The recent clashes in Catalonia, where more than 900 people were injured in confrontations between national police and ordinary people seeking to vote in the attempted independence referendum have again shown that a number of countries within Europe, and elsewhere too, find it hard to deal with the dynamics of regional identities supplementing or in some cases even supplanting identities or loyalties to a wider nation.

This is by no means a feature of federalism. While some countries have federal systems because of strong historical regional identities, others have embraced mixed forms including in some cases far reaching devolution of powers to regional governments. The reason for the distribution of power to a range of regional entities is in most countries simple: unitary control would not be accepted for historical and identity reasons, or in some cases has led to such grievances about perceived discrimination and disenfranchisement, that failure to devolve power would lead to ongoing confrontation, including a potential for violence, and hence ineffective governance.

The problem that most central governments of nations with centrifugal tendencies have is that it is virtually impossible to take powers back AND reinforce the loyalties to the centre. As soon as they start to do the first, in many cases the loyalties tip even more strongly towards the regional cause. But the question is also why in the context of Europe, in itself a federal system which recognises the principle of subsidiarity, some governments seem so bent on maintaining and demonstrating the central power at the expense of people’s happiness about a recognition of their regional identity. Both the Scottish and now Catalan cases suggest that the desire to leave the wider national context is fairly evenly split. What is not split is the desire to be recognised in their regional identity, and given the powers to run a significant part of affairs independently.

No Prime Minister or President wants to be associated with the breakup of a nation, but most of them would also not want to be remembered for having effectively torn apart the last bits of a region’s population trust and pride in belonging to a wider nation state. Mr Rajoy may have done just that with his heavy handed response. Identities are multi-layered and multiple. The search for ‘either / or’ loyalties is not only futile, it does a disservice to the cause of citizens to establish places of belonging that are filled with meaning and seen as supporting their lives.

Central Governments must do much more and early on to work on equitable settlements of power distribution and recognition of identities. And this could well lead to a much more widely adopted practice of regions working together with other regions both in their national contexts, and beyond their borders. Some areas such as foreign policy or defence, would be usefully run at national levels, but for the most part the success of relations within a country are about central governments listening to the emergence of democratic demands for autonomy and distinctions of identity, and letting go. This may be more difficult for countries which feature, or have grown out of heavy trappings and pageantry of central power, such as monarchies or autocratic traditions. But the desire of regions to become autonomous are a sure sign that the glue that was once provided by these institutions has gone, at least for parts of the population. In these cases trust must be placed in the desire of people to work together based on goodwill, instead of tying them together by force. The relationships will be happier.

Despite all challenges that the Europe Union has about its larger way of sticking together and democratic accountability, nations within it have all reason to feel safe in encouraging, not curtailing the life and aspirations of regions for more self-government based on common values of democracy, subsidiarity, the rule of law and the human rights of individuals and communities.