Reading People Flow, the pamphlet written by Theo Veenkamp and others with the support of openDemocracy, I was intrigued by the proposal for a European narrative project. The aim of that project would, say the authors, be a process of enquiry and intellectual innovation, as well as generating concrete applications that will change European societies directly.
People Flow locates the project in Istanbul, which seems peculiarly appropriate. But there is an even better choice: Gibraltar. Does not that small enclave European doorway to Arab expansion in the 8th century; that rock, disputed between Spain and the United Kingdom since the 18th century; harbour of broken dreams for the thousands who embark today from all parts of Africa, heading across the narrow strait for the wealthy shores of Europe deserve at least local branch status in this new European narrative?
The writers of People Flow state that the new narrative demands an inclusive concept of Europe. It is a happy and inevitable consequence of the coming together of European nation-states that more and more people are sensing the need for freshly revisiting their histories. Those who want to advance the agenda of freedom and equilibrium have to make sense of the divisions and extreme nationalism of the past if they wish to advance the horizons of mutual understanding.
Most of the work done to revisit the birth and development of national identities is of course being done within the boundaries of a singular European language. But the idea of a palimpsest of European histories, as suggested by the authors of People Flow is all the more attractive, because it does not lead inexorably towards the promotion of that lethal concept a new European identity.
The invitation to Istanbul extends our views beyond these borders. But if you consider for one moment the ways in which Protestantism, Catholicism, Judaism and Islam have both united and divided the peoples of Europe and beyond, it is all the more remarkable that all of them coexist peacefully in Gibraltar.
Three centuries on the rock
The existence of Gibraltar as it is today is borne out of war. The claims and counterclaims still separating Spain and the United Kingdom are based on the Treaty of Utrecht, which put an end to the War of the Spanish Succession in 1713. Three centuries have passed, new wars and new treaties, times of alliance and times of animosity, but none have produced a conjuncture in which it was possible to solve the problem.
The reason is that at the heart of the Gibraltar question lie two bogus claims.
The first is the Spanish claim regarding Gibraltars sovereignty, which is based on historical legitimacy. The text of the Treaty of Utrecht states that the British crown could only dispense with Gibraltar by surrendering it to the Spanish crown. Today, the Spaniards urge that in this new era of the European Union and friendship between the two countries, it is time for Britain finally to renounce the spoils of war of the 1700s, and give back Gibraltar the sooner the better, though we can wait, if we have to to its rightful owners.
The second bogus claim is the one presented by the United Kingdom (and, it must be said, fully endorsed by the Gibraltarian electorate). According to this claim, the Gibraltar issue is not a question of history, but of democracy. The right to self-determination is claimed on behalf of the Gibraltarians, since it is inconceivable that in our democratic times the sovereignty of the territory could be decided without a final and absolute say by the colonys electorate.
The Gibraltar problem is thus created by the confrontation between two ideas, both of which could be severely tested by a new European narrative. On the one hand, states claim legitimacy via the history that they tell. Since the papers of 1713 say they must the Spanish state demands compliance. Gibraltar has to be Spanish.
Yet, on the other hand, there is no reason why Gibraltar should be Spanish. If todays world really was required to reverse the results of all conquest by war since 1713, what trouble we would be in! And if this claim of legitimacy is really to be upheld, many people might soon be asking why Gibraltar should not be devolved, or returned, to even earlier claimants the scattered Arabs of Tariq who actually possessed the rock for far longer than the Spanish or British crowns.
To the British and the Gibraltarian side, the claim of a democratic right of full self-determination for the Gibraltar electorate should not go unquestioned even if there is something arbitrary in the identity of that lucky thirty thousand, who are the product of innumerable restrictions imposed on the ancillary population serving the British military base on the Rock, and of further decrees that added to Gibraltarian citizenship when a limited form of civilian government developed in the colony in the second half of the 20th century. Nor does this fixed, exclusive claim offer any wider vision to a Europe seriously seeking answers to the kind of challenges raised by the People Flow debate.
Gibraltar between Europe and the world
Gibraltar is in need of a new narrative, and these are some of the chapters it could include:
- The granting of European citizenship to Moroccan workers and their families, who have worked in the territory since the Spanish government of Franco closed the borders in 1969, thereby preventing the inhabitants of the neighbouring town of La Linea de la Concepcion from commuting daily into Gibraltar for work.
- The granting of Spanish nationality to all Gibraltarians who wish to enjoy it.
- The creation of a Special European Zone in the area of Gibraltar Bay, embracing both Gibraltar town, and those Spanish towns built by the populations evacuated from Gibraltar at the time of the British conquest. This zone could incorporate the symbols that shaped its history Arab, British, Spanish and become a hub for communication between Europe and Africa as well as the Mediterranean sea.
- The establishment of multilateral institutions of government for the entire zone, taking into account its current rich diversity but also aiming (under European guidance) at equal rights to settlement and taxation for all citizens in the area.
The Gibraltar problem can be mind-boggling in its details. It involves, among other issues, Gibraltars decolonisation process at the UN, the viability of offshore financial centres and the not insignificant matter of military bases.
It may be that some of these issues could be better dealt with if and when Spain and Britain finally shift away from their respective tracks of historical legimitacy and selective democracy which have led to consistent failure in their attempts to negotiate a way out of their historical dispute.
History has left Gibraltar with inflated egos, a military base, offshore banks and tough barracks for the border guards. Is it time to build a branch of People Flow?
