Editorial

No. 58 — 2022
Coordinator: Lucila Mallart

The coordination and editing process of the contents included in IDEES magazine special issue Catalonia and the League of Nations, published on September 29, 2022, has been carried out by the researcher Lucila Mallart, together with the Center for Contemporary Studies’ team and the curator of the commemoration of the 100 years of the League of Nations International Conference on Communications and Traffic in Barcelona, Manuel Manonelles.
Josep Puig i Cadafalch i els orígens d’una diplomàcia de la Catalunya autònoma

Josep Puig i Cadafalch: home de govern amb vocació internacional La figura de Josep Puig i Cadafalch (Mataró 1867 – Barcelona 1952) s’assimila habitualment a la del destacat arquitecte, arqueòleg i historiador de l’art. Més enllà de la Casa Amatller, la Casa de les Punxes, la fàbrica Casaramona i tantes d’altres, Puig i Cadafalch fou també l’impulsor de l’expedició historicoarqueològica del 1907 als Pirineus que, entre d’altres, descobriria els frescos romànics de Taüll, així com de les excavacions a Empúries, o l’autor de L’Arquitectura Romànica a Catalunya que li donà un important reconeixement internacional. Però Puig i Cadafalch fou també…
No. 58 — 2022
Amadeu Hurtado: the Catalan Question at the Assembly of the League of Nations

On 10 August 1931, a decree issued by the president of the provisional government of the Spanish Second Republic, Niceto Alcalá-Zamora, appointed lawyer, journalist and parliamentarian Amadeu Hurtado i Miró (1875-1950) as Spanish delegate at the 12th Assembly of the League of Nations . With a long, successful legal career, he was also a lifelong Catalanist and republican, having begun political activity at the turn of the century and gained a seat at the Spanish Lower House as a member for Solidaritat Catalana. At the same time, Hurtado had made a name for himself as a journalist and press editor.…
No. 59 — 2022
Transgender women, journeys, intersections and gender-based violence

My name is Beyoncé and I’m a “chav” transgender woman. I started sex work in 2006 in the Villaverde industrial estate in Madrid. In 2001 I came to Madrid in search of a life free of the gender-based violence I had suffered from my father and some other family members, but it didn’t turn out like that. In this article I have highlighted the gender-based violence that destroys the lives of transgender women drawing from the specific story of my life and the work done in the framework of the European TransR-Trans Sex Workers Rights are Human Rights project .…
No. 59 — 2022
Towards an intersectional feminism in law

Even though some terminology similar to the concept of intersectionality has already been incorporated into Catalan and Spanish regulations, the concept itself is still not very well known and not often applied in feminism, especially in the field of public policy . In order to trace the emergence of intersectionality as one of the most significant contributions of feminism, it is necessary to understand the historical context that led to the “turn of feminist awareness”, in the leap from the second to the third feminist wave . In this context, as we will see below, the conceptual and political bases…
No. 59 — 2022
Prevention and comprehensive reparation of gender-based violence: a paradigm focused on the rights and needs of women, children and adolescents

The amendments introduced by Law 17/2020, dated 22 December, to Law 5/2008, dated 22 November, concerning the right of women to eradicate gender-based violence, have not only broadened the forms and areas acknowledged, but have also allowed us to develop a new paradigm of intervention. New perspectives of the analysis and understanding of gender-based violence have thus been incorporated, such as intersectionality, which refers to reciprocal constitution among categories that produce inequalities (such as origin, skin colour, phenotype, ethnicity, religion, administrative situation, age, social class, economic precariousness, functional or mental disability, addictions, HIV status, deprivation of liberty and sexual and…
No. 59 — 2022
Gender-based violence in women’s political lives and the public sphere

The United Nations defines violence against women in political life as “any act of gender-based violence, or threat thereof, that is likely to cause physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering and is directed against a woman in political life solely because she is a woman, or that affects women disproportionately” . It should be understood as a continuum that includes sexist comments and behaviour carried out with the intention or effect of humiliating or degrading, sexual harassment and aggression, psychological violence, physical violence, and symbolic violence (for example, the reification of women) . There are two key aspects that…
No. 59 — 2022
Consent: Sister, I believe you

