Social costs and policy preferences: Evidence from territorial strategies in Catalonia

Abstract

Research on territorial preferences in self‐determination disputes has traditionally focused on economic and identity‐related factors. However, the impact of social costs—encompassing overall societal comfort and conviviality—on specific preferences for territorial strategies remains understudied. This paper presents a novel perspective by investigating how social costs affect such policy preferences in Catalonia, a region in Spain where secession has become a politically salient and defining feature of the political debate in recent decades. Through embedded experiments conducted within regionally representative online surveys over two time periods, we examine the relationship between social costs and preferences for territorial strategies. Our theoretical framework and empirical findings underscore the importance of considering social costs as a determinant of policy preferences, warranting further cross‐national exploration—beyond territorial debates.