Institutions, European Integration, and the Policy Process in Contemporary Spain

Abstract

By any standards, democracy in Spain since the late 1970s has been a signal success. Following a stultifying dictatorship that lasted from 1939 until 1975, Spain’s economic and political development has been little short of remarkable. Spain’s economic transformation, which started to emerge during the latter years of the dictatorship, strengthened dramatically after the transition to democracy. In fact, a reasonable case could be made for admitting Spain to the G8: its economy ranks 11th in the world (measured in GDP at purchasing prices) and 8th among Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. Its annual GDP growth has comfortably outstripped the average for the EU 15 since 1995, GDP per capita in 2006 was well above the average of the expanded EU27, and overall GDP has been predicted to pass that of Italy by 2009 (Chislett, 2006).² Moreover, Spain enjoys greater political stability and a more secure democratic status than Russia, which was invited to join the G7 in the late 1990s.

We are grateful to Andrew Davis and Laura Sudulich for invaluable research assistance, to our editors Bonnie Field and Kerstin Hamann, and for their comments in various contexts to William Chislett, Carlos Closa, Paz Fernández, Erik Jones, Almudena Knecht, Ignacio Molina, Martha Peach, Mariano Torcal, Cees van der Eijk, and Mary Vincent.