Three types of sub-national activity are analysed and compared in this project:
- Local autonomy in the “stateless nations” of Scotland, Flanders, Catalonia and Quebec;
- Inter-regional cooperation in “Euroregions”, i.e. the 60 borderlands (co-)funded by the EU; and
- Urban resistance against central governments, such as US “sanctuary cities” and Italian homologues.
All three challenge nation-state sovereignty by prioritising local pragmatism over nationalist identity; cooperating across the very borders that delimit the reach of state jurisdiction; and/or by refusing to implement certain decisions of their sovereign overlords.