ABSTRACT
In 2017 the Catalan government tried to challenge the Spanish authorities with a binding referendum on independence that polarized an already divided Catalan society and captured lots of international attention. The uncertainty on many legal and political features of the event paved the way for the spread of misinformation and, most importantly, activated internal and international disinformation campaigns. The aim of this chapter is to provide a preliminary assessment of the impacts of such information disorders and to analyze their broader implications on Catalan and Spanish politics. Following a short introduction, the chapter focuses on the main points of uncertainty around the referendum and critically discusses some evidence on external and internal disinformation campaigns. The last section tries to provide a preliminary assessment of the main impacts of the disinformation campaigns on Catalan and Spanish politics and, more particularly, the main legislative initiatives to regulate information disorders.