The plaintiff had an intense feeling of isolation and unease, which stupefied her and made her adopt an attitude of submission and passivity, leading her to do what the defendants told her to do, keeping her eyes closed for most of the time. The defendants were aware of it and took advantage of the plaintiff’s situation in the small space to which they had taken her. Their intentions were to perform several acts of sexual nature with her with a libidinous intent, and they acted in common agreement among themselves.According to the magistrate point of view, everything happened without the…
No. 59 — 2022
Obstetric violence and violation of sexual and reproductive rights

Conceptualisation of sexual and reproductive rights Sexual and reproductive rights are a set of rights related to the sexual and reproductive dimensions, which are constantly evolving. Specifically, sexual rights are based on the recognition of women as sexual beings, and sexuality as a fundamental part of their personality and identity. Sexual and reproductive rights include the right of all people to enjoy a satisfying and pleasurable sex life, and the right to be able to express their desired and chosen sexual and gender identity. Reproductive rights refer instead to the reproductive self-determination of people and consider reproduction to be an…
No. 59 — 2022
Online gender-based violence: implications of tackling it within the framework of gender-based violence circuits

Our society has become a digital society. The Internet, social networks, mobile phones, Wi-Fi, computers and a whole range of information and communication technologies (ICT) are increasingly present, to the point where the distinction between the online and offline environment is losing meaning. Technology is increasingly becoming an intermediary element in study, work, and business with companies and administrations, communication and, above all, the way we relate to friends, family, colleagues, and our partners and/or other sex-affective relationships, especially in the case of young people. Social networks and ICT (relationship, information and communication technologies) have allowed women, LGTBIQ+ people, and…
No. 59 — 2022
Gender-based violence and public policies: building up feminist and intersectional responses

Gender-based violence shows an order of structural inequalities related to the gender system, but also to the intersections of this category with others, such as origin, skin colour, phenotype, ethnicity, religion, administrative situation, age, social class, financial vulnerability, functional or psychological diversity, addictions, HIV status, deprivation of liberty and sexual or gender diversity. Since feminisms have been breaking the silence that invisibilize and naturalize the violence against women, there has been a wide range of knowledge, legislation and social transformations in order to eradicate it. Along this path, public policies have focused fundamentally in providing responses to violence that takes…
No. 59 — 2022
Keys to understanding and dealing in a transformative way with gender-based violence in the educational sphere

Gender-based violence in educational centres: a structural problem There is nothing new about confirming that educational centres reflect social dynamism and that, although admitting it hurts us, there are cases of violence. If there is violence on the streets and at home, there is also at school, albeit sometimes very subtle. In this article, we share some tools to approach gender-based or patriarchal violence, which is both the cause and manifestation of gender- and sexuality-based inequalities . Far from being anecdotal and isolated acts, these inequalities are present in the daily routine of classrooms, passageways, playgrounds, sports fields, bathrooms, dressing…
No. 59 — 2022
Economic violence and judicial proactivity

The recognition of economic violence as a form of violence against women Spanish Law 5/2008, of 24 April, on the right of women to eliminate violence against women recognises economic violence in its Article 4.2. e) as a form of economic violence, defining it as the intentional and unjustified deprivation of resources for the physical or psychological well-being of a woman and, where appropriate, of her children, in the repeated and unjustified non-payment of child support ordered in the event of separation or divorce, in hindering the disposal of own or shared domestic and/or relationship resources, and in the illegitimate…
No. 59 — 2022
Sex, gender and other little words: some notions to help understand the biographies of women, adolescents and girls with transgender life experience

“Ain’t I A Woman?” Sojourner Truth, 1851 For some time now, a debate has been going on about the rights of women and girls with transgender life experience regarding their existence and legitimacy in the context of the negotiations for the approval of a comprehensive nationwide transgender law. The law that has been in force for over 14 years is Law 3/2007, which regulates the registry rectification of the mention of a person’s sex (at the time misnamed the Gender Identity Law). It regulates solely and exclusively the change of the mention of sex in official documents such as on…
No. 59 — 2022
Sexual violence against children and adolescents as situations of gender-based violence

The terms of social, symbolic, legal and political recognitions establish living conditions and their frameworks, which is why feminism calls for the permanent expansion of borders concerning the recognition of human rights. In this sense, as several authors have pointed out, the fight for the eradication of sexual, patriarchal and gender-based violence has become an epistemology for social change . In this article, I shall justify why it is important to articulate public policies that consider children and adolescents, along with women, as subjects of gender-based violence. Before delving into this reflection, I want to state the reasons that have…
No. 59 — 2022
Prevention and anti-sexist masculinities

