Spanish Politics Final

Spain form of government

Constitutional monarchy, Bicameral Congress, Prime Minister

Form of state

Autonomous communities

Electoral rules

usually on sunday, proportional representation, multi seat constituencies, vote of the MP’s, single party government or coalition government

why are elections important?

• Representative democracies require free and fair competitive elections

• 3 basic functions

  • Legitimize political power

  • Produce political representation

  • An accountability mechanism

• 30% of total elections that took place in 2024 were held in non democratic countries

Electoral integrity

• The extent to which the conduct of elections complies with international standards and global norms for good elections

  • Usually established in treaties, conventions, and guidelines issued by international and regional organizations

Electoral systems

• Classify democracies according to their electoral systems

  • Set of rules and norms that are usually written into ;aws that regulate electoral competition

  • We can distinguish electoral systems according to their formulas

  • 3 main: majoritarian, proportional, mixed

Components of electoral systems

• Open or closed lists

• Magnitude of district

  • Number of representatives elected in each electoral district

• Exclusion threshold 

  • Minimum number of votes necessary for a party to win a seat 

  • Closely linked to the size of the district 

• Smaller the district, the larger the effective threshold will be

Majoritarian systems

• System where the candidate with the most votes, wins

• Tend to favor stability of proportionality

• Once the votes are cast and counted, the candidates or parties with the most votes are declared the winners (there may also be additional conditions). Winner takes all system

• Almost always use single member districts

  • Exceptions: block vote

Majoritarian system First past the post

• relative majority– one single vote to one single candidate (one winner)

Majoritarian Double round majority:

• absolute majority. If a candidate gets an absolute majority of votes, they win the first round. If not an absolute majority, the two most voted candidates compete in the second round.

Majoritarian alternative vote

• absolute majority. Voters sort their candidates by preference

Majoritarian system pros

• Governmental stability: clear parliamentary majorities

  • Reduces need for coalition government

  • Pass legislation easier 

• Tendency towards fewer parties

  • Simplify political competition

• Accountability

  • Voters can clearly identity who is responsible for governing

• Strong link between representatives and districts

  • Citizens known who represent them

• Simplicity

  • Easy for voters to understand and for authorities to administer

• Faster decision making

  • Policy decisions may be taken more quickly because they are single-party and stable

Proportional system

• Dominant type in europe, LA, and africa

• Conscious translations of a party;s share of votes into corresponding proportion of seats in the legislature

• Proportionality is preferred over governability 

• More proportional more seats are elected in a constituency 

• Require constituencies with more than one member

• Use a quota to distribute and translate votes into seats in parliament

  • “Price” candidates or parties have to pay to obtain a seat in each electoral district

  • Spain quota: Hondt’s method

pros proportional system

• Fair representation of votes

  • Translate votes into seats more accurately

• Inclusion of smaller parties

  • PR systems make it easier for smaller parties to win seats

• Better representation of minorities

• Fewer wasted votes

  • Seats are distributed proportionality so most votes contribute to representation

• Higher voter satisfaction and participation

• Encouragement of compromise and consensus

  • Produce coalition governments which encourage negotiation and compromise

How does the system work in Spain? D’Hondt method

• D’Hout: Sort different party candidates according to total number of votes obtained and what % this number of votes represents 

• To avoid expressive parliament fragmentation,  candidates need to pass a threshold (3% of total votes)

• Assign the seats to the parties that passed the threshold according to the number of votes the obtained

  • If there are 8 seats in parliament, we divide number of votes each party obtain as many times as seats there are

Spain electoral process

Citizens vote → Seats are distributed (D’Hondt method) → King of Spain nominates a Prime Minister → Parliament votes → Government is formed → Process repeats in next election

Normative basis

• founded on a hierarchy of norms, with the 1978 Constitution at the pinnacle, establishing the country as a social and democratic state subject to the rule of law

• important reforms on law regulating political parties and their activity

  • gender quota an parity laws

  • voting rights abroad

  • Spanish transparency law

  • etc.

