Sovereignty/s: What do we want to prioritize?
Herribiltza has just published in ARGIA and Mediabask the answer he gives to the document “Euskal Herria Sovereignty: recovering our living conditions”, a document that Bizi published in 2018. According to Herribiltza, "the vital movement gives false meaning to the sovereign word." Based on the Euskera-French translation of Elhuyar and the French definition of the Petit Robert dictionary, Herribiltza believes that "the true meaning of Euskal Herria Burujabe is independent Euskal Herria, the sovereign Basque people".
According to this logic, would the concept of "food sovereignty" that Via Campesina has published since 1993 be reduced to "food independence"? The absurdity would be quite serious: "food sovereignty" is based on the recognition of the right to put in place with complete autonomy the resources to produce their own food for each population, state or state group, through agricultural policies that they consider most appropriate and without negative effects on the population of other countries. This notion of "food sovereignty" was manifested against the organization of cultural markets promoted by the World Trade Organization (WTO), an organization which, unfortunately, was implemented in plant by many "independent" states.
If we collectively define the project of food, energy, cultural sovereignty, etc., it would be regrettable not to create a political organization that could materialize that project.
In line with this definition of food sovereignty, Bizi wants to defend the main determinants of all the conditions of our lives, that is, everything we need today for housing, for heating, for feeding, for moving and even for building as people within a collective meaning human community. Today we want to build territories that can welcome and feed everyone and those who will follow. This recovery of the conditions of our lives is called sovereignty.
Would it be better for Bizi to put "his energy for institutional sovereignty" as invited by Herribiltza? Obviously, from many aspects of the reality we live in, the centralisation and concentration of powers in an external capital is certainly not the best solution to defend the conditions of our lives, to defend our sovereignty. But, frankly, there is no reason to think that the institutional sovereignty of smaller territories such as the Basque Country is a priori better. At 20 years we will be able to say that if we have spent our energy to achieve the independence of Euskal Herria, if this new state is a tax haven, if nobody speaks in Euskera, if its cultivation is unsustainable and still does not meet the needs of a quarter of the population, if it continues to depend on oil, if its culture is folklorized, for the tourist plaza that has driven its inhabitants from the interior of the cities, etc. ?
According to the Robert dictionary, this state would be sovereign. Not according to Bizi. But that, of course, does not mean that institutional sovereignty is inadequate for us. If we collectively define the project of food, energy, cultural sovereignty, etc., based on the liberation of false needs and environmental sustainability, it would be regrettable if there were no political institutions that could materialise such a project. For example, like the Chamber of Agriculture which bets on emancipation from a cultivation model incompatible with the economic and cultural reality of the North.
Bizi favors the ascending vertical logic: institutional demands must be based on the defense of the conditions of our lives
These views of Bizi on sovereignty are detailed in the article "Sovereignty and Sovereignty" published by the Telesforo Monzón Foundation in 2020. We also explained that in Europe the so-called "sovereign" movements, both those on the right and those on the left, have the same descending vertical logic, according to which political decisions – and, ultimately, the measures to be applied to the population – derive from their conception of institutional sovereignty. Bizi, on the contrary, prevails the ascending vertical logic: institutional demands must be based on the defense of the conditions of our lives.
Therefore, Bizi works for the abertzales and non-nationalists to define together a project of sustainable and just territory for the Basque Country. If the independentists want the social majority to come together behind their institutional project, they are very interested in helping it! The Bizi Group will present in 2023 Euskal Herria Independiente, to be held on 7 and 8 October in Baiona the updated version of the 2018 document with proposals to accelerate the ecological and social metamorphosis to move towards a sovereign, sustainable and solidarity Basque Country. We hope that this proposal will be enriched by the contributions of all those who share these objectives. In Baiona we see you soon!
Vital movement
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