A ‘Second Transition’ in Spain? Policy, Institutions and Interparty Politics under Zapatero (2004–8)

Abstract

This work analyses whether the first government of Socialist Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (2004–8) represents a ‘second transition’ in relation to the transition to democracy that occurred in Spain in the mid-1970s. After reviewing the concept of a second transition and the electoral context, the work analyses the patterns of change and continuity in the areas of public policy, political institutions and interparty politics. It concludes that while there were significant changes during the Zapatero government, they do not amount to a second transition.

Keywords:

• Spain
• PSOE
• Zapatero
• Political Leadership
• Political Change

In 2004, the Spanish parliamentary election came just a few days after the devastating Islamist terrorist attacks on Madrid commuter trains. The Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE, Spanish Socialist Party), with first-time candidate for prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, won an unexpected victory over the conservative Partido Popular (PP, Popular Party), newly led by Mariano Rajoy. The PSOE formed a minority government under Prime Minister Zapatero with the support of primarily leftist parties. This victory came on the heels of eight years of PP governments under José María Aznar. Spaniards went to the polls again in 2008, and returned a victory for the Socialists and Zapatero to government, though still without an absolute majority.

Few people prior to the 2004 elections would have imagined many of the developments that occurred between 2004 and 2008. Under Zapatero Spain rapidly withdrew Spanish troops from Iraq; held a very public, political debate on the Spanish Civil War (1936–39) and the Franco dictatorship (1939–75); passed very progressive social legislation, including gay marriage and adoption and a sweeping gender equality act; and expanded autonomy in six of Spain's 17 regions. The press, politicians and academics have referred to some or all of these developments as a ‘second transition’ that alters or revisits policies, institutional arrangements and political strategies that were established during Spain's transition to democracy in the mid-1970s.

Spain's transition to democracy is widely understood as a consensual transition, though largely controlled by the outgoing regime. Reformists within the Francoist regime and later of the centrist party, Unión de Centro Democrático (UCD, Union of the Democratic Centre), and leaders of the opposition, including socialists, communists and some peripheral nationalists,1 engaged in multilateral negotiation and compromise that gave birth to the new Spanish democracy. These negotiations did not, however, occur in a vacuum, nor were all negotiating actors on an equal footing. The non-democratic regime was clearly in control of all of the political institutions prior to the elections of 1977, and during the constituent legislature (1977–79) the only democratically legitimate institutions were the parliament and the government. While many of the emblematic political institutions of the regime had been dismantled, such as the Francoist pseudo-party, el Movimiento, and the vertical unions, state institutions had not yet been reformed, including the military, police, courts and local governments. The intact military and security apparatus represented a potential veto player should the transition go too far or too quickly.

This environment surely contributed to the moderation of demands from the left and some peripheral nationalists. In this context, the negotiating parties agreed many of the hallmarks of the Spanish transition: an amnesty that included both regime supporters and opponents; the more tacit agreement to look forward instead of addressing Spain's divisive past; the Moncloa pacts that confronted economic crisis through socioeconomic accords signed by the parliamentary parties; and the political institutions embodied in the constitution of 1978. The parties by and large avoided polarisation on historically divisive issues such as religion and the monarchy. In many ways it was a conservative transition; yet it would be incorrect to conclude that it was only the left and the peripheral nationalists that compromised.

Soon after Zapatero's election in 2004, the Economist magazine published a survey article on Spain titled ‘The second transition’.2 The article praised many of the advances the country had made economically, culturally and politically since its transition to democracy. It also pointed out weaknesses, including the lack of independence of a range of institutions, such as think-tanks, the judiciary and the media, and the timidity and deference of Spanish business to the government. It also highlighted that Spain lagged in social areas, such as gay rights and the role of women, and the burgeoning challenges of immigration and regionalism. It also boldly claimed that the 2004 elections were likely to be seen ‘as the natural end of the first era of Spain's post-Franco transition to democracy. What follows now is a second era—a transition from a simple democracy to a more complicated, more sophisticated one.’

