Contenu du sommaire : Les partis régionalistes et nationalistes

L'Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya is both the oldest and least well known Catalan nationalist party. Although it was the dominant party throughout the Second Spanish Republic, since the transition to democracy it has experienced a chaotic period blocked in on its left by the Catalan socialist party and on the right by Convergencia i unio. Nevertheless, after serious ideological and strategic revision, since 1999 this left leaning nationalist party has consistently increased its support to such a degree that it played the role of kingmaker after the 2003 "regional" elections. Inspired both by a straigtforward and classical form of Catalanism and the socio- democrat tradition, today the ERC is an unavoidable force within the Catalan political space.

This article seeks to understand how the Galician nationalist movement (BNG) succeeded in overcoming its political marginality after the Spanish transition to democracy and today disputes with the Socialist party the second position in the Galician party system. Beyond the historical preconditions and the political opportunities of the creation of the autonomous communities in Spain, the authors stress the organisational and strategic capacities of nationalist actors. The ongoing fédéralisation of Spain provides an open political opportunity structure, but other factors need to be taken into account, such as organisation, charismatic leadership and the repertoire of mobilisation, especially the moderation of nationalist demands. The article analysis specifically: (i) the successful strategy of ideological moderation and reframing during the 1990s and (ii) the progressive electoral coordination of most pre-existing nationalist parties around the BNG.

The situation of Basque nationalists is the direct result of the political and institutional spaces within which they operate. For this reason, historical differences between the two processus of nation building have engendered diverging methods of expression. Indeed, in Spain, Basque nationalism has had considerable room for manœuvre whilst its counterpart in France has remained enclosed within very localized political configurations. Since the 1980s, the emergence of transnational nationalist parties should not be over-emphasized. National contexts remain a stronger influence over infra-national or even extra-national mobilisations, even if the perspective of the European Union continues to nourish the hopes of many actors.

Thanks to an analysis of the members of the pro-independence groups in the Catabnian and Cor- sican assemblies (1999-2003 and 1999-2004 mandates), one can observe an iron law of the "colonial" reproduction of the dominant selection logic of political personnel, even if these groups represented sociations which were different with many regards. The superior studies, than the professional paths of these "radical" representatives constitute indeed trajectories that are frequently closed to the ones of the other groups. However, on the one side, these representatives are also in general younger than the others. And, on the other side, in selection systems dominated in Catalonia by lawyers and in Corsica by medical professions, these representatives appear, confi- gurationally indeed, as dominants (detaining resources legitimately converted within the representative space), but as dominants who are "parallel" to notables, which limits the de-differentiation hypothesis and contributes to the specificity of these parties.

The Partit occitan is a recent political group (1987) expressing an old demand especially on the cultural field. How to study this political group considering the typologies placed at the political observers disposal ? Do we have to study it as an autonomist party or as a "small party" ? Both analytical grids are useful to perceive this group in search of being acknowledged in the local as well as the transnational political system. Considering a more than century-old history, the Рос is the most effective attempt of a political Occitanism. It represents the fighting but marginal demand of an area.

Like other ethno-religious movements within France, the ideology of Corsican nationalism began at a time of growing economic and administrative homogenisation at the level of the nation state. However, the emergence in 1976 of identity-based political violence organized by a politco-military entity (the FLNC) has transformed the nature of this conflict from that of its ethno-cultural origins to a conflict between the state and part of its periphery. Underground action has become the cornerstone around which both moderate and radical political organisations have had to position themselves. In 1998, the assassination of the regional Prefect, Claude Erignac, has also deeply destabilized all the local political "games" linked to the party system. The ambition of this article is to explain these organisational or political changes that have been caused either directly or indirectly by a form of terrorist violence which goes to the heart of the sub-system of nationalist and regionalist political representation.

Brittany is a good example to understand the distortion between the existence of an identi- tary potential and the weak influence of ethno-regionalist parties. In this region, regionalist forces have never succeeded to obtain significant political results. In this way, the "Union démocratique bretonne" (UDB) appeared as an exception because this party structured a left regionalist movement until the mid of the 1960s. Even if its electoral impact remain weak, the UDB has implemented since ten years an ideological. By renewing its traditional alliances, the UDB tries actually to increase its political representation in the regional society.

Over the last few decades in Europe, the birth and growth of new nationalist parties has led to the transformation of this family of parties. In Italy, the success of the Lega Nord shows particularly strongly the original mixture of a quest for identity and themes that come from Europe 's new right. In the space of a few years, the Lega Nord has gone from being a marginal organization to becoming an unavoidable actor within the contemporary Italian party system. Recent developements have been marked by the need to manage deep contradictions between a movement that defined itself against « the system » to one that has ended up participating in the government headed by Silvio Berluconi. In this way, the institutionalisation of nationalism from the North of Italy seems to exemplify one of the paths of change taking place within the new right in Europe.

Regionalist mobilisations in Italy are quite well known in the northern part while they are almost completly neglected in the Mezzogiorno. Sardinia is a southern region in which an autonomist party (the Sardinian Party of Action) has existed since 1921. This article describes its historical genesis and its main political features (electoral performance, participation to regional government) and explains its political dynamics during the Postwar period

Over a period of three decades, this article examines the nature, the change and the consequences of anti-party attitudes amongst Spanish, Portugese, Italian and Greek citizens. Its authors treat the question of political disengagement from a perspective that is intended to be more measured and subtle than those used by many recent publications on this theme in political science. Using statistics, they identify two distinct types of anti-party sentiment: reactive antipartyism awhich is a temporary phenomenom and a cultural antipartyism that is more long term. On the basis of this typology, and through opposing the idea that there is an all-encompassing crisis of political parties in Western democracies, the authors demonstrate the relativity of the linkages between antiparty sentiment, the rise of anti-system reactions, opposition to democracy and the modalities of alternative forms of political involvement.

Since the 1980s, cross-frontier cooperation agreements in Europe have been multiplying. In this article, we argue that the regional modifications brought about by cross-frontier cooperation not only affect political administrative structures but also favour changes in notions of identity amongst local inhabitants. Frontier areas serve as "laboratories" enabling the study of these changes in a specific space and time frame. Our study is based on research carried out between 2000 and 2003 in Hendaye (France), Irun and Fontarabia (Spain). These three towns, separated by the river Bidasoa which here forms the Franco-Spanish frontier in the Basque Country, and located around the bay of Txingudi, are linked since 1998 by a cross-frontier agreement initiated by their respective municipalities called the Consorcio Bidasoa-Txingudi. In spite of the Consorcio s discourse however, this rapprochement has not yet had a significant impact on traditional identifications amongst the local population. At present, a mere European gloss has emerged, which camouflages more complex notions of identity linked to the particular political and cultural character the Basque as well as localist attachments.