Organic Law 5/1985

rules the General Electoral System, which regulates elections to

• The Congress and Senate

• Municipal elections

• Elections to the European Parliament

• Cannot be easily changed

Current composition Congreso de los Diputados

• 350 MPs (fixed)

• every four years Proportional representation closed lists

• at least 2 deputies per province

• representation: individual preferences

Current composition senado

• 266 senators

• every four years, majoritarian, open ballot

• at least four senators per province

• Representation: territories

1977 law on political reform

• Ended the Francoist political system

• Allowed Spain to hold democratic elections again

• Created the legal framework for the first free elections (1977)

Normative principles prior to the constitution

• Congress = proportional system → seats match vote share

• Senate = majority system → winners are those with the most votes in each area

First transitory provision

• the government will regulate the first elections of the cortes generales

• senators shall be elected by universal, direct an secret suffrage of spaniards

• elections to congress will be inspires by criteria of representation proportional

  • corrective devices will be applied to avoid “fragmentation drawbacks” of the chamber

  • electoral circumscription will be the province, establishing an initial minimum number of deputies for each of them

The transition actors

left-leaning parties: proportional system

Alianza Popular (PP): first past the post

UCD (suarez’s party): stability and no excessive parliamentary fragmentation

The transition

• Suarez (UCD) found the solution

  • proportional system to the left

  • but with elements of correction

    • d’hont: favors big parties

    • province= constituency; gives power to rural spain

Malapportionment

• an an imbalance between the distribution of seats and the population weight of electoral districts.

• In Spain, there is an overrepresentation of the more rural inland provinces of the peninsula, and an underrepresentation of large cities and more populous provinces.

• conservative bias

Electoral disproportionality

• the small provinces elect 214 out of 350 seats = less than 50% of the Spanish population elects 61% of seats/MPs.

• The D'Hondt formula is based on the principle of proportionality… BUT it is ineffective when the constituencies are small and distribute less than 8 seats

• This favours the two strongest parties in provinces that have a small magnitude: smaller parties are penalized

Political consequences of the electoral system: Proportional system with scarce proportionality

1. High variation between % votes vs. % seats

2. Benefit for parties who receive more seats than votes

3. Punishment for the parties who receive more votes than seats

• this disproportion is higher in smaller constituencies

Political consequences of the electoral system: low fragmentation

• Even though smaller parties get political representation in the parliament, their weight (number of seats) is too small

• Higher probability of supermajorities = No need for coalition governments

• Stability over diversity in political representation

Political consequences of the electoral system: seats per capita

• “Vote value” is different between provinces 

Political consequences of the electoral system: Closed list: an accountability problem?

• Helped to consolidate the party system in the transition period

• Impossibility to punish the performance of a particular MP

• Scarce “political responsibility” of the MP in front of the citizens 

EL SENAT elections

• Limited vote system

• It is called limited because voters cast fewer votes than the number of seats assigned to the constituency for the Senate.

• In Spain, voters have one less vote than the number of seats in the constituency (except in single-member constituencies).

• Open lists.

the senate elections consequences

1. Absolute majority for the most voted party.

2. One more conservative and corrective element of the system The Constitution cannot be reformed without the approval of the Senate

political parties

• A party is an organization held together by the weaker bond of common policy/values.

• Their purpose is the advancement of their interests and the realization of their ideals (power), not of the people as a whole, but of the particular group or groups which it represents (Morse, 1896).

• The main objective is achieving political representation by becoming hegemonical in their ideological bloc.

party system

• The party system of a country is the product of the interaction between the electoral system and its rules (electoral barriers, small constituency....), and the divisions found in society

organizational/institutional perspective of political parties

• it focuses on the organizational structure of parties, their membership and their institutional role (supply-driven perspective): they offer something to the system

sociological perspective: classification of political parties

• Parties are the result of the historical context and cleavages of society

• Demand-driven perspective: parties respond to the demands of society.

organizational criteria

• Cadre parties: Parties run by elites and selected technicians.

