After the sudden changes it took during the Process, the PSC learned the hard way that on the identity issue, there were no half measures left and that, if it did not frontally oppose sovereignty, a large mass of Spanish voters would desert to less dubious options—in this case, Ciutadans. Indeed, Rivera and Arrimadas's party harshly punished the PSC's electoral strongholds, and Miquel Iceta, under pressure from the PSOE, decided that it was necessary to take a clear stand, assuming the cost of abandoning the famous Catalan soul of the party. Time has proved him right, because the Trial ended like a dream, as did Rajoy's PP, and the Socialists had a free hand to manage this long hangover we're stuck in. I know that the PSOE supported Article 155, and the repression, and that the agreements with the separatists have been marked by arithmetic necessity; but it cannot be denied that Catalan socialism has been very skillful in presenting itself as the party of judgment and order, the party that would make us turn the page. The PSC's electoral space is broad and stable because it is conceived as a double wall, a reversible wall: it serves both to confront sovereignty aspirations and to curb the PP's revanchism. Salvador Illa's polite and parsimonious profile—which should not be confused with any ideological lukewarmness—has proven to be a balm for all those who grew tired of the identity-based stress of the last ten years.
The problem, of course, is that Catalonia is what it is and not what we would like it to be. This is a lesson that all politicians, including Salvador Illa, must learn. Puigdemont and Junqueras had to accept that their proposal (building a state without the coercive tools inherent to a state) required negotiation or open conflict with Spain, which in turn depended on having an uncontested social majority behind them. Was there a majority to call a referendum? Undoubtedly. But all the levers of real power were in the hands of the adversary, who didn't budge an inch, leaving the Catalan leaders with no room for maneuver and, above all, no reasonable Plan B.
Salvador Illa has in mind a project in which Catalan national identity must be integrated and softened into a united and more or less plural state. A legitimate option, but alas: it turns out that Spain is also what it is, and not how we would like it to be. Right now, it's not Catalonia that is moving away from the common home; it's the common home, fueled by the Holy Alliance of the political, economic, and media right, that is sailing straight into the storm, leaving the majority of Catalans behind, with Feijóo ready to take the helm and the far right ready to take Feijóo. Since the outbreak of the Cerdán case, with the PSOE in a state of shock and the left in decline, the Spanish political atmosphere has been stifling, bar-like, and psychic. And the polls seem overwhelming.
I wouldn't want to underestimate Pedro Sánchez's resilience, so often proven. But the PSC is surely already exploring all possible scenarios for the immediate future. The most optimistic will think that, should the PP win in Spain, the party will be able to reclaim the anti-independence wall, entrench itself on the other side, and make the Socialist Generalitat the great brake on the Spanish right. The tactic that never fails, that of the lesser evil (it's a great invention, the PSC). But if there is a hostile government in Madrid—and in Aragon, and in Valencia, and in Andalusia...—there will be a backlash in Catalonia, and Illa will run the risk of being caught between two fires, as in the years of the Process, but now occupying the presidency of the country; a position in which no one can stand aside. Or perhaps they can.
