Democracy is the most important idea underpinning the modern Western political tradition, yet what do we really understand by the term? Do governments really carry out the wishes of the people who elect them? In this work, the first in the William A. Douglass Distinguished Scholar Series, Pedro Ibarra Güell questions conventional approaches to democratic theory that judge democracy by elections alone. Specifically, he argues in favor of a new interpretation of democracy that incorporates not just electoral processes but also an established set of relations between citizens and leaders that facilitate a greater harmony, or concurrence, between popular demands and political decision-making. He contends that such an approach, which he terms relational democracy, is in fact demonstrably more democratic than the purely representative emocracy of many current political systems. Yet he is also aware that many claims for greater participatory democracy fall short when it comes to their practical implementation. Therefore, his highly original proposal for relational democracy is grounded in an appreciation of the pitfalls of relying on theory alone, and instead offers what he believes to be a viable and practical alternative to representative democracy. By way of a conclusion, the book applies the basic tenets of the argument in favor of relational democracy to a specific case study, evaluating the nature of democracy in the Basque Country.

Relational Democracy (Douglass Scholar Series)

Politics & Social Sciences

Pedro Ibarra Güell

Politics & Government

Center for Basque Studies

Beginning with the arrival of one man from the French Basque town of Baigorri, Jean Esponda, Basques migrated to the small town of Buffalo, Wyoming in increasing numbers throughout the twentieth century. They were drawn by the irresistible lure of the possibility of owning land to run sheep. As they staked their claims they left an indelible mark on the culture of the town and changed themselves in the process. Here, mostly in their own voices, their stories are told.

Buffalotarrak

History

Romtvedt, David

Americas

Kashpar: The Saga of the Basque Immigrants to North America (Basque Diaspora Series)

Eiguren, Joseph

"That Old Bilbao Moon" is a memoir, an ethnography of desire, an essay tracking a generation's consciousness, a manifesto for a new city and a new subject after the shipwreck. This Dantean narration presents "characters," including its author, whose lives do not conform to idea cultural models. They are rather figures under the threat of disintegration who require self-transformation for their survival. Every conservation and event here narrated is ethnographically factual, yet the book is essentially about the fundamental fantasies and subjective conversions of a generation surrendered to "the passion for the real." This Bilbao generation of the sixties-branded inaugurally by the trauma of ETA, socialism, atheism. Aresti's Malden behera (Downfall), the survival of Euskara, the art of Oteiza and Chillida, feminism-found in Frank Gerhy's "shipwreck" masterpiece its ultimate emblem and the promise of a new city. It is the architecture of labyrinth, a building of cuts and torsions, "the reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe" (Muschamp), turned into the new face of "that old Bilbao moon" that Brecht sang as "the most beautiful in the world." Because even after the ruins and the defeat the mandate persisted: you must change your life, you must transform your city.

That Old Bilbao Moon: The Passion and Resurrection of a City (The Basque Series) (Volume 1)

Biographies & Memoirs

Zulaika, Joseba

Community & Culture

Saddle up folks for a wild ride along the trail in the company of the famed Basque gunslinger Garmendia and his traveling partner Amalio. As well-known as Billy the Kid, Jesse James, or Wyatt Earp back in the day, in this first book of the Garmendia trilogy, our hero is framed for murder and pursued by evil Tidy Harry–who runs Clean City–and his henchmen Rat and Bat. Will Garmendia survive? And who is the mysterious Black Rider? Authored by the celebrated Basque poet and novelist Kirmen Uribe and with illustrations by Mikel Valverde, Garmendia’s story brings the Old West to life!

Garmendia and the Black Rider

Uribe, Kirmen

Basques in the United States, in 2 volumes, contains names and entries for nearly 10,000 first generation Basque immigrants from the 1800s through today.

Basques in the United States: A Biographical Encyclopedia of First-Generation Immigrants, Volume 1: Araba, BIzkaia, and Gipuzkoa

San Sebastian, Koldo

Volume 2 of the biographical encyclopedia of Basque immigrants to the United States covers the provinces of Iparralde: Lower Navarre (Nafarroa Beherea), Lapurdi, and Zuberoa, and Navarre (Nafarroa)

Basques in the United States: A Biographical Encyclopedia of First-Generation Immigrants, vol. 2, Iparralde and Nafarroa

Biographical encyclopedia of first-generation immigrants.

Basques in the United States, Second Edition, Volume 2

Biographical encyclopedia of first-generation Basque immigrants.

Basques in the United States, Second Edition, Volume 1

Incarceration of political enemies was a principal strategy for repression by the Francoist regime during the Civil War and Franco’s early rule and El Puerto de Santa María, in Andalusia, was a major prison. Bitter Justice tells the story of some of its prisoners, focusing on the Basque dimension and based on newly cataloged prison files, interviews with family members of prisoners, and research in Cádiz and Basque archives. The book tells the story of these prisoners: their charges, sentences, and conditions of release, which were generally more stringent for Basque prisoners than for others. And El Puerto contained more Basque prisoners than all the other Andalusian prisons put together. In addition, Bitter Justice considers important interrelated issues: El Puerto’s background including conditions and treatment of its inmates; Basque prisoners’ conditions; a presentation of collective memories of Basque prisoners’ relatives relating to the prisoners’ lives before, during, and, perhaps as important, after their return to their communities. The book also presents case studies of “offenders” and analyzes any inconsistencies of sentences, charges, and release conditions that affected Basque and Cádiz prisoners. This research shows that prison irregularities, and discrimination against those convicted from the Basque Country, were normal. This history, the first of its kind, sheds a new light on the terrible early repression of the Franco regime and its effect on many lives.

Bitter Justice: The Penitentiary of El Puerto de Santa María and Its Basque Dimension, 1936–1949

LYON, David

Europe

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