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Opinion
1 December 2014 2.00 h

from the editor

marcela topor

A year of politics and corruption

Look­ing back through the archives, you re­alise that 2014 was not just any year. Firstly, major his­toric events took place. Eu­rope saw the rise of na­tional self-de­ter­mi­na­tion move­ments in Scot­land and Cat­alo­nia. Sadly, the Span­ish gov­ern­ment has not been as amenable to ne­go­ti­a­tion as that of the UK. Scot­land cel­e­brated its ref­er­en­dum on in­de­pen­dence, while Cat­alo­nia still waits for the same right to de­cide. This has done lit­tle to re­duce ten­sions with Madrid, and a head-on col­li­sion could well be com­ing sooner rather than later.

On an­other level, the po­lit­i­cal agenda was marked by cor­rup­tion al­le­ga­tions. One of the most se­ri­ous af­fects the much-re­spected fig­ure of Jordi Pujol, for­mer pres­i­dent and fa­ther of Cata­lan na­tion­al­ism. Yet, the rip­ples of cor­rup­tion have spread much fur­ther than Cat­alo­nia, im­mers­ing Spain's main par­ties, PP and PSOE. Thus, there is a se­ri­ous cri­sis of trust to­wards the sys­tem, as can be seen from the birth of the anti-sys­tem party, Podemos.

Our an­nual re­view of­fers a se­lec­tion of high­lights from 2014. We hope you enjoy it and wish you the best for 2015. Happy Christ­mas and Happy New Year!

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Marcela Topor
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