium, sparking a diplomatic crisis. Spain then imposed direct rule on the region, a decision supported by the EU, which said the referendum required constitutional approval. As a result, local support for Catalan independence dwindled, paving the way for Madrid to step in.
The Spanish separatist and autonomist movements are the best known in Europe, and their management has been noted throughout the continent. Many other European countries, especially the larger ones, have autonomist movements calling for devolution, autonomy, or complete independence. Due to the perceived failure of the EU, international diplomacy, and integration efforts to resolve these issues, each country maintains its own policies. Few movements are considered serious threats, but attempts at self-assertion often provoke direct state intervention if the government has the capacity to do so.
Many of Europe's former regional identities have been in decline in recent years. The rise of nationalism in Europe in the 1800s led to the creation of unitary nation states that integrated capitals with their surrounding regions, a trend known as “capital magnetism.” Additionally, the increased urbanization of other large cities weakened traditional ties to local communities and support systems.
Pressures for integration and assimilation also extended to regional identities in order to create a more national identity. For example, at the time of Italian unification in 1861, less than 10% of Italians spoke Tuscan, but this dialect began to be promoted as standard Italian. The use of Tuscan in public and administrative life, in the mass media, and in other ways gradually diminished the use of other regional dialects and languages. Similarly, French policy promoted Parisian French as standard French, while in the German Empire High German was promoted.
Contemporary EU countries face greater constraints on linguistic repression. The EU's “post-sovereign state” system provides a framework that requires member states to respect the protection of minority languages and other rights. Yet governments have modernized their approaches to establishing national unity. Proficiency in the majority language is often a prerequisite for education, media, and employment opportunities, and immigrants favor learners of the majority language. As a result, dozens of European minority languages are at risk of disappearing.
Nevertheless, European autonomy movements wield political power: Political networks such as the European Liberal Alliance, a grouping of pro-independence parties, are active in the EU parliament and use the democratic process to act as a political outlet for separatist movements.
Italy is constantly trying to more effectively link its autonomous regions – Sicily, Sardinia, and several northern regions – to the country. The transformation of the regional party Lega Nord into the national party League in 2018 saw some success. But the autonomy movement is similarly adaptable. Other northern Italian parties recently rallied to pass a bill granting greater autonomy in June 2024. Italy's German-speaking province of South Tyrol faces the added challenge of receiving support from Austria. Austrian leaders have repeatedly proposed granting Austrian passports to German speakers, and in January 2024 expressed support for further autonomy reforms, drawing a reflexive rebuke from Rome.
Hungary's conflicts with its neighbors are even more notable. The collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1920 left large Hungarian communities in Romania, Slovakia, and Ukraine. Today, the Hungarian government supports these communities through funding cultural institutions, financial assistance, and fostering a sense of solidarity, which has caused tensions with these countries. However, as a small country, Hungary has struggled to exert significant influence, especially in EU member states such as Romania and Slovakia, and has had only limited success in Ukraine.
That said, EU countries generally tend to avoid interfering in separatist movements in other countries. This has allowed France to consolidate control over its mainland territories. However, France has yet to solidify control over Corsica, a Mediterranean island it purchased in 1768. The retreat of the French Empire after World War II reignited historical tensions, which were further intensified by the arrival of many French and Europeans from Algeria to Corsica in the 1960s. Violence in Corsica has largely subsided since the 1970s, but a ceasefire was not established until 2014, and separatist uprisings in 2022 indicate that the situation remains tense.
In response to the unrest, French President Emmanuel Macron raised the possibility of granting Corsica more autonomy. Previously, in 2017, amid rising tensions over Basque separatism in neighboring Spain, France gave the Basque region greater autonomy by granting it the status of a single community and integrating its several regional councils under a single regional authority. In contrast, Alsace's merger with two other French regions in 2016 reduced its autonomy and further integrated it into the national fabric. These differing approaches illustrate the diversity of policies adopted by national governments to manage the region.
Germany, the EU's most populous country, governs some regions vying for greater autonomy, but its federal system, which gives states greater power in areas such as education and language, has helped to ease separatist sentiment and reduce the need for control from Berlin.
Federalism has not solved the challenges facing Belgium. The country's Flemish and French-speaking regions want more autonomy, while some advocate integration with a larger Dutch-speaking or French-speaking state. While greater regional autonomy is part of the solution, the regions remain interconnected through the capital, Brussels, and its broader role as capital of the EU.
