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New York, USA. Euzko Etxea of New York will host this Saturday a talk of the Agirre Lehendakaria Center, where members of the center will give un update on its latest activities and researches. Among them will be Amaia Agirre, team member of the ALC and also granddaughter of the lehendakari Jose Antonio Agirre, whose figure has inspired the project. She talked to EuskalKultura.com before departing to New York.

"Our family has always been involved with this city and, especially, with the Diaspora," said Amaia. "Keep in mind that much of the Agirre family had to leave the Basque Country at the time, so they do know what it is to live in exile. Though today the situation is different, and our generation has not been forced to live outside, as the President Ibarretxe often says, the chain is not broken".

The Basque Case

Juan Jose Ibarretxe is precisely one of the main drivers of the project. In recent years he served as professor and researcher at Columbia University and George Mason University (Washington), and as a result of this work he published the study "The Basque Case: A Comprehensive Model for Sustainable Human Development" in 2012.

"These centers have signed a partnership agreement to create a permanent research program, the "Lehendakari Agirre Program". And they invited the University of the Basque Country to join it", Amaia explained. The result of this international collaboration was the creation of the Agirre Lehendakaria Center (www.agirrecenter.com), which was officially launched last March.

Social Transformation

To better explain the field of work of the ALC, Amaia Agirre places it in the context of the recent history of the Basque Country: "At the end of the 70s Euskadi was leaving behind a 40-year dictatorship, during which any sample of Basque culture was repressed. At that time, Euskadi lived a severe economic crisis, with an unemployment rate of 30%; and its international image was directly related to terrorist violence. Under these circumstances, Euskadi succeeded in transforming its economy and becoming one of the world leaders in health, education and per capita income. Nowadays, Basque companies have large international presence and Basque culture is linked to modernity ".

The aim of ALC is to study the strategic decisions that made this transformation possible and share them with other countries seeking to respond to similar challenges in an innovative way, Amaia says. "Columbia University is very interested in two things: first, the study of the achievements of the past 40 years, and, secondly, the fact that those achievements have been made in spite of a situation of terrorist violence. In such conditions, the most natural outcome is that the country is an economic regression, but we have done just the opposite", she reflects.

Emotional bond

Amaia Agirre, who has academic training in Conflict Resolution, recognizes that this project has also an emotional bond: "The Lehendakari Agirre was my grandfather and I would like to put back on the spotlight some of the values ​​that he championed, specially ona: that he was able to somehow unite all Basques, despite having different ideas. That's what I miss terribly today".

The progress made in the Basque Country has been great, and Agirre see the ALC as a tool to keep doing so in the future. "So far we have done well, but that does not mean we should act with vanity; on the contrary, we must keep working, because we still have much to learn and improve. Moreover, we entered an interesting time, with no violence, and we should not miss this chance. Given the current crisis, for me this project looks to the future and gives us several tools to face it with renewed energies. It is an exciting project", she concludes.