• Mass parties: Parties with strong ideological and programmatic component that focus on attaining a high membership in order to

  • finance themselves

  • political socialization and influence eith their own ideology

  • political influence

• The distinction between Cadre and Mass parties is not based on the size of the party but on their structure and their relationship with their members

Electoral criteria: catch-all parties

• Parties with a broad social base

• Old mass parties abandon their ideological brands → liquid ideologies

• Main focus: capture average, moderate voter, moderate ideology.

Electoral criteria: professional parties

• Parties oriented to win elections  Centrality of experts (spin-doctors)

• Permanent electoral campaigns

• Dissolution of parties as identity agents.

• More simple (sometimes populist discourse):

  • Establishment vs anti-establishment

Sociological perspctive

Parties respond to the demands of society, and their main political conflict's structure party competition  Cleavages

Spanish national parties: traditional

• Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE)

• Partido Popular (PP)

• Partido Comunista Español (PCE)           Izquierda Unida (IU)

Spanish national parties: “new ones”

• Podemos

• Sumar

• Vox

• Ciudadanos (C’s) *Dissolved

Adolfo Suarez and UCD

• Founder of the Union of the Democratic Centre:

  • Former members of the Falange.

  • Christian democrats, 

  • Liberals, 

  • Social democrats,

  • “Independents”

• Resigned as president on January, 29 of 1981

• UCD disolved in 1983

Felipe Gonzalez and PSOE

• Social-democrat

• Actively opposed francoist dictatorship from the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party

• Appointed secretary general in 1974

• Leader of the 1979 PSOE’s reform:

• Dismissed their Marxist principles: “a class, mass, Marxist, democratic and federal party”

• Approach to European social-democracy

• No longer a “labor class” party. Aimed to also capture the middle class

• Became president (1982) through a super-majority (202 seats)!!

From Alianza Popular to Partido Popular

• AP was founded in 1976 by Manuel Fraga and other 7 former Francoist ministers “The magnificent seven”

• Was formed by seven small regional political associations that didn’t support the “total reform” of the Francoist regime.

• Lost every national election until its refoundation to the People’s party (Partido Popular/PP):

  • Formed by Christian-democrats, liberals and centrists

  • “Smoothed” their conservative stands

• Fraga resigned and named Jose Maria Aznar as general secretary

• Aznar became president in 1996 until 2004

Spanish Communist party (PCE)

• Most punished by the Francoist regime

  • Summary executions to its members

  • Even after legalized: 

    • Atocha massacre, 1977

• Republican/Anti-monarchic

• Santiago Carrillo (1963)

  • “National reconciliation”

  • Leader during the transition

• Internal debates lead to crisis

  • Leninist (pro URSS) vs. Reformist

  • Joined “United Left” (IU) in 1992

Early traits of the Spanish electoral competition
1977 - 1979

• Survivors” of the dictatorship

  • Internal vs. external organizational conflicts

  • External/international financial support

• Catch-all-parties: broad spectrum of views among its members

  • Leadership had an important role inside the organizations

  • Vertical, undemocratic/stealth structures

  • Focus on building democracy, not ideologies

• unperfect bipartisan system

Main traits of the Spanish electoral competition

• Low fragmentation, mostly due to the electoral system

• Intensely structured around the right-left scale

• In some CCAA, the predominant (additionally) dimension is the national identity:

  • Catalonia

  • Basque country 

United Left (PCE/IU)

• Born from a social movement against the entry of Spain in NATO

• Formed by regional communist federations and small parties. PCE joins it in 1986

• Becomes the third “major party” in Congress the 1989 general elections

• Strong Anti-corruption position

The cost of austerity (strict economic policies implemented by governments to reduce public debt)

• Spanish government initially approved a stimulus package which comprised of

  • Assistance for unemployed people

  • Tax rebate for workers

  • Mortgage moratorium for unemployed

• European commission demanded spain to cut their public debt 

  • Public spending cuts

15-M movement

• People were struggling economically and nothing was being done to change it

podemos

• Born from as a direct result from the 15-M movement

  • Pablo Iglesias and other intellectuals

  • Become a populist party because of discourse based on us vs them

    • Privileges popular sovereignty above all else

Sumar movement 

• Born as left wing joining

• Created by current vice president 

• Increased popularity after the approval of the labor reform 

• Assumed leadership of the left after crisis in podemos

Ciudadanos

• Founded in catalonia

• Started as a regional party, but got great results in 2015 general elections

• Began as moderate center right, often looking to capture the moderate vote

• Won catalonia 2017 autonomic elections, after the intervention of catalan autonomy 