The terminology of a ‘second transition’ is not simply a foreign one. In fact, PP leader and future prime minister Aznar wrote a book called España: la segunda transición (Spain: The Second Transition) in 1994, in which he discussed his ideas for the future of Spain, proposing an alternative to the Socialists who had been governing since 1982. Yet the terminology gained most traction amongst the left and Spain's peripheral nationalists. Pasqual Maragall of the Partit dels Socialistes de Catalunya (PSC-PSOE, Socialist Party of Catalonia), then president of the Catalan regional government, and a variety of party leaders, including Carod Rovira of Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC, Republican Left of Catalonia), Artur Mas of Convergència Democràtica de Catalunya (CDC, Democratic Convergence of Catalonia), Josep Antoni Duran i Lleida of Unió Democràtica de Catalunya (UCD, Democratic Union of Catalonia) and Gaspar Llamazares of Izquierda Unida (IU, United Left), all referred to hoped-for territorial reforms, such as of the Spanish Senate, the recognition of the multinational nature of the Spanish state, the extension of regional governments' competencies (stipulated in ‘statutes of autonomy’) and a revision of regional financing, as a second transition.3 In academic and policy circles, Zapatero's governing agenda has also been dubbed a second transition (Druliolle 2008; Encarnación 2009; Mathieson 2007; Woodworth 2005), including the decision to recognise and address Spain's divisive past, as well as Zapatero's progressive legislative agenda that has sparked the ire of conservative forces, such as the Catholic Church and the PP. Aznar's expression has therefore come back to haunt the PP, which denounces the so-called second transition. As reported in El Mundo,4 former PP interior minister Jaime Mayor Oreja stated that the party had to confront ‘what some have called the second transition’, and not ‘settle in it as if it were something inevitable’.

It is not only the potential reform of state institutions and Zapatero's policy agenda that have led some to refer to this period as a second transition. It is also about the division, rancour and hostility that characterise interparty relations. Political commentator Paddy Woodworth (2005) wrote an article titled ‘Spain's “second transition”: reforming zeal and dire omens’, in which he discusses Zapatero's willingness to take bold action on major issues without consensus, the catch-word of the Spanish transition, with the PP and without concern for the ‘implicit and explicit limits that period [the transition] set on political change’. He also draws attention to the PP's invective opposition. More ominously, he states, ‘There are abundant indications that a new seismic shift is underway, which may resolve some of the issues that remained outstanding after most Spaniards voted for a democratic constitution in 1978. This “second transition” could change the shape of the Spanish political landscape almost as dramatically as the first one did. The question is whether this upheaval will permit the creation of new and improved democratic institutions, or simply put the old ones under severe strain.’

The concept of a second transition is a tricky, multifaceted one. In one connotation, it clearly questions the manner in which the transition to democracy was carried out, the perceived limits that were placed on it and what the left and moderate nationalists gave up due to their willingness, or readiness, to compromise. It can also suggest a second stage of democratic deepening that expands political and social rights to previously excluded or underrepresented groups and improves some of the deficits of the current democracy. Yet, for others, a second transition means undermining a delicate consensus that permitted democracy to flourish in Spain, which can only serve to divide Spaniards and put at risk the unity of the Spanish state.

This issue provides the opportunity to systematically analyse some of these developments. Its goal is to provide insight into the patterns of continuity and change manifested during the first Zapatero government. This work first reviews the electoral and parliamentary context. It then presents an overview of the patterns of change and continuity in three admittedly overlapping areas: public policy, institutional reform and interparty relations. In all three areas, there were clearly significant departures, and Zapatero accomplished an impressive number of the PSOE's manifesto promises, even though he led a minority government. Yet, the terminology of a second transition is likely overstated.

Competitive Electoral Politics and Minority Government

The 2004 elections took place in extraordinary circumstances, and delivered an upset victory to the Socialists. Yet the 2004 (and 2008) elections continued a pattern, established in 1993, of highly competitive national elections that produced minority governments. During this elections cycle, it is the 2000 election that produced a PP absolute majority that is anomalous (Oñate & Ocaña 2005). However, the relative importance of leftist and leftist-nationalist parties for the Zapatero minority government is a novel development (Field, this issue).

