Marc Pradel presents the book "Catalonia, the network of cities, the municipalism of Pasqual Maragall and its influence on the governance of Catalonia" at Casa Golferichs.
The urban sociologist Marc Pradel presented the book yesterday along with UAB political science professor and director of IERM, Ricard Gomà, and urban geographer Oriol Nel·lo. This book, published a year ago, is the search resulting from the first aid (2014-2015) granted by the Pasqual Maragal Legacy program.
It was the first act presented by Ernest Maragall as executive president of the Fundació Catalunya Europa. Maragall begins the event by recalling the purpose of the project "Legacy Pasqual Maragall": a program of research and reflection on the action and political thinking of Pasqual Maragal with the aim of promoting, through this line of reflection and analysis, new ideas and useful proposals for the future of the country.
Before a full house, in a meeting that gathered friends, family members, political representatives and civil society, Oriol Nel·lo, Ricard Gomà and Marc Pradel explained how the search for Pradel analyzes the thinking and action of Pasqual Maragall, relating Maragall's contribution to the transformation of the city of Barcelona, ??with the momentum that Catalan municipalism experienced during his tenure as mayor (1982-1997) and as President of the Generalitat between 2003 and 2006. Followed by Ernest Maragall, he initiated the act the well-known geographer Oriol Nel·lo who expressed his satisfaction in contributing to the Maragallist thought, as well as seeing that the work of the FCE in relation to the Legacy of Pasqual Maragall accumulates more and more fruits and solidity. He made reference to three obstacles that Marc Pradel successfully faces in his search. The first is the concept of municipalism. In order to explain it, he quoted Gabriel Alomà "the progression is not a region, a city, a nation, but quite the opposite: that other one that is a region, a city". The second is the complexity of the political thought of Pasqual Maragall, "which is, that same, complex and not paradoxical" nuanced. With a lot of lucidity and savoir faire. Nel·lo defined Maragall as "a socialist who calls himself a liberal, a liberal who demands state intervention, a Catalanist who wants to transform Spain and a pro-European who claims the virtues of subsidiarity." Finally he ended his speech explaining how the practical municipalism of Pasqual Maragall was two things: subsidiary and metropolitan.
Next, Ricard Gomà referred to the writing style of Pradel's book. He praised that it was a book not only for academics but with a didactic and clarifying vocabulary made by citizens and therefore with the will to encourage citizen debate. He also referred to "Legacy Pasqual Maragall", which he explained "can be read as a transforming project in Barcelona but also as the creation of an ideology that goes much further." Historically, we can say that we have a distinctive municipal feature with respect to other communities of Spain of the world and this, it is thanks Pasqual Maragall ".
Next, Marc Pradel explained that he wanted to investigate if, after the multiple political actions of Pasqual Maragall, there was a project and a consistent political theory, since Maragall was an action figure who left no written record of the trajectory of the thought that followed to bring his political actions, especially during the Tripartite period. On the other hand, the sociologist intends to analyze if this municipalism, this commitment to urban planning in a network, was maintained today and what form it has adopted if this was the case.
Pradel also exposed the limitations he found when undertaking his search: The first comes from the particularity of the character. The analyzes on Pasqual Maragall, explained Pradel, have focused mainly on his figure, his personality and his particular style of understanding and doing politics. This type of analysis reviews the electoral results and the political action of Maragall as the result of his personality. Initially, this interpretation hindered the more objective analysis of the vision of the political project and the set of ideas of Maragall. The second difficulty that Pradel exposed is the success of the Olympic Games, which leave the rest of his political action in the background, which makes it difficult to analyze Maragall's thinking as a whole, with great coherence throughout his career politics. Despite the limitations, Pradel agreed to publish a solid and didactic book on the municipalism and political vision of Pasqual Maragall during his political life, through a personal reading that prompted a constructive debate at the end of the act.
The act was mediated by Jaume V. Aroca, a journalist from La Vanguardia. It ended with a series of questions and reflections that led to a final conclusion: more Europe. More presence of this union of states to the hasty cosmopolitans is compatible with the vision of the national-municipalist that the speakers defined yesterday and how Pasqual Maragall so aptly initiated. It is necessary to emphasize the importance of implementing proximity policies from Europe to find the balance and strength of good governance in today's globalized world.
