The Economics of Catalan Separatism

This book analyses the economic consequences of the regional government of Catalonia’s challenge to democracy and the rule of law in Spain. This process, started in 2010, culminated in a coup d’état in the autumn of 2017. The book has three parts. First: The circumstances behind the challenge: economic structure, social and political aspects. Second: The economic impacts of the resulting huge political instability and social polarisation, and the downturn in GDP, investment, competitiveness, Barcelona’s appeal, and flight of companies and banks to Madrid. Third: Independence would mean collapse of trade with the rest of Spain and the EU, expulsion from the eurozone, fall of GDP, plummeting tax revenue, soaring unemployment and, finally, conversion of this hypothetical new Catalonia into a failed, vassal and totalitarian state.

Ferran Brunet is professor of applied economics at the Universitat Autònoma of Barcelona. His teaching and research are mainly on European economics, a subject on which he has written widely, having published numerous works and articles on European imbalances, economic governance, and competitiveness. In this book he analyses the economic consequences of the political instability caused by Catalan separatism.