In 2004, voting took place just a few days after the horrific terrorist attacks on Madrid commuter trains that killed 192 people and injured scores more (Van Biezen 2005; Fishman 2007; Lago & Montero 2006; Powell 2004; Santamaría 2004; Torcal & Rico 2004). Prior to the attacks, most polls predicted a narrow victory for the governing PP. In the three days that transpired between the attacks and the elections, the PP government was increasingly criticised for its handling of information regarding the investigations into those responsible, and was accused of continuing, many claimed deliberately, to attribute the attacks to Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA, Basque Homeland and Freedom), the Basque-independence terrorist organisation, when evidence pointed to Islamists. The assumption was that it would be more electorally damaging to the incumbent PP government if the attacks were of Islamist origin, given that Prime Minister Aznar had supported the US-led Iraq War in the face of extremely widespread public opposition.

The elections swept the governing PP from office and dealt a defeat to Prime Minister Aznar's hand-chosen successor, Mariano Rajoy. Most academic analyses conclude that the attacks had an impact on the voting behaviour of the Spanish electorate. Based on an analysis of survey data, Lago and Montero (2006, p. 26) conclude that the attacks impacted on behaviour in two ways: ‘first, because the government was blamed for the attacks as a result of its support for the war in Iraq; second, because of the view that government information about those responsible for the attacks was at best self-interested and at worst manipulative’. Most also argue that the effects of the attacks on voting cannot be considered in a vacuum, however. As Fishman (2007) argues, PP strategies and policies during the prior four years, such as the deteriorating relations between the PP government and multinational periphery, and the PP's social and economic policies, also mattered. The evidence also indicates that it was increased turnout, new voters and the strategic voting of the supporters of smaller parties that delivered a victory to the PSOE and not a large swing away from the PP to the PSOE (Torcal & Rico 2004, p. 115). The results of the 2004 and 2008 elections are presented in Table 1.

Table 1 Election results, Congress of Deputies, Spain

	2004			2008
	No. votes	% votes	No. seats	No. votes	% votes	No. seats
Socialist Party (PSOE)	11,026,163	42.6	164	11,289,335	43.9	169
Popular Party (PP)	9,763,144	37.7	148	10,278,010	39.9	154
United Left (IU)	1,284,081	5.0	5	969,946	3.8	2
Convergence and Union (CiU)	835,471	3.2	10	779,425	3.0	10
Basque Nationalist Party (PNV)	420,980	1.6	7	306,128	1.2	6
Union, Progress and Democracy (UPyD)	–	–	–	306,079	1.2	1
Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC)	652,196	2.5	8	298,139	1.2	3
Galician Nationalist Block (BNG)	208,688	0.8	2	212,543	0.8	2
Canary Coalition/Canary Nationalist Party (CC-PNC)	235,221	0.9	3	174,629	0.7	2
Navarre Yes (NA-BAI)	61,045	0.2	1	62,398	0.2	1
Others	996,515	3.8	2	772,052	3.0	–
Blank votes	407,795	1.6	–	286,182	1.1	–
Total (valid votes)	25,891,299	99.9	350	25,734,866	100	350
Turnout	75.7%			73.9%
Source: Ministry of the Interior, Spain ( < http://www.elecciones.mir.es>).

While it was widely considered an unexpected victory for the Socialists, we cannot know for sure who would have won the 2004 elections had the attacks not occurred. Polls indicated that the difference between the PSOE and PP shrank as the campaign progressed. Also, in every policy area except economic and employment policy, the public viewed the PP's governing performance negatively (Lago & Montero 2006, pp. 30–31), and the final tracking poll conducted a week prior to the election indicated that 59.3 per cent of respondents believed the country ‘needed a change of party in government’ (Fishman 2007, p. 272).

The Socialists had last governed from 1982 to 1996 under Prime Minister Felipe González, whose final years in office were riddled with corruption scandals. In winning the 2004 elections, the PSOE reversed a long pattern of electoral decline and ended the leadership crisis produced by González's departure. Zapatero also represented an important generational passing of the baton from those who led the party during the transition to democracy to those, for the most part, who came of political age in the post-transition years. This is part of a larger generational change in the political parties; transition political leaders have largely left the front lines of politics (Field 2008).

In the PP's view it would have won the 2004 elections had it not been for the terrorist bombings (Powell 2004, p. 379). It was also clear from the political climate of the following four years that the PP had tremendous difficulty accepting the PSOE's victory. The extremely tense and divided political environment led Whitehead (2007, p. 19) to include Spain's 2004 elections as an example of the challenges posed by ‘closely fought elections’, stating, ‘the political climate is as polarised and embittered as at any time since the death of long-time dictator Francisco Franco in 1975’.

