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SPECIAL SECTION : Spain
How democracy returned to Spain
By Carlos Alba and Carmen Navarro
Free and competitive elections took place in Spain for the first time in 1979 and democratic local governments started to introduce policies and reforms that dramatically transformed the underdeveloped cities and towns of the 1970s. At that time, mayors had clear agendas for building infrastructure and introducing basic public services. Today, while the basic needs are fulfilled, the remaining challenges are not so straightforward. On the one hand, local governments must strengthen their position in relation to other levels of government, and find their rightful place in the Spanish political system. On the other hand, local authorities are confronted with the difficulty of improving performance in a world in which problems are complex, resources scarce and solutions can come only from the joint effort of public and private actors.
Modern Spain emerged out of the late dictator Francisco Franco’s highly centralized political regime. In the 1979 constitution, autonomous communities were not labelled as “states” and the system was not defined as “federal” for several reasons. First, the word “federalism” was carefully avoided throughout the transition due to that term’s association with separatism, political instability and past pro-independence movements. Second, the system is not a traditional federal one because the Spanish model is not an agreement among political representatives of its constituent units, and Spain is far from assigning a standard set of governmental functions to all the federal units. In practice, there are similarities to Belgium, Mexico and South Africa – three centralized countries that have devolved to the point where many political scientists describe them as federal.
Until recently, there was an important distinction in practice between autonomous communities that are simply “regions” and those that are “nationalities,” such as the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia, which have a background of autonomy and self-government as well as a distinct language and culture. Strong political entities, these communities have their own legislatures, executives and judiciaries. They enact laws that have the same force as those of the Spanish state and their administrations are not subordinate to central control. Their jurisdiction over critical policy areas such as education or health, makes them at least as powerful, if not more so, than any other subnational government in Europe. Since 1996, however, recent political and constitutional developments have given all the regions in Spain the status of autonomous communities with similar levels of autonomy and powers. Despite this change, attempts to describe all regions of Spain as equal in status is always criticized by those regions that consider themselves “nations” and believe that they should be treated differently. 
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Carlos Alba is a professor of political science at the Autonomous University of Madrid. Carmen Navarro is an associate professor of political science at the Autonomous University of Madrid.
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