When we talk about working and promoting attitudes that are part of egalitarian and inclusive anti-masculine masculinities, we are being structurally preventive, because we want to do the total opposite of what the patriarchy wants to impose. It has always been said that this system cannot be changed, that it is impossible. But we must challenge this patriarchal order, and we must do so by starting to develop attention skills and the ability to care for other people. To do this we need to cultivate the capacity for empathy because it is only that way that can we generate new…
No. 59 — 2022
The recognition of institutional violence: a new tool to demand women’s rights

The term institutional violence, coined by human rights organizations, has a great communicative power and aims to leave behind the paradigm of the individual offender in order to focus on administrations. It also aims to leave behind the model of formal recognition of rights to move onto one where these rights are effectively enforced. The inclusion of this new field of violence involves the recognition of a historical debt to women’s and feminist movements, a conceptual advancement and a tool of great transformative potential. First step: building a compliance and assessment framework based on the due diligence standard The inclusion…
No. 59 — 2022
Intersectionality: conceptualisation, implementation and challenges

Origins and outreach intersectionality The concept of intersectionality arises in the context of American black feminism (from authors such as Kimberlé Crenshaw (1989) (1989)— with the aim of grasping the situation of structural discrimination and inequality suffered by black women from a feminist and anti-racist perspective. The key point was to show that these two axes (gender and race) separately could not explain their situation of inequality, but rather it was necessary to see how they interlinked and shaped a particular oppressive experience. Today, the term has expanded and it is used to show how different axes of inequality (such…
No. 59 — 2022
Vicarious violence and second-order violence

Law 17/2020, of 22 December 2020, amending Law 5/2008 on the right of women to eradicate gender-based violence, has updated the conceptual framework by incorporating new forms of gender-based violence, among which are vicarious violence and second-order violence. In both cases, reference is made to the violence perpetrated against the woman’s environment: children, family, friends or professional network, as a way to continue causing her harm and suffering, punishing her network of support and isolating her. The visibility of these two forms of violence were a demand of the feminist movements and their regulatory acknowledgement must strengthen the protection of…
No. 59 — 2022
Feminicides and gender-based aggressions

Feminicide has been defined by Law 17/2020 as “gender-based murders and homicides of women, inductions to suicide and suicides as a result of pressure and violence exerted against women”. The Catalan legislation includes therefore a concept that has been widely developed from theory, feminist activism, comparative legislation and international law. In particular, the concept of ‘feminicidi’ has been one of the translations of the English expression femicide, which was used for the first time as a denouncement of the misogynist murders of women by the sociologist Diana Russell in the Court against Crimes against Women, held in Brussels in 1976…
No. 58 — 2022
Preface: Catalonia and the League of Nations

The historical, political, social and international context that marked the creation of the League of Nations in 1919-1920, after the end of the First World War, and the international treaties that ensued, coincided with a particularly intense period in the history of Catalonia. Catalonia, like so many other parts of the world, was in a state of effervescence, in part due to the new global context that was just taking its first steps, but also because of domestic dynamics, both within Catalonia and linked to the (always complex) relationship between Barcelona and Madrid. A significant proportion of Catalan society had…
No. 58 — 2022
Josep Puig i Cadafalch and the origins of a diplomacy for autonomous Catalonia

Josep Puig i Cadafalch: a statesman with international aspirations Josep Puig i Cadafalch (Mataró 1867 – Barcelona 1956) is more often remembered for his distinguished career as an architect, archaeologist and art historian. As well as being the architect who designed Casa Amatller, Casa de les Punxes, the Casaramona factory and so many others, Puig i Cadafalch also sponsored the historical-archaeological expedition to the Pyrenees in 1907 that, among other things, discovered the Romanesque frescoes of Taüll, and the excavations in Empúries, and wrote L’Arquitectura Romànica a Catalunya (Romanesque Architecture in Catalonia), which brought him international recognition. However, Puig i…
No. 58 — 2022
An International Narrative for the Mancomunitat?