After four years of government during which the divisions between the principal parties were made abundantly clear, Spaniards returned to the polls for parliamentary elections in March 2008 (Bosco 2009; Field 2009; Sánchez-Cuenca 2009a). Mariano Rajoy and José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero were once again the two principal candidates for prime minister. Zapatero returned a victory for the PSOE, validating the 2004 results in the eyes of many; yet the race was tight and the PP and PSOE both increased their support. There is some evidence to suggest that the PSOE picked up votes from the left and nationalist parties, and lost some of its centrist voters to the PP (Torcal & Lago 2008; Urquizu 2008). Most other parties lost support, including IU, Convergència i Unió (CiU, Convergence and Union), the Partido Nacionalista Vasco (PNV, Basque Nationalist Party), ERC and Coalición Canaria (CC, Canary Island Coalition).

What is perhaps surprising is that neither the 2004 (Van Biezen 2005; Oñate & Ocaña 2005) nor the 2008 elections (Torcal & Lago 2008) stand out at a systemic level from the characteristics of the cycle of elections that began in 1993. Aside from the anomalous elections of 2000, these characteristics include ‘high levels of competition and very tight victories, decreasing volatility, 75 per cent turnout and higher levels of party vote concentration’ (Torcal & Lago 2008, p. 374). After the first two democratic elections in 1977 and 1979, Spanish national elections were characterised by a severe lack of competition between the two principal parties, Alianza Popular (AP, Popular Alliance), which was renamed Partido Popular in 1989, and the PSOE. They were separated by an average of 17.9 percentage points in the popular vote and clearly no alternation was possible.5 Beginning in 1993 competition between the PSOE and PP emerged and alternation became a possibility. If we exclude the elections of 2000, the two parties on average were separated by 3.5 points in the popular vote.

Furthermore, it was not until 1996 that the PP governed in the young democracy at the national level and then only in minority with the support of centre-right regional-nationalist parties. Between 2000 and 2004, it governed with an absolute majority for the first time. Therefore, while democratic elections have taken place since 1977, competitive elections between two viable governing parties distinguish the post-1993 period from the Socialist-dominated years of 1982 to 1993, and are reminiscent of the more competitive electoral politics of the initial years for democracy, yet with different actors.

Also, even though the vote has increasingly concentrated in the two largest parties, both elections continued a pattern begun in 1993 of producing minority governments, again with the exception of the 2000 PP absolute majority victory. Minority governments are frequent in Spain and have been formed by all of the major parties, including the now defunct UCD, PSOE and PP. In 2004, with 164 seats in the 350-member parliament, the PSOE fell 12 seats short of an absolute majority. Zapatero was elected prime minister with the votes of ERC, IU, Iniciativa per Catalunya-Verds (ICV, Initiative for Catalonia-Greens), CC, Bloque Nacionalista Galego (BNG, Galician Nationalist Block) and Chunta Aragonesista (CHA, Aragonese Council), and formed a single-party minority government. Zapatero's legislative programme therefore had to attain the support or at least acquiescence of other political parties.

Previous minority cabinets were supported by de facto grand coalition alliances in the legislative arena (1977–82) or agreements between the state-wide parties (both the PSOE and PP) and centre-right regional-nationalist parties (1993–2000): CiU, CC and PNV. The first Zapatero government stands out for the comparative importance of leftist parties, including left-wing regional nationalists, in parliament and for the government's legislative agenda. Zapatero may have been more disposed to collaboration with the leftist parties than his Socialist predecessor, Felipe González, who opted for collaboration with the centre-right nationalists instead of IU when he found himself without a majority in 1993. Yet there were also developments that augmented the weight of leftist, particularly nationalist, parties. First, there were changes at the regional level, particularly the 2003 formation of the tripartite government in Catalonia (PSC-PSOE, ERC, ICV) and the 2004 formation of the bipartite government in Galicia (PSOE, BNG). As Field (this issue) argues, these sub-national developments made these regional parties more important alliance partners at the national level. Also, the 2004 elections produced a dramatic jump in support for ERC, which increased its deputies in the Spanish Congress from one to eight and formed its own parliamentary group for the first time since the transition. While this does not mean that the government consistently relied on the left-wing parties, in fact the government was able to shift alliances; nonetheless there were novel alliance options that had not existed previously.6