• After growth, radicalized discourse towards the right, competing for a political space in spanish politics

Vox

• Authoritarian 

• Conservative:

  • Against same sex marriage

  • Gender violence

  • Anti abortion

• Nativism

• Nationalism

• Climate Change negationists

• Against general social welfare provision (Neo-liberal) – New trend: welfare chauvinist

Aliança Catalana

• Authoritarian

• Conservative:

  • Against “gender ideology” (sic)

  • Gender violence

  • Abortion

• Nativism (immigration as a threat)

• Nationalism (Catalan independentists)

• Climate change is good

• Against general social welfare provision (Neo-liberal, pro-private retirement programs) – Welfare chauvinist

Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya

• Catalan nationalist and democratic socialist political party.

• Founded in 1931

• Significant role during the Spanish Republic

  • Important conflict against the anarchist

  • Deemed illegal during the dictatorship.

  • Maintained a Government in exile

• Ruled the Catalan Government in coalition with CDC/Junts from 2017 until early 2024.

  • Former president: Pere Aragonès

• Ideology: Left-Republican. Pro-Independence of Catalonia

• Leader: Oriol Junqueras

From Convergència to Junts per Catalunya

• CDC was the hegemonic Catalan party for 23 years with the arrival of democracy. It won all the Catalan elections from 1980 to 2003 (Catalan Parliament).

• After corruption scandals, its leaders saw the necessity to re-found the party.

• Ideology: 

  • Originally: Catalanist, centre-right

  • Currently: (looking for their spot) centre-right, pro-independence

Partido Nacionalista Vasco

• Christian democratic and Basque nationalist party (similar to the role of CDC/Junts in Cat, but with different origins)

• Founded in 1895

• Hegemonic in the Basque Country

• Currently in the Basque Government in coalition with the socialists.

• Traditional ally of the Spanish minority Governments (PSOE and PP)

BNG (Bloque Nacionalista Galego)

• Galician nationalist party

  • Left-leaning party

• Founded in 1982 from several left-wing communist and socialist Galician parties

• Advocates for Galician self-determination

• Currently main opposition party in Galicia

• Currently an ally of PSOE’s government in Madrid (but not part of the government)

Why do people vote the way they do?: fragmentation

a situation in which political power and electoral support are divided among many parties instead of being concentrated in a small number of dominant parties

fragmentation consequences

• the degree to which the party system is divided among multiple competing parties makes it harder for any single party to obtain a majority of votes or seats and form government

• potential for political instability of legislative deadlock

Why do people vote the way they do?: polarization

• Distance proximity perceived by political elites, in terms of how close or distant they feel from other parties

• Gap is result of differences between parties on several dimensions

Why do people vote the way they do?: social positions and vote

• Social positions help explain citizens’ vote

• social positions modifies voting preferences because they define political attitudes, values, ideology, etc

Why do people vote the way they do?: social cleavages

• A division of society into at least two opposing sides that is determined by the position of individuals  in the social structure, and that, because it is deeply felt by  the individuals, ends up configuring alignments between the sides of the social cleavage and the political parties

How are party systems a result of both the electoral system an social and political cleavages?

• The existence of different parties representing different interests is a direct consequence of the conflicts existing in a social and political system

• If a country has experienced a profound class conflict, it’s likely that workers organized, so that a worker-based political party exists

• A religious conflict (between religious denominations) might trigger the creation of political parties that have one or more denominations as their base

Alignment

• extent of which there is a strong link between social group and political party 

Normative derivation

• a conscience that the division is important and mobilizes individuals for the defence of a particular set of values.

• ideas, values, identity

Organizational derivation

• practical articulation of these values and creation of at least one political party that defends those values associated with one side of the social cleavage.

