The Realities Of Language

There may be other factors that have influenced the decision. The PP administration does not hold an overall majority. Its natural ally (some would say unnatural ally) is the one-time Majorcan socialist, Carme García, who lined up with the PP after the elections in 2011 and enabled it to form the council's administration, but who has had cause to disagree with the PP. And Catalan, for someone from a Majorcan nationalist background, is a strong candidate for disagreement.

Elections are quite possibly another factor. The next municipal elections are two years away. A town which has sociolinguistic realities rooted in Catalan therefore, has an electorate that is rooted in similar fashion. The politics of language in Majorca, or at least in Alcúdia, might be said to be governed by the realities of politics, those of the ballot box. And these realities, can make even Partido Popular politicians sit up and take note, especially if they fear seeing their power disappearing because of a stance that does not reflect the language realities.

While Alcúdia town hall has taken a decision which is at variance with the Bauzá regional government, the president and his new education minister plough on with their objective of promoting Castellano as a language for education. It is curious indeed that Alcúdia's PP can appreciate linguistic realities, yet the government cannot. Or maybe, Alcúdia is odd in having such realities. I don't think so.

The government will argue, however, that these linguistic realities are changing. It can point to the fact that the percentage of families with children aged three to seven who want Castellano as the language of their children's education has increased; for the next school year, it will be up to 30%, slightly more than double what it has been during the current school year.

The argument, however, has to take into account the fact that when it came to choosing between Catalan and Castellano before the current school year, there was considerable confusion about the system of so-called free selection of language, so much so, that some schools advised against a choice being made. Indeed, a quarter of parents had no choice. For the next school year, the government says that there are no “no choices”. So, one can interpret the rise in the number of parents opting for Castellano in different ways, one of them being ,that they may represent some of the 25% who had no choice in 2012.

However the ‘rise' is interpreted, and the government naturally interprets it as support for its free selection policy, 30% does not amount to a ringing endorsement of the policy. Or perhaps it does, in that 70% of parents want Catalan, thus reflecting sociolinguistic realities, such as those in Alcúdia. And the government has steered away from undermining its message that free selection is getting parental support, by failing to explain why the percentage of parents who prefer Catalan has itself, increased - from 62% to 70%.

With elections for regional government also two years away, it is pertinent to wonder to what extent the politics of language will influence the electorate. In Alcúdia, the decision to support Catalan can be interpreted as one with an eye on the electorate. The PP government, though, cannot backtrack on its policy in the hope of mollifying ‘discontented Catalan speakers'. Indeed, with the changing of the guard at the education ministry, it seems more intent than ever on pressing the case for Castellano.

The politics of language were always likely to be a potential, electoral, Achilles' heel for the PP. And in two years time, Bauzá may discover just how sore that heel is.