In the early spring of 1921, Josep Puig i Cadafalch placed the Mancomunitat de Catalunya (Commonwealth of Catalonia, comprising the four provincial councils), of which he was president, at the disposal of the delegates who had come to Barcelona to take part in the International Conference on Communications and Transit, the first intergovernmental conference organised by the League of Nations, formed just over a year earlier. Over a period of one and a half months, from 10 March to 20 April, a large part of this Conference’s sessions were held at the Palau de la Mancomunitat, the former Palau de…
No. 58 — 2022
Lluís Nicolau d’Olwer at the League of Nations

This year marks a century since the formation of Acció Catalana by young activists who split from the Lliga Regionalista. One of the key proponents of this split was Lluís Nicolau d’Olwer. Rather than a vocational politician, he was a scholar and humanist who went into politics, as a moral imperative, as he always said. With Acció Catalana, he began an important political career that led him to take part in the Pact of San Sebastián in 1930 and the Revolutionary Committee that was formed after that meeting. When Primo de Rivera took power in 1923, Nicolau d’Olwer went into…
No. 58 — 2022
Wilsonianism in Catalonia and the Catalanist Attempts to take part in the Paris Peace Conference

The attempts to internationalise Catalan aspirations for self-government. Union des Nationalités and the Catalan volunteers in the First World War Before the outbreak of the Great War, certain sectors within Catalan nationalism began the process to internationalise their aspirations for self-government. In 1912, the architect and Lliga Regionalista leader Josep Puig i Cadafalch, who would later become the second president of the Mancomunitat, represented the Catalanists at the Union des Nationalités (UdN). This organisation acted as an information, publicity and propaganda centre and as a lobby for those who identified themselves as oppressed nationalities, particularly European nationalities, fostering a current…
No. 58 — 2022
J.M. Batista i Roca: a Pro-independence Intellectual during the Interwar Period (1914-1945)

Josep Maria Batista i Roca (1895-1978) was the first intellectual, academic, university professor and public figure who was a lifelong proponent of Catalan independence, proclaimed it publicly and acted accordingly . His political action was based on strengthening Catalonia and its national spirit and awareness, nurturing character and preparing the leaders of tomorrow, inspired by the British model. Batista i Roca was one of the few intellectuals who truly sought to establish a position for Catalonia in the world – Catalan geopolitics. He would do this on five levels: pan-Catalanist, pan-Occitan, Iberian, European and, lastly, Hispanic. We will briefly outline…
No. 58 — 2022
Catalanism, the League of Nations and the National Minorities

The European national minorities after 1919 Initially, the League of Nations was hampered by three shortcomings: the defection of the United States, the exclusion of Germany and the absence of Russia. France demanded infeasible war reparations from Germany, the runaway inflation destabilised the fragile Weimar Republic, the French occupied the Ruhr between 1923 and 1925, and Austria was denied the right to unite with Germany after losing Hungary and the Slavic possessions of the defunct Austro-Hungarian Empire. However, the League of Nations created organisations that have endured, such as the International Labour Organisation, and successfully mediated in conflicts such as…
No. 58 — 2022
Francesc Maspons i Anglasell and the League of Nations

One of the constants of Francesc Maspons i Anglasell’s life (1872-1966) would be his Europeanism and his deep knowledge of international law. Born on 22 July 1872 in the Barcelona neighbourhood of El Raval, at no. 17, Carrer d’en Xuclà, his parents were Francesc Maspons i Labrós and Pilar Anglasell i Buxeres, two families that had been part of the Catalan Renaixença movement in its early days. With strong roots in the town of Bigues (Vallès Oriental) since the 12th century, the lineage had produced a large number of lawyers and notaries. Advocating a romantic, eminently rural Catalanism in which…
No. 58 — 2022
Diplomatic opportunities in turbulent times (1931-1939)

When studying diplomatic relations and interactions between political players of varying levels and status, there is one axiomatic premise that must be accepted: the parameters of realpolitik do not always align with legal and theoretical principles. It is very common for political movements, armed groups, political parties or territorial entities without any state recognition to establish contacts and dynamics that are characteristic of internationally recognised administrations. In this respect, the 1930s are paradigmatic of this break with legally established procedures on an international scale, especially after Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in January 1933, but there were also other cases.…
No. 50 — 2020
Political and media polarization: consequences of the lack of pluralism in the media system

In September 2020, the European Commission published the First Report on the Rule of Law of its 27 memberships of the European Union. The independence of the judiciary, corruption, and media pluralism –with an emphasis on the fundamental rights to freedom of information and expression– are the axes of this examination of the democratic quality of the States. In the case of Spain, shadows appear in these areas. To address the issue of news pluralism, the European Commission report takes into account the Media Pluralism Monitor (MPM) produced by the Center for Media Pluralism and Freedom (CMPF) of the European…