Policy Changes and Continuities

The public policy of the Zapatero government was certainly less constrained by the taboos of the Spanish transition. Zapatero was willing to contend with the Spanish Civil War and the Franco dictatorship and boldly entered policy terrain related to morality and religion. His government also placed the advancement of equality for disadvantaged groups at the centre of the political agenda. Though there were clearly some innovations, his foreign and economic policies manifested important continuities.

The policy area that represents the most important departure from prior patterns of Spanish politics since the transition is that of historical memory. During the Zapatero government, Spain held a very public, political debate on its past, particularly related to the Spanish Civil War and the subsequent dictatorship of Francisco Franco—issues that were left off the political agenda during Spain's transition to democracy in an effort to let bygones be bygones and thereby secure the transition to democracy (Aguilar 1996). The Zapatero government placed the issues of historical memory and reparation centre stage (Aguilar 2008; 2009; Blakely 2005; Boyd 2008; Encarnación 2008; Field 2008; Gálvez-Biesca 2006). The package of reforms included measures to extend state benefits, such as upgrading war pensions, providing economic and healthcare benefits to those forced to leave Spain as children during the war, and financing the exhumation and reburial of Civil War victims. New legislation also called for the removal of public symbols of the dictatorship. Moreover, the policies, as Aguilar (2008) finds, ‘reflect a distinct change of tone’ (p. 425); for example, they ‘explicitly pay moral tribute to the reprisal victims’ and ‘hold the Franco regime responsible’ (p. 421).

While the Zapatero government was criticised from the right and by the PP of unnecessarily dividing Spanish society and opening old wounds, the initiatives did not entirely satisfy the proponents of dealing with Spain's past. Amongst the limitations, the legislation did not nullify the sentences of the Franco regime; there was no truth commission; and the state did not take responsibility for finding, identifying and reburying the disappeared. The president in Spain of Amnesty International stated, ‘Spain is the only country in which the state subcontracts to the families of the victims to find the victims’ (Junquera 2008). In 2009, civil rights organisations were pressuring the government to assume this responsibility (García 2009). The legislation also did not undo the amnesty or seek reprisals.

Zapatero demonstrated a greater willingness to take on divisive issues related to morality and religion (Calvo 2009), which were trodden upon lightly during the transition (Gunther & Blough 1981) and post-transition years. Such initiatives include legislation that makes attaining a divorce easier, a new education law that removes religion as an obligatory course and requires a civics course, the liberalisation of stem cell research, and granting full marriage rights to same-sex couples. The government also restructured, but did not eliminate, state financing for the Catholic Church. These policies generated heated opposition from the Catholic Church, conservative civil society organisations and the PP.

The Zapatero administration also stands out due to its social policies more broadly, particularly measures directed at reducing discrimination, promoting equality and extending civil rights (Calvo 2009; Calvo & Martín, this issue; Encarnación, this issue), what has been referred to as ‘citizen socialism’. Gender equality initiatives were particularly central. During his first term, Zapatero filled half of the cabinet positions with women, including a female deputy prime minister.7 The government's legislative initiatives included a law aimed at specifically protecting women from violence from their male companions, and a sweeping equality law that attempts to promote equality in all spheres of life. A new dependency law also expanded the welfare state to provide assistance to those who care for Spaniards who cannot care for themselves, which may also disproportionately help women, who are typically the caregivers.

The centrality of gay rights in Zapatero's agenda clearly contrasts with prior governments, including the PSOE governments of Felipe González, which had a hostile relationship with the gay and lesbian movement (Calvo 2007). This meant a dramatic expansion of gay rights, including marriage and adoption, making Spain one of the few countries that grant full marriage equality to same-sex couples. It also passed a law that, amongst other provisions, permits transsexuals to change their name and gender in the national registry without having surgery first (Calvo 2007; Platero 2008).8

There were also measures aimed at improving the plight of another disadvantaged group, namely the immigrant population which has dramatically increased in Spain. These measures included the controversial regularisation process of 2005 and the Plan for Africa. The Plan for Africa is an attempt to replace illegal immigration with legal migration through a comprehensive strategy that involves cooperation with source countries and the promotion of social integration into Spanish civil society. Yet Richards (this issue) argues that these measures were limited, in contrast to the bolder equality measures addressed above.