Still, separatists continue to propose a “velvet divorce” between Belgium's regions, similar to the peaceful division of the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1992. Opinion polls predict a victory in the June 2024 elections for the Flemish Belanger party, which campaigned on reaching an agreement to either break up the country or declare independence for Flanders. But the party's shock defeat ensures Belgium's survival, and therefore the stability of the EU.
Outside the EU, the issue of European autonomy is also in flux. In the late 1990s, the UK granted greater autonomy to Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Wales. The Scottish independence movement was halted by the failure of the 2014 referendum and the UK's departure from the EU two years later. The Scottish National Party has set up a Brussels office to maintain links with the EU, as has the European Friends of Scotland group, which was established in 2020. The Scottish Independence Conference plans to hold a conference in Edinburgh in October 2024, with more than a dozen European groups coordinating the independence movement, although the participation of separatist movements within EU countries may limit the scope of EU involvement.
Brexit has rekindled separatist sentiment across the UK, particularly in Northern Ireland, but also in Wales. In England, devolution has become increasingly debated in recent years, with regional parties such as Cumbria First, East Devon Alliance and Mevion Kernow pushing for autonomy for their regions. London has struggled to counter these movements since Brexit, but has been successful in preventing a resurgence of paramilitary activity in Northern Ireland since ending it in the 1990s.
The relative success of Western Europe in reducing armed conflict over the past few decades contrasts with its resurgence in Eastern Europe, where the region's fragile borders and the emergence of weak states after the collapse of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union have allowed separatist movements to flourish.
The EU and NATO played key roles in the breakup of Yugoslavia and the emergence of new states, often at the expense of Serbia. In response, ethnic Serb separatism has surged across Bosnia and Kosovo, with supporters citing EU and NATO support for separatist movements in the 1990s as justification for their actions.
Russia has also stoked separatism in parts of the former Yugoslavia and the former Soviet Union in order to counter EU and NATO enlargement or to incorporate those regions into the EU or NATO. Russia has supported Serbian interests in the Balkans as well as used, to varying degrees, separatist movements in Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan to advance its own interests.
Russia has long courted separatist movements in the West, inviting representatives to conferences such as the Russian Anti-Globalization Movement, many of which are made up of extremist groups. However, Russia itself has its own separatist and autonomous movements, including in Chechnya, Tatarstan and others. These have received support from the West, including through the launch of the Forum for Post-Russian Free States. Turkey also supports separatist movements in Russia, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently marked the 50th anniversary of Turkey's 1974 invasion of EU member Cyprus by supporting local Turkish separatists.
Most European separatist movements lack the foundations to become independent states without outside support, but continue to pursue independence nonetheless. Also, European countries with territories outside Europe, such as France with New Caledonia and Denmark with Greenland, must manage burgeoning separatist movements. Access to the EU may be influential in persuading these countries to remain, but external factors, such as Azerbaijan's recent support for New Caledonian independence, may play a larger role.
New concerns about governments may also emerge closer to home: Tensions between ethnic Russian minorities and governments in the Baltic states remain prominent and the situation remains uncertain amid the war in Ukraine. The rise of the Alternative for Germany party in East Germany has highlighted deep divisions in a country less than 40 years after unification, and the potential for new political groups to exploit those sentiments.
But the most pressing problem seems to be emerging in major Western European cities. Addressing concerns about what French authorities call a “parallel society” of Muslim immigrants and their descendants, French President Emmanuel Macron has introduced legislation in 2023 to cut off radical Islamic education, funding and propaganda networks, often from abroad. Macron labeled the phenomenon “separatism.” He was referring to marginalized communities in well-known suburban neighborhoods on the outskirts of France’s major cities that are increasingly falling outside the state’s control, fueled by domestic discontent and dissatisfaction with French foreign policy. While the situation in France seems most severe, such sentiments are common across Western Europe.
The EU's response to autonomy and separatist movements has frequently been criticized by nationalist governments, and balancing separatism and nationalism remains a delicate task. However, large countries such as Germany and smaller ones such as Denmark have shown that it is possible to address these issues within a national framework. Non-EU member Switzerland has similarly managed to maintain its unity. Clearly, despite nationalist policies, centuries-old communities are resilient and difficult to absorb or extinguish without external support. Dealing with these long-standing issues and new movements will require ongoing adaptation.
This article was produced by Economy for All, a project of the Independent Media Institute.
