Autonomía estratégica y soberanía europea

422 pEntre los años 2013 y 2016, el concepto de autonomía estratégica comenzó a emplearse en la Unión Europea (UE) en ámbitos muy específicos, como los de seguridad y defensa. En apenas una década el contenido de este concepto se enriqueció y su uso se extendió a sectores como los de la salud y las energías, las cadenas de valor y suministros estratégicos. En la actualidad, la autonomía estratégica se proyecta en casi todas las áreas políticas de la Unión. Defender los intereses de la UE en un entorno geopolítico hostil y mitigar la dependencia respecto a cadenas de suministro extracomunitarias, son citados como ejemplos de una autonomía estratégica que ha pasado de ser un concepto a ser una capacidad. Esta imperiosa necesidad de actuar ante distintos retos comunes de la Unión ha contribuido a hablar incluso de soberanía europea. Esta obra colectiva es una de las primeras obras monográficas publicadas hasta la fecha sobre esta materia. Desde diferentes enfoques y disciplinas, se ofrece, por una parte, una interesante panorámica de los conceptos de autonomía estratégica y de soberanía europea. Esas discusiones marco son completadas, de otra parte, con trabajos que abordan las proyecciones de la autonomía estratégica en relevantes áreas políticas de la Unión Europea, como es caso del control de fronteras, la seguridad y defensa o la salud

Metropolitan and city-regional politics in the urban age: why does “(smart) devolution” matter?

In recent years, two apparently contradictory but, in fact, complementary socio-political phenomena have reinforced each other in the European urban realm: the rescaling of nation-states through “devolution” and the emergence of two opposed versions of “nationalism” (that is, ethnic, non-metropolitanised, state-centric, exclusive, and right-wing populist nationalism and civic, metropolitanized, stateless, inclusive and progressivistemancipatory-social democratic nationalism). In light of these intertwined phenomena, this article shows how an ongoing, pervasive and uneven “metropolitanisation effect” is increasingly shaping city-regional political responses by overlapping metropolitan, cityregional, and national political scales and agendas. This effect is clear in three European cases driven by “civic nationalism” that are altering their referential nation-states’ uniformity through “devolution”. This article compares three metropolitan (and city-regional) cases in the United Kingdom and in Spain, namely, Glasgow (Scotland), Barcelona (Catalonia) and Bilbao (Basque Country), by benchmarking their policy implementation and the tensions produced in reference to their nation-states. Fieldwork was conducted from January 2015 to June 2017 through in-depth interviews with stakeholders in the three locations. Despite the so-called pluri-national and federal dilemmas, this article contributes to the examination of the side effects of “metropolitanisation” by considering three arguments based on geoeconomics (“prosperous competitiveness”), geo-politics (“smart devolution”), and geodemocratics (“right to decide”). Finally, this article adds to the existing research on metropolitan and city-regional politics by demonstrating why “devolution” matters and why it must be considered seriously. The “metropolitanisation effect” is key to understanding and transforming the current configurations of nation-states, such as the United Kingdom and Spain (as we currently know them), beyond internal discord around pluri-nationality and quasi-federalism. This article concludes by suggesting the term “smart devolution” to promote more imaginative and entrepreneurial approaches to metropolitan and city-regional politics, policies, and experimental democracy within these nation-states. These approaches can identify and pursue “smart” avenues of timely, subtle and innovative political strategies for change in the ongoing re-scaling devolution processes occurring in the United Kingdom and in Spain and in the consequent changes in the prospects for the refoundational momentum in the EU