- Our species has several particularities. Language and culture have often been mentioned and it is understandable, because languages and cultures make us human. As anthropologist Clifford Geertz said, no human being without culture is possible. However, we often forget another of our hallmarks: the need for care.
Since our ancestors rose up, childbirth became difficult, children are born before the pups of the rest of mammals. As a result, in the first few months we have total dependency, and for many years, adult support is essential to move forward. This peculiar character has caused great changes in our species. The depth of the feeling of love, among other things, is due to it.
However, the need for care does not end with childhood, even in old age, in most cases our dependence becomes absolute again. In recent years this situation has become evident in our societies envejecidas.De one way or another, less or more, we need the help of others in all times of our lives, we are a social species and as we are social, we get well thanks to mutual care and working together.
The need for care does not end with childhood, even in old age, in most cases our dependence becomes total again
As history progresses, we have occupied the entire planet and coexistence and survival have become complicated. We have had to invent technical, social, cultural, political, legal tricks to deal with our way of life. In recent decades, moreover, we have gone through two chilling milestones like the Rubicon: the first, the threat of the World Atomic War; the second, the climate crisis. The survival of our species is at risk, and the risk is ours. We are aware of this for the first time. We are immersed in the Planetary Age and the Anthropocene, the models we have used and created so far have fallen short and we need new instruments.
State-Nation
After the transport revolution, when man came to every corner of the planet, all the peoples of the earth got in touch. Unfortunately, in most cases this meeting was traumatic, as Europeans were the main protagonists of it. With the scourge of Eurocentrism, we open our model to every corner, disregarding and replacing all pre-existing social organisations. With the war Europe brought capitalism, but also the State model.
The first steps of the Planetary Age were addressed under the impulse of imperialism. Subsequently, Europe had a process of change and the concept of nation-state emerged. The new model was dark and clear. He claimed the sovereignty of the people, he claimed the legal equality of all his fellow citizens, he wanted to take charge of the custody of his fellow citizens, but in passing, he wanted to impose compulsory homogenisation and resisted the enemy.
The nation-state wanted to take over all the responsibilities. Logically, many of the competencies that the Church had assumed were assumed by the secular State.
The nation-state wanted to take over all the responsibilities. Logically, many of the competencies that the Church had assumed were assumed by the secular State. Indeed, the Church had advanced the State in some respects. Control of births, weddings, celebrations and care, among others. The Church immersed itself in civil society networks to control the lives of its inhabitants, who wanted to dominate the social networks of indigenous peoples and peasants. The church was replaced by the state. On the one hand, trying to “democratize” all these spaces, but at the same time, in the same way as the Church did, destroying the autonomous social networks and the world of minority and indigenous peoples and cultures.
When, at all stages of life, any one of us needs help, it turns to the closest networks, to the relatives, to the neighbors. We only turn to strangers when these nearby networks have no response capacity. Therefore, public surveillance, protection and support services are often channelled from local authorities. The risk of dependence may increase when external agents from these nearby networks or from the nearest public services are introduced.
Funds (exchanges)
In all indigenous and peasant cultures, the families distinguish three pillars: 1. Basic for survival; 2. Emergency; and 3. For celebrations. Families (understood in the broad sense) want to maintain control over the three funds, while the authorities try to intervene in the three. As has been said before, in our geopolitical context the Catholic Church was the one that introduced the hand: privatizing the lands to be renters; soliciting power in emergency situations and trying to ensure that most celebrations were held with the consent of the Church. States also behaved similarly, privatizing communal lands, establishing compulsory taxes and regulating secular parties (14 juillets, for example).
However, there has been another major change in recent years. As is well known, the State Nations act in our environment as transnationals and slaves of the “market”. As a result, it is now the “Market” that wants to put its hand in the three funds. In the private fund dominating the labor market, violating the right to housing, turning us into a product that is on sale; in the emergency fund, extending mortgage loans for life and privatizing retirement plans; and in the fund for celebrations, so that we spend little of our money on big business surfaces and on constant internet purchases, turning leisure into a business.
The State-Nation model is in a critical situation.
For the aforementioned reasons and many other variables, the State-Nation model is in a critical situation. The main blocks that extend to the entire planet will condition the future of the earth and our species: Russia; China; US. Europe is in danger of falling into one of these blocs, without being able to free itself from the dependence that our lifestyle generates in the energy sector and in food, among others.
In this Europe that has lost prominence in its historic evolution, in a corner, we are the Basques. At the historic moment when the Nation of the State emerged, we were denied this trajectory and now, faced with the urgent need of the political, legal, economic and sociocultural instruments that these states had, this model does not serve.
However, I believe there are data that allow us to be optimistic. We have the tools to respond to an unsustainable model that has spread all over the world. I am sure that the French and Spanish states will respond much worse. A disturbing witness, the far-right one that has been strengthened in these two States. The model of these nation-states based on homogenisation has failed, and they are already suffering its consequences.
Refuge
We citizens and small peoples need a refuge from the storm that has come upon us.
In our case, the French and Spanish states did not respect us; they have never supported us, neither in history, nor now before the hegemonic blocs, nor before the claws of the Market Dictatorship. Those states have failed us and we have to flee their cells.
We need less state and more civil society, but we also need less private and more public ownership. We have to recover the entertainment that we've been stolen from.
We have to start sewing the social networks that have shattered, starting with the closest areas. We need a republic to our measure and to our service. A place where the future is viable.
Our Republic is going to need new features, because it cannot be built like the nineteenth century State Nations, because the world and ourselves have changed radically.
We need less state and more civil society, but we also need less private and more public ownership. We have to regain the leisure they have stolen from us, recover what they have given to the market, maintain control of our lives and replace savage competition with collaboration.
We have to build a refuge so that the Basque people who have never wanted to be a living and habitual language; so that the Basques of all origins have the same rights; so that they leave NATO; so that all the new ghosts that will liberate the Hegemonic Blocs will be stalled; so as to guarantee democracy; so as to preserve the environment and protect human beings. We need a Basque Republic to take care of ourselves.