The combination of these reforms certainly rebranded social democracy in Spain (Encarnación, this issue; Kennedy 2007; Maravall 2009; Mathieson 2007). Encarnación (this issue) argues that we can best understand this transformation in light of the crisis the PSOE faced at the end of the González years and the subsequent renovation of the party leadership which brought a new generation of political leaders to power, including, of course, Zapatero himself.

It is more difficult to see the Zapatero government as representing a clear departure in economic and foreign policy. Zapatero inherited a positive economic performance upon which he was able to improve until the economic crisis hit in 2007–8, though the economy suffered from significant underlying structural problems (Mulas-Granados 2009). Royo (this issue) finds that, despite developing an economic programme for the 2004 campaign which advocated a shift from a growth model largely based on consumption and construction to one based on value added and productivity, the macroeconomic programme followed by Zapatero was similar to those followed by Aznar and González, and in broad terms since the transition to democracy. This is the one area that appears to be above partisan politics. Both parties are committed to fairly orthodox economic policies.

The Zapatero government dramatically reversed some of the foreign policies of the prior Aznar government, particularly Aznar's attempt to forge a special relationship with the US and his support of the Iraq War. Zapatero immediately fulfilled his promise to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq, severely straining relations with the George W. Bush administration. Yet strong ideological divisions on foreign policy began to emerge under Aznar, most obviously with regard to Iraq and the US, but also regarding Mediterranean (Gillespie 2007) and European Union (EU) policy (Llamazares 2005). While both parties continued to support EU integration, in line with Spanish public opinion, the PP presented a distinct vision of Europe that was based on neoliberal economic policy, an intergovernmental perspective of European governance and an Atlanticist orientation (Llamazares 2005). Closa (this issue) illustrates that Zapatero's EU policy shared important traits with prior Socialist administrations, and in some areas with the Aznar governments. Powell (this issue) contends that in other foreign policy arenas Zapatero attempted to carve out new policies, primarily to separate himself from Aznar, but he was also willing to follow different policies from prior Socialist governments. However, it is difficult to claim that Aznar or Zapatero represents a second transition in the foreign policy arena. In some ways, the clearer policy differences between the two principal parties are reminiscent of the division on foreign policy during the transition years, particularly with respect to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the relationship with the US. The limitation of partisanship on foreign policy was built after 1986 under the Socialist governments of González rather than set during the transition years (Gillespie 2007). Transition foreign policy is the ‘consensus that never was’.9

The Limits of Institutional Reform

At the most general level, the institutional model designed during the transition years remains in place. At the heart of this model is a parliamentary system of government with strong, hierarchical political parties; a disproportional, closed-list proportional representation electoral system in which party trumps individuals; rules that privilege government stability and effectiveness over representation; and an open-ended territorial model that provides for extensive decentralisation, yet weak integration of the regions in national decision-making (Field & Hamann 2008). Fundamentally changing this model would require not only political will but the large supermajorities stipulated by the constitution. While Zapatero did not set out to replace this model, he was also unable to deliver the kind of institutional change envisioned in the 2004 platform. Institutional reforms that were enacted were also not as unilateral or radical as depicted.

The PSOE's platform presented a package of four constitutional reforms: first, a reform of the Senate to make it a more authentic chamber of territorial representation; second, the inclusion of the names of the 17 autonomous communities and the autonomous cities in the constitution as well as the elimination of obsolete articles from Title VIII (Territorial Organization of the State), such as the process of constituting autonomous communities; third, the inclusion of a reference to the EU; and, finally, the elimination of a male preference in succession to the Crown. Yet, given the partisan distribution of power in the parliament and the very high thresholds for constitutional reform, no reform could take place without the support of the PP.

