Independence protests are on the rise across Europe, as Spain, the UK, and other states have faced severe secessionist challenges. The largest wave of these protests swept Catalonia and reached its peak in 2017 when the push for a binding referendum led to an unprecedented secessionist crisis. Organizing for Independence explores the question of how the referendum crisis as a threat and opportunity transformed secessionist protest and its organizational basis. Combining protest event data, qualitative interviews, and network analyses, Hans Jonas Gunzelmann shows how organizational change took place inside, outside, and between formal organizations, and was driven by activists’ symbolic constructions of transformative events. The book goes beyond simplistic accounts of secessionist protest by providing a dynamic perspective on strategic interactions between protesters and their opponents and allies. These insights are particularly timely as independence movements all over the world look with great interest at what happened in Catalonia.

Hans Jonas Gunzelmann is a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Civil Society Research at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. He most recently published “Counter-surveillant Organizing during the Secessionist Cycle of Contention in Catalonia” in Social Movement Studies.

List of Figures and Tables

List of Abbreviations

Acknowledgements

1 Introduction

2 Conceptual and Theoretical Framework

3 The Catalan Secessionist Protest Cycle: Intensity, Action Repertoires, and Organizational Structures

4 Crisis Organizing: From Normal Times to Intense Times

5 Organizing Eventful Protest: Defending the Referendum

6 The Day that Lasted Years: Making Sense of the Referendum

7 Organizing Under Pressure: Dealing with Repression

8 Conclusion: The Transformative Power of Secessionist Crises

Appendix

References

Index