After completing his basic studies and showing that he was too interested in the politics of his country, he decided to study Catalan Philology at the University of Barcelona.
During the 1970s, he joined the Partit Socialista d ‘Alliberment Nacional PSAN, and in 1973 he was imprisoned due to the fall of the 113 members of the permanent Commission of the Assembly of Catalonia.
Later he linked his political career to left-wing nationalism, popular Catalanism and democratic independence.
Being an active member of the 21 National Congress of ERC, he was elected general secretary of the party in 1996, being re-elected some time later.
Some years later, in April 2002, he was elected ERC candidate for the presidency of the Generalitat de Catalunya.
He has also dedicated himself to Catalan public administration, and was head of the territorial services of culture in Tarragona from 1982 to 1984. Then he served as a senior technician in linguistic planning until 1988, while working as a teacher at the Universitat Catalunya d’Estiu.
His great influence and dedication to politics gave him the opportunity to become a deputy to the Parliament of Catalonia since 1988.
Carod Rovira is also Writer and has written several books, has participated in encyclopedias, dictionaries and specialized magazines.
As for his personal life, he is married and has three children.
The result of the regional elections in 2003 allowed his party to govern in coalition with the Partito Socialista de Catalunya and Iniciativa per Catalunya Verds and Josep was appointed head of government of the Generalitat in December 2003.
Unfortunately, his secret contacts with representatives of the terrorist group ETA were leaked to the media, and he had to resign in January 2004.
For the month of March of the same year, his party obtained an important electoral support in the general elections of Spain, obtaining 650,000 votes and eight deputies.
In 2008, new elections were held, but this time the results were not so satisfactory, achieving only 1.17% of the votes. This circumstance produced a strong crisis in the party and Carod-Rovira decided not to run for the presidency of the congress of his party, which was expected in June of that year.
Some time later, in June 2011, it was learned that he had discharged from membership in ERC.