The constitution designers made reform difficult. There are two alternative processes, depending on the nature of the reform. The first three reforms would go through the process described in section 167, which is an ordinary reform of the constitution. This type of amendment must be approved by three-fifths of the members of the Congress and of the Senate. If this is not attained, the reform can occur with an overall majority of the members of the Senate and a two-thirds vote in the Congress. This type of amendment only needs to be approved in a referendum if one-tenth of the members of either chamber request it within 15 days. The reform of the provisions relating to the Crown would go through the reform process described in section 168, regarding a total revision or a partial revision related to particular sections of the constitution, including the Preliminary Part (which includes the definition of national sovereignty, defines the political form of the state as a parliamentary monarchy and recognises the right to self-government of the nationalities and regions within the Spanish state, amongst other provisions); Chapter II, Division 1 of Part I Fundamental Rights and Public Liberties; or Part II The Crown. Amendments of this type are even more arduous. Reform first requires a two-thirds majority in each house, after which parliament is dissolved. In the subsequent parliament, each house must also ratify the reform by a two-thirds majority. Finally, it must also be ratified in a national referendum. The extreme acrimony between the PSOE and PP ultimately led Zapatero to set constitutional reform aside.

Zapatero also fell short of dramatically revamping Spain's territorial model. While there is broad consensus across the political spectrum that the Senate is a deficient chamber, there is no consensus on what form a new Senate should take. His proposed package also included measures to enhance coordination across autonomous communities and between the autonomous communities and the central government, and the reform of autonomy statutes in the direction of greater decentralisation. Statute reform advanced the furthest. Six (Catalonia, Andalusia, Valencia, Aragon, Balearic Islands and Castile-Leon) of the 17 autonomous communities' statutes were ultimately revised (Baldi & Baldini 2009; Colino 2009; Keating & Wilson 2009; Muro, this issue). Of the statutes, the most controversial was the Catalan statute, which was opposed by the PP as unconstitutional and by ERC, who had supported the draft statute in the Catalan parliament yet voted against what it considered a diluted version ultimately approved in Madrid.

As Keating and Wilson (2009, p. 549) state regarding the statute reforms, ‘the issues of real controversy concerned symbolic issues (nationality, historic rights, citizen rights and duties), language policies, regional financing, and a few controversial claims for regional competencies (such as water policy)’. The proposed statute approved by the Catalan parliament referred to Catalonia as a ‘nation’ yet this was changed in Madrid to an awkward stipulation that the Catalan parliament recognises Catalonia as a ‘nation’ while the Spanish constitution recognises its ‘national reality as a nationality’. The statutes for Andalusia, Aragon, the Balearic Islands and Valencia define this region as a ‘historical nationality’ while Castile-Leon defines itself as a ‘historic and cultural community’ (Keating & Wilson 2009).

Yet, despite the extremely rancorous politics surrounding statute reforms, five of the six statutes ultimately gained the support of both the PSOE and the PP, and both parties rejected the proposed reform coming out of the Basque Country. Revisions of statutes of autonomy require the approval of the regional parliament, using approval thresholds stipulated in their respective statutes of autonomy, and approval by the Spanish parliament as an organic law. Statute reforms in the Basque Country, Catalonia, Galicia and Andalusia also require a referendum. Despite high thresholds at the regional level, the weakness of the PP in Catalonia and Andalusia meant that statute reform went forward in the regional parliaments without the PP's support. Yet the PP at the regional level supported the statute reforms in Valencia, Aragon, the Balearic Islands and Castile-Leon (Keating & Wilson 2009, p. 542). Furthermore, after the renegotiation of Andalusia's statute in the Spanish parliament, it ultimately attained the support of the PP. The PP, however, maintained its bitter opposition to the Catalan statute and appealed to the Constitutional Court, whose decision at the time of writing is still pending. The PP also severely criticised the government's attempt to negotiate a peace with ETA, which ultimately failed (Sánchez-Cuenca 2009b).

Zapatero's government also blocked some reform proposals coming out of the autonomous communities. Despite having stated that he would accept a statute as approved by the Catalan parliament, many of the more radical elements of the proposed Catalan statute were ultimately eliminated, including terms such as ‘sovereignty’, ‘independence’ and ‘self-determination of the people’ (Baldi & Baldini 2009). The statute reform proposed by the Basque parliament, known as the Ibarretxe Plan after the then Basque regional premier, was rejected outright due to its proposal to transform the Basque Country into a state freely associated with Spain and its recognition of the right to self-determination, and therefore deemed to exceed the limits of the constitution.

