The Queen and Gi-hun should also speak Catalan in "Squid Game".

Catalan separatists are making a language quota a condition for their approval of the new state budget in Spain: at least six percent of the series broadcast by streaming platforms such as Netflix and HBO are to be broadcast in Catalan or in Basque and Galician, the other two official languages ​​of Spain.

The left minority government is frantically improving a law to prevent its budget from getting stuck in the Senate.

Hans-Christian Roessler

Political correspondent for the Iberian Peninsula and the Maghreb based in Madrid.

  • Follow I follow

The separatist Left Republicans (ERC), who lead the regional government in Catalonia, use the weakness of the left-wing coalition under Pedro Sánchez to raise their profile politically in the language dispute.

"Our language is sacred to us, and we will act if the government does not comply with our demands in its new law," threatened ERC parliamentary group spokesman Gabriel Rufian, alluding to the budget.

In Barcelona, ​​the state secretary for language policy of the regional government went one step further and called for a boycott: "The whole Netflix thing will end when hundreds of thousands of Catalans decide to cancel their subscription."

Consistent "re-Catalanization"

The language dispute that has flared up again is about an old conflict that has left deep wounds: for many Catalans, the Catalan language is the foundation of their identity. For decades it had been suppressed during the Franco dictatorship. As a kind of reparation for the young democracy, after Franco's death in 1975, Catalans (and Basques) were given responsibility for culture and language, which the separatists used for their political purposes. They began with a consistent “re-Catalanisation”, which ranges from schools to the media to business life. However, the many native Spanish speakers in Catalonia were marginalized. Many Spaniards from other parts of the country as well as Latin Americans had moved to the economically successful region.

But in the globalized world, it is difficult to use national laws to access international platforms: Netflix, HBO, Disney or Amazon have no company headquarters in Spain. The government in Madrid insists that it therefore cannot impose a quota on them with a national law. As a compromise, it could now stipulate a law that national and international producers will have to spend a certain share of their income in Spain on such films and series in the future.

While a last-minute solution is looming for streaming services, the regional government is looking for an open confrontation with Madrid in Catalan schools. She refuses to implement a court ruling requiring Catalan schools to hold at least a quarter of all classes in Spanish. After a long legal battle, the regional government finally failed in its appeal proceedings before the Supreme Court in Madrid. But in Barcelona they don't think about obeying the judgment. Catalan Education Minister Josep Gonzalez-Cambray urged all educational institutions to simply ignore it.

In Catalonia, the “immersión lingüística”, immersion in the Catalan language, is a legal requirement. Spanish has almost become a foreign language in schools and universities, although in everyday life in Catalonia more than 50 percent of the people still speak Spanish, which almost as many consider to be their language of identity. But almost all subjects are taught in Catalan. There are only two or three hours for classes in Spanish language and literature; that is little more than for a foreign language like English.

Parents had complained against this and got it right. They now have to legally enforce this in their children's schools. In doing so, they encounter bitter resistance, as the example of a five-year-old in Canet de Mar shows. The family was hounded on the Internet and their name and place of residence were published. According to press reports, there was a call to "stone their house"; others asked to isolate the boy. The other children should leave the classroom if the class is in Spanish. "If we don't react, they will kill our language," it said in a short message. More than 200 people demonstrated in front of the school on Friday. With organizations like the "Association for a Bilingual School" (AEB) one has the impression that an example should be made in Canet,to discourage other families from insisting on their right to more Spanish lessons.