• ideas turned into political structures

First era of cleavages

• 20th century western social structures already built on main cleavages upon which political parties were created

• Each side created their cultural products to isolate their members from foreign influences:

Political parties: cleavages

• existence of particular parties is dependent on the fractures or divisions that either have existed or still exist in a society

Active cleavages

• For cleavages to be active, they must have electoral consequences.

• Not only do both communities prefer different parties, but some parties exist only within each community

Protestant reformation 16th century

• conflict produced: catholics vs protestans

• cleavage: religion

creation of the nation state

• conflicts produced

  • state subjects vs church subjects

  • cultural communities

  • dominant center vs periphery

• cleavage: origin

industrial revolution

• conflict produced:

  • land owners vs industrial businessmen

  • bourgeoisie vs workers

• cleavage: class

cleavage of origin

• •Whereas the class cleavage takes similar forms everywhere, the  cleavage of origin takes different shapes in different countries (in  some countries no shape at all):

• National identities (state-less nations)

• Ethnic differences

• Center-periphery opposition

• Urban-rural opposition

National identity

• Establishment of absolutism and liberal states produced  heterogeneous states throughout Europe (in national terms).

• Catalonia and Basque Country in Spain, where Spanish-origin immigration also created groups with distinct national identities

problem with the indicators of social cleavages

• Language: 

  • infallible in Belgium; useful in Catalonia; not useful in Basque Country, Northern Ireland; inexistent in Scotland

• Place of birth: only when immigration is recent (Catalonia, but not Scotland or Wales) but controversial.

• Individual identification to a region more than the country

  • Belgium different from both Flemish and Walloon. 

  • This is a problem in Spain.

Centre- preiphery

• The building of large liberal states led to tensions between powerful centres and territories far away from these centres.

• Center = power, “nothing” to do with geography

• Spain: one centre (Madrid), a first periphery (around Madrid);  and other “alternate centres” with distinct national identities  (Catalonia, Basque Country, Galicia) and strong political and economic power.

cleavage overlap

• there are two active cleavages, but their  boundaries match completely

Juxtaposition of cleavages

there is no relationship between existing cleavages (being on one side of one cleavage does not predict your position in another cleavage)

Dealigment

• Traditional relationship between social cleavages (class, religion, territory, etc.) and voting behaviour becomes weaker or inconsistent, creating new and sometimes contradictory patterns of political preferences and electoral support.

• As a result, social position no longer predicts vote choice as clearly as before.

• New political conflicts (identity, globalization, immigration, corruption, generational divides) intersect with older class cleavages.

The End of the Two-Party System in Spain

• Spain traditionally had an “imperfect two-party system”. From the 1980s until around 2014, Spanish politics was dominated by two main parties:

  • PSOE – center-left

  • PP – center-right

• The 2008 economic and financial crisis triggered political change: economic struggle for Spain and strong public dissatisfaction

  • High unemployment

  • Austerity policies

  • Growing distrust in political elites

  • Large protest movements

• Crisis of political representation and weakened support for the traditional parties.

• Emergence of new political parties: the crisis opened space for new political actors that challenged the two-party dominance.

• 2015: PP and PSOE together obtained only 50% of the vote

  • created a more fragmented parliaments and has direct political an governance consequences

two party system to a multi party system

• More parties competing at the national level

• Coalition governments becoming necessary

• created ideological polarization

• Increased political volatility

what does the transition to a multi party system reflect?

• Social change

• Economic change

• Loss of trust in traditional parties

• Rise of new political movements

• An electoral system open to breakthrough and changes despite corrective mechanisms.

Multi party system fragmentation

• from two main political parties to four

• beyond the particular interests of peripheric nationalisms, many AACC see now that political representation gives them leverage to negotiate benefits for their regions in exchange of support for government formation and budget, legislative and bills approval

Uncertainty and stabilization period (1977-1982)

• Uncertainty is usual in the first elections after a dictatorship and beginning of any democracy

• Large number of parties presented candidates (11 parties got representation)

• Most voted party was the UCD (35% of votes and 166 seats), so the first government didn’t have absolute majority

• PSOE was the second force (30% of votes and 121 seats) and the largest left party

2. Socialist hegemony
(1982-1989)

• In 1982 an electoral change took place. It affected the distribution of political force in the future. 

