Artur Mas
Artur Mas i Gavarró (Catalan pronunciation: [əɾˈtuɾ ˈmas]; born 31 January 1956) is a Catalan politician. He was president of the Government of Catalonia from 2010 to 2015[2] and acting president from September 2015 to 12 January 2016.
In this Catalan name, the first or paternal surname is Mas and the second or maternal family name is Gavarró; both are generally joined by the conjunction "i".
Artur Mas
Josep Tarradellas (1937)
Pasqual Maragall (2003)
Independent (since 2023)
Catalan European Democratic Party (2016–2023)
Democratic Convergence of Catalonia (1991–2016)
Helena Rakosnik
3
Mas is a long time member of Democratic Convergence of Catalonia (CDC by its Catalan acronym) which used to be the bigger of the two component members –along with Unió Democràtica de Catalunya– of what at the time was a long-standing electoral coalition, Convergència i Unió (CiU), a liberal nationalist coalition which had dominated Catalan regional politics since the 1980s.[3] In 2001 Mas was named general secretary of CDC, then, in 2012 he was named president of the party[4] until the party was refounded in July 2016 as PDeCAT, which he presided between July 2016 and January 2018.
From 2003 to 2015, Mas has run five times for the Catalan presidency, four heading the –nowadays defunct– CiU ticket and one running for the novel Junts pel Sí coalition. He attained the presidency in two elections, 2010 and 2012 (both running for CiU) but neither with an absolute majority. In the absence of single party majorities, both tenures were marked by political instability and ended with Mas calling a snap election.
Mas is an economist who obtained his degree from the University of Barcelona, and is fluent in English and French, in addition to Catalan and Spanish.
His ideology tends to be considered liberal from the economic point of view and supportive of Catalan independence. From the social point of view, he has mostly supported a moderate agenda in numerous issues, such as gay rights, but not same-sex marriage[5] and free debate on his party concerning abortion.[6]
In 2010, for the first time, Mas indicated he would vote "Yes" on a hypothetical referendum to secede from Spain. Since then, sovereignty and Catalan independence have become the central part of his political agenda,[7][8] with Mas being instrumental in CDC's novel turn towards separatism.
Early life[edit]
Mas was born in Barcelona as one of the four children of a wealthy industrialist family.[9] His mother was originally from Sabadell and his father from Poblenou. He studied at the Aula escola europea, and is thereby fluent in French, English, Catalan and Spanish. Later he graduated in Economics from the University of Barcelona and married Helena Rakòsnik.[10]
Juan Mas Roig, great-great-grandfather of the former president of the Generalitat Artur Mas, was a slave ship captain who in 1844 moved 825 slaves from Africa to Brazil.[11]
Presidency[edit]
2010–2012[edit]
The Catalan elections that took place on 28 November 2010 were to finally determine the political future of Mas, who was for the third time CiU's candidate to the presidency. During the campaign Mas had promised to put into place the government of 'the best' people, including the possibility of appointing ministers ('Consellers') from outside his political coalition, Convergència i Unió, if their talent justified doing so.[21] Moreover, he also engaged in a process which would culminate in full powers over taxation for Catalonia—significantly reducing the so-called 'fiscal deficit' between Catalonia and the whole of Spain—by putting this issue to referendum to the Catalans and as a condition for giving any support to Spanish governments after the Spanish elections scheduled for 2012.
Surveys had indicated that this time his party would obtain enough seats to govern without being heavily dependent on third parties and with no risk of a repetition of left-wing coalitions like those of 2003 and 2006. In the event, CiU won 62 of the 135 seats in the Catalan Parliament, short of an absolute majority.
He was eventually invested as president of the Generalitat on 23 December 2010 thanks to an agreement to get the Socialists' Party of Catalonia (PSC) abstention in the vote[22] In the investiture speech, Mas claimed a new funding model for Catalonia inspired by the Economic Agreement and proclaimed the Catalonia national transition based on the "right to decide".[23]
The agreement with the PSC proved fragile, which forced Mas to seek new allies in the regional parliament, this time engaging in talks with the Popular Party (PP). By negotiating PP's abstention, Mas was eventually able to pass the 2012 public budget.[24]
Stances[edit]
In February 2012, in an interview to La Vanguardia, Mas made a statement saying that "the cultural DNA of Catalans is intertwined with our long belonging to the Franco-Germanic world. Catalonia, after all, long belonged to the Marca Hispanica and its capital was Aachen, the heart of the Carolingian Empire. Something must endure in our DNA, because we Catalans have an umbilical cord that makes us more Germanic than Roman."[42][43]
Mas espouses the vision that "Spain can only become a full nation if Catalonia ceases to be a part of it".[44]
2015 election[edit]
As a result of the political instability resulting from the referendum issue, Mas called a second consecutive snap election. Due to internal tensions within the coalition regarding the separatist turn led by Mas, CDC and Unió did not agree to reform CiU, hence putting an end to 37 years of cooperation between both parties.[3]
Instead, CDC joined forces with ERC in Junts pel Sí, a novel coalition which made public that Mas was going to be its candidate for the presidency, despite not being headed by him (as a result of balance of power negotiations within the coalition, Mas was placed fourth in the electoral ticket). The new coalition attained 62 seats, failing to secure an absolute majority. Unlike the previous election in 2012, support from other parties in the regional parliament could not be taken for granted in 2015, because ERC, which had previously supported CiU's government, had joined CDC in the Junts pel Sí coalition.
The only prospective partner willing to negotiate with Junts pel Sí was the far-left separatist party Popular Unity Candidacy[45] (CUP).[46] After a lengthy period of negotiations started just after the election took place on September 27, Mas was vetoed by the CUP. In January 2016, after three months of what was defined as "rancorous infighting" in the separatist camp, Mas eventually stepped down at the eleventh hour from his candidature for the presidency in order to allow a government to be formed and a third consecutive snap election to be avoided.[47] At that point, Mas also resigned from his seat in the parliament, remarking that he would place his “personal efforts in rebuilding what Convergència Democràtica de Catalunya (CDC) means and represents in Catalonia”.[48]
Subsequently, as CDC was refounded as PDeCAT, Mas retained the presidential role in the refounded party.[49] On 9 January 2018, he renounced the presidential role of PDeCAT.[50]