Abstract
In recent years, two apparently contradictory but, in fact, complementary socio-political phenomena have reinforced each other in the European urban realm: the re-scaling of nation-states through “devolution” and the emergence of two opposed versions of “nationalism” (that is, ethnic, non-metropolitanised, state-centric, exclusive, and right-wing populist nationalism and civic, metropolitanized, stateless, inclusive and progressivist-emancipatory-social democratic nationalism). In light of these intertwined phenomena, this article shows how an ongoing, pervasive and uneven “metropolitanisation effect” is increasingly shaping city-regional political responses by overlapping metropolitan, city-regional, and national political scales and agendas. This effect is clear in three European cases driven by “civic nationalism” that are altering their referential nation-states’ uniformity through “devolution”. This article compares three metropolitan (and city-regional) cases in the United Kingdom and in Spain, namely, Glasgow (Scotland), Barcelona (Catalonia) and Bilbao (Basque Country), by benchmarking their policy implementation and the tensions produced in reference to their nation-states. Fieldwork was conducted from January 2015 to June 2017 through in-depth interviews with stakeholders in the three locations. Despite the so-called pluri-national and federal dilemmas, this article contributes to the examination of the side effects of “metropolitanisation” by considering three arguments based on geo-economics (“prosperous competitiveness”), geo-politics (“smart devolution”), and geo-democratics (“right to decide”). Finally, this article adds to the existing research on metropolitan and city-regional politics by demonstrating why “devolution” matters and why it must be considered seriously. The “metropolitanisation effect” is key to understanding and transforming the current configurations of nation-states, such as the United Kingdom and Spain (as we currently know them), beyond internal discord around pluri-nationality and quasi-federalism. This article concludes by suggesting the term “smart devolution” to promote more imaginative and entrepreneurial approaches to metropolitan and city-regional politics, policies, and experimental democracy within these nation-states. These approaches can identify and pursue “smart” avenues of timely, subtle and innovative political strategies for change in the ongoing re-scaling devolution processes occurring in the United Kingdom and in Spain and in the consequent changes in the prospects for the refoundational momentum in the EU.
Highlights
In recent years, two apparently contradictory but, complementary socio-political phenomena have reinforced each other in the European urban realm: the rescaling of nation-states through “devolution” and the emergence of two opposed versions of “nationalism”
From a broader historical perspective, Keating (2014b) argues for the re-scaling of nationstates as the politicisation of regional space through claims for devolution from their city-regions (Jonas and Moisio, 2016). This phenomenon coincides with strong historical identities, city-regional articulation engines, metropolitan hubs and national diversity, as in the cases this paper will present: Glasgow in Scotland, Barcelona in Catalonia, and Bilbao in the Basque Country
We present the hypothesis that the “right to decide” can be seen as a new version of a metropolitan-based “right to the city” beyond nation-states
Summary
Two apparently contradictory but, complementary socio-political phenomena have reinforced each other in the European urban realm: the rescaling of nation-states through “devolution” and the emergence of two opposed versions of “nationalism” (that is, ethnic, non-metropolitanised, state-centric, exclusive, and right-wing populist nationalism and civic, metropolitanized, stateless, inclusive and progressivistemancipatory-social democratic nationalism). We can observe in these three cases how the United Kingdom and Spain, as nation-states, are eroding their “particular” sovereignty by disempowering their endogenous capacity for democracy and implementing multi-level governance in the following ways: a) in post-Brexit Scotland, diminishing the “right to decide” to remain part of the EU or to be present in the negotiations (Financial Times, 2016); b) in Catalonia, prosecuting the president of the Catalan parliament for allowing debate on a potential referendum (Crameri, 2016); and c) in the Basque Country, permanently attacking the agreement in the concierto económico, the economic framework agreement with Spain, which includes the contemporary political and symbolic taxation devolution formulae used as the principal asset for Basque self-government (Bourne, 2008; Uriarte, 2015; Iṙ epoğlu Carreras, 2016).
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