Referendum Cycles: Organizing Discontent Outside the Nation-States

In the shadow of the Great Recession, territorial tensions have become more acute in Scotland and Catalonia over the last years. In fact, while more tan two millions Catalans marched in various occasions and claimed for for having a referendum on independence, nearly half of the Scots voted for seceding in a binding referendum. Two strong movements were born, amidst continuous tensions at the EU level (and uncertain prospects), beyond the control of traditional intermediary institutions of representation. Both merged claims for redistribution, against austerity, dignity and social protection and self-determiantion, as well as democracy, and emancipation. Particularly, based on interviews and archival material, this paper will seek to analyze these movements’ emergence and developments vis a vis their relationship with broader anti-austerity and for real democracy fights. Also, the paper will focus on the organizational domain. Whilst the Catalan process was more bottom-up driven thanks to the emergence of the ANC, an hybrid organization that acted as an interface, we argue, the Scottish case was more a top-down process, but still managed to penetrate broad layers of society thanks to strategic coalitions.