The Basque diaspora online

The precedent: EuskoSare

Until then the diaspora had organised itself online on its own, centre by centre and person by person. Basque Global Network was the Basque Government’s attempt to bring all of it together in a single social network, open also to those who did not belong to any centre. But the idea of a common meeting point for the whole Basque community of the world was not its own. In 2004 Eusko Ikaskuntza, the Society of Basque Studies, had launched EuskoSare, presented as the “virtual meeting point of the Basque world on the internet”, with forums on research, the Basque language, dance, radio, libraries, music and gastronomy.¹¹

The 2013 announcement in New York

Nine years later, the lehendakari (president of the Basque Government) Iñigo Urkullu announced the Government’s network on 13 October 2013 in New York, as he closed the autumn meeting of the North American federation NABO, which was celebrating its 40th anniversary. The aim, he said, was “to connect all the Basques spread around the world” and to make the Basque Country known abroad. He also had in mind those who live or work far away without going through a Basque centre: the student, the entrepreneur, the aid worker, the professional. And he presented it as an evolution of the Liga Internacional de Amigos de los Vascos (International League of Friends of the Basques) of 1938.²²

The 2016 prior consultation

Before opening it, the Basque Government asked the diaspora what it wanted to find there. A total of 120 people answered the online survey, and all of them said they were interested in taking part.¹²

What they asked for most was information: 28% wanted general and official information about the Basque Country, and 20% the chance to share contacts and calendars. On the format they were split almost evenly: 45% preferred a social network model such as Facebook or LinkedIn, and 42% a forum. By subject, they were interested in education and culture (36%), society and cooperation (27%), institutional affairs (20%) and the economy and business (15%). And the language most asked for was Spanish (40%), followed by Basque (27%), English (18%) and French (12%).¹²

The launch and the first users

The network opened in the summer of 2016. It was presented by Marian Elorza, Secretary General for External Action, and Asier Vallejo, Director for the Basque Community Abroad, and it began with 210 users from 20 countries. It worked in Basque, Spanish, English and French, and it was arranged in five areas: institutional, business, cultural, educational and development cooperation. The door was wide: it was open to Basques living outside the Basque Country, to members of Basque centres, to members of other Basque networks on the internet and to anyone with an affinity for things Basque.¹³

That same year the Basque Government put the number of Basques spread around the world at some 84,300, and the number of people who belonged to the 190 centres and federations in 25 countries at some 34,000.¹³

A year and a half later, the network stepped off the screen to make itself known: in December 2017 it set up a stand at the Durango Basque Book and Record Fair. It allowed users to build networks of contacts and groups, and to share events, calendars and documents.²³