The Catalunya Europa Foundation has presented the working paper "The Catalan Socialists in the configuration of democratic Spain, 1982-2010", written by the historian Jaume Muñoz Jofre. The event was attended by historians Borja de Riquer and Joan Fuster Sobrepere who reflected on this issue with the journalist Milagros Pérez-Oliva.

Muñoz's work is a first approach to the role of the Catalan Socialists in democratic Spain from the first elections won by the PSOE, in 1982, to the ruling of the Statute issued by the Constitutional Court, in 2010 The study is divided into three blocks, the state, the regional and the municipal, the latter, which became the great bastion of socialism that served, for years, as a test of public policies that would later be carried out in Catalonia and Spain.

Borja De Riquer considers that there has been little influence and presence of Catalan contemporary Spanish politics, the maximum figure was Narcis Serra, who became vice president of the government. De Riquer attributes this low presence to several reasons, depending on whether they are right-wing or left-wing parties. The right Catalan has been very reluctant to part of the Spanish government, both for its skepticism about the possibility of reforming Spain, because, basically, is a lack of project-level Spanish. Instead, the left has always been clear this project, but De Riquer wonders whether the PSC has a Spanish proposal from the Catalan socialism. For this historian, until the appearance of the figure of Pasqual Maragall the PSC did not have a concrete project for Spain.

Joan Fuster Sobrepere considers that the project that the PSC has tried to deploy during these years is a federalist project that wants to influence the dynamics of the state to modify it. The right Catalan, however, has tended not to want to engage in the Spanish project.

The ruling of the Statute marks the temporary end of this study. Muñoz Jofre considers that it is a key moment that affects the foundations of the PSC. The 3 historians agree that the text of the Statute was hardly acceptable in Madrid because it raises bilaterality and contains many nationalist adherences. In addition, they claim, the existing Constitution impedes federal development.

Read the working paper here.