• The 1982 elections were a popular response to the Coup d’état attempt by Tejero in 1981: people wanted democracy.

• After two terms, in 1989, PSOE’s absolute majority was lost (176 seats needed for AM at least). 

• After hegemonic dominance by the Socialist party, after 1989, the PSOE gradually lost voter support, in part because of government fatigue and reconfiguration of the right 

3. Competition and rotation
(1993-2008) 

3 phases

Phase 3.1: competition

• The relative majorities (not absolute) forced parliamentarian agreements to achieve stable governments

• People's Party (PP) wins but no majority

• Led by José María Aznar → more centrist image

• Spanish Socialist Workers' Party declines after scandals

• PP forms government with Convergence and Union, Basque Nationalist Party, and Canarian Coalition

Phase 3.2. The PP absolute majority phase 

• In 2000 the competitive period finished with the first absolute majority of the PP

Causes of the PP victory in 2000

• Demobilization of left voters: IU voters did not turn out to vote. 

  • Leadership crises in PSOE and IU, and the electoral coalition PSOE + IU moved away the left classic vote 

• This produced a transfer of votes between ideological blocs, some moderate social democrats voted for the PP (7.4%)

• Some electors understood that the competitive period was finished and were convinced that the PP would win, so they did not mobilize. 

Phase 3.3: rotation and the PSOE government (2004-2008 )

• The 2004 elections were exceptional because of the 11-M terrorist attack in Madrid

  • The attack and its management could be one of the main reasons of the PP defeat, but scholars don’t agree

  • The terrorist attacks had a mobilization effect in favor of the PSOE

• In fact, the PP achieved the best results as an opposition party and only lost 7% of its votes

4. Crisis period (2011-2015)

• The 2011 general elections were determined by the economic crisis. 

• The initial response of the socialist government had a positive effect in containing the crisis

• The worsening economic situation forced the government to advance the elections

• The PP won for a second time an absolute majority

4.1. Economic crisis and beginning of the 15M (2011)

• Crisis of the 1978 regime (stable two-party system)

• 2008 global financial crisis hits Spain hard

  • Economy reliant on construction + tourism

• Political consequences:

  • Spanish Socialist Workers' Party loses major support

  • People's Party later also declines

• Social + territorial challenges:

  • 15-M movement protests inequality + lack of future

  • Catalonia Statute reform → rise of Catalan independence process

The cost of austerity

• The European Commission (2010) demanded Spain to cut their public debt:

  • Public-spending cuts

    • Increased retirement age from 65 to 67

    • Reduced Minimum wage

  • Boosting tax revenues through tax rises. 

• Rescue of the financial sector with tax-payers money at the expense of increasing public debt

4.2. 2015-2017 Political crisis elections: break of the bipartisan system

Breakdown of bipartisan system (PP–PSOE weakest results ever)

Causes:

• Ongoing effects of 2008 global financial crisis

• 15-M movement becomes institutionalized

• People's Party corruption scandals (Bárcenas, Gürtel, Caja Madrid)

• Rise of Catalan independence process

Key developments:

• Fragmented parliament → no clear majority

• Pedro Sánchez rejects coalition with Podemos

• Rise of new parties: Podemos and Citizens

Outcome:

• First sign of end of bipartisan system

• 2016 re-election → PP improves results

• Mariano Rajoy forms government

2018: First successful motion of censure

• First time a motion of censure is approved

  • But not the first that was presented.

• Passed with the support of 180 deputies

• It resulted in the downfall of Mariano Rajoy's government and in Pedro Sánchez becoming the new Prime Minister of Spain

5. 2019-202X: Coalition governments

• The inability to invest a president remained in the 2019 general elections. This forced the formation of the first coalition government in the history of Spain.

• The 2023 election seemed to bring back the possibility of restoring the bipartisan system

• Current polls suggest that the next Congress will remain fragmented