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L’Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya is both the oldest and least well known Catalan nationalist party. Although it was the dominant party throughout the Second Spanish Republic, since the transition to democracy it has experienced a chaotic period blocked in on its left by the Catalan socialist party and on the right by Convergencia i unio. Nevertheless, after serious ideological and strategic revision, since 1999 this left leaning nationalist party has consistently increased its support to such a degree that it played the role of kingmaker after the 2003 "regional" elections. Inspired both by a straigtforward and classical form of Catalanism and the sociodemocrat tradition, today the ERC is an unavoidable force within the Catalan political space.