2017 Catalan general strike

While protesters targeted Spanish police and national government sites, other effects included suspended public transportation and port activities, canceled university classes, and closed businesses small and large.

Catalonia held a contentious referendum on its independence from Spain on Sunday, 1 October 2017, against orders from the Spanish central government.

[1] The national police enforcement attempted to prevent Catalans from voting in some locations with violent crackdowns[2][3] that resulted in about 900 people injured and separatist calls for a general strike.

[1][3] By the time of the strike, the Catalan government was awaiting final referendum results before acting on what they had preliminarily announced as 90 percent support from about 2.3 million voters.

The legitimacy of a declarative result was disputable for reasons of general population turnout, voter rolls, and independent confirmation.

[8][10] They called for three million Catalans, including business owners, workers, and the self-employed, to withhold their work and bring Catalonia to a halt.

[5] At the time of the strike, Catalonia represented a fifth of the Spanish gross domestic product, comparable in size to the Chilean economy.

[11] Separatists hoped that the strike would become a major demonstration, leading shop owners to shut down as protesters moved downtown.

[1] On 3 October, two days after the referendum, hundreds of thousands of demonstrators[3] blocked roads across Catalonia, including main thoroughfares in Barcelona.

[1] In the small towns of Calella and Pineda de Mar, protests led some hotels to eject their Spanish police guests.

Protests at the National Police Corps station in Barcelona continued from the day prior for its role in repressing the referendum.

[10] On the Via Laietana, they chanted "Withdraw the forces of occupation" and "The disgrace of Europe" to the tune of the rock song "Seven Nation Army".

[14] The strike led the Spanish Ministry of the Interior to call an emergency meeting,[1] and Spanish King Felipe VI to give a rare televised address that blamed Catalan leaders and the referendum for destabilizing the nation and showing "disloyalty towards the powers of the state—a state that represents Catalan interests."

[3] On the first night of the strike, their union filed complaints: that the Catalan police had not fulfilled its duties by not enforcing the Spanish court ban of the referendum, and that 200 officers were kicked out of a Calella hotel following a threat from the town's mayor.