The territorial reforms increased the competencies of the autonomous communities and in some cases shielded (blindaje) those competencies, and included novel symbolic, identity and citizenship claims. Yet it is difficult to see this as a radical departure from prior patterns of Spanish politics. Certainly Aznar in his second administration had hardened his position toward decentralisation, which is when statute reform emerged on the political agenda. Yet this is better seen as another stage in an ongoing process of decentralisation, which at distinct times has meant concessions by all of the major governing parties, including the PP. As Muro (this issue) claims, while there were innovations in coordination, such as Zapatero meeting with the presidents of the autonomous communities in what is called the Conference of Regional Presidents, Zapatero like his predecessors was unable to resolve the critical problem of better integrating the regions in national decision-making.

Parliament did pass a variety of laws meant to rejuvenate public life, including legislation to improve the neutrality of political institutions in their use of publicity; to limit the power of the government over the public Spanish Radio and Television (RTVE), which is often accused of being manipulated by the government; and to place limits on and make more transparent donations to political parties. Yet the government fulfilled fewer of its electoral promises to revitalise parliament and increase its proximity to citizens. It passed a new national defence law that stipulates that parliament must approve sending troops abroad, and, in fact, before the law came into effect the government attained permission to send troops to Afghanistan and Haiti (Powell, this issue). Yet the government's more ambitious proposal to revise the parliamentary rules languished.

In the electoral arena, the government did not change the election list system from closed to open lists, or enact legislation to allow for the direct election of mayors, as proposed in its platform. It, as proposed, passed legislation to promote a more equitable distribution of candidacies, between men and women, yet this did not reach the level of parity outlined in the platform. Provisions of the above-mentioned equality law require that neither men nor women candidates attain less that 40 per cent of the list positions overall. The law also stipulates that the 40 per cent minimum applies to each section of five positions, which means that neither sex can be placed in more than three of every five list slots. It also mandates that where there are fewer than five places on the district list, list positions must be distributed as equally as possible (Field 2009).

What's New about Polarisation

There is little left of the consensual interparty politics of the transition. The PP viscerally opposed almost every policy discussed above, and the first Zapatero government has likely presided over the most politically divisive period of Spain's young democracy. Severe rifts manifested regarding Spain's participation in (and withdrawal from) the Iraq War; the investigations into the terrorist attacks on the Madrid commuter trains; the Zapatero government's handling of domestic terrorism; the new autonomy statute for Catalonia; appointments to the courts and the functioning of the justice system more broadly; the historical memory of the Spanish Civil War and the Franco dictatorship; and the legislation regarding education, gay marriage and adoption, sex-based quotas, and divorce, amongst other things.

Yet, even though the rhetoric of division may have reached new, often outlandish, pinnacles, polarised interparty politics is not new. In the legislative arena, there has been a steady deterioration of interparty collaboration between the two principal parties since 1993 when heightened electoral competition began, and, except for a one-time increase, interparty collaboration has diminished each legislature since the transition (Field 2005; 2008). Moreover, it was the second Aznar administration (2000–4) that registered a statistically significant decline in collaborative interparty politics vis-à-vis the previous legislatures. There was no aggregate drop in collaboration between the second Aznar and first Zapatero governments on legislation. In this sense, it was the second Aznar administration that marked a new phase of divisive legislative politics.

There are attributes of the polarisation of the first Zapatero legislature that are novel. Division between the two principal parties dramatically increased on ‘issues of state’ which had previously enjoyed greater bipartisan support. In mid-2005, slightly more than a year into the Zapatero government, El País reported that ‘the bridges between the government and the PP are completely broken, without even salvaging issues of state, respected between the executive and the principal party of the opposition, at the national level and in European countries: antiterrorism, territorial questions and foreign policy’ (Aizpeolea & Marcos 2005). Field (2008) in a study of the laws passed during the Zapatero government finds a dramatic drop in bipartisan support for organic laws, which have a semi-constitutional status, and for laws related to government institutions, such as those treated by the Constitutional, Defence, Justice, Interior and Public Administration committees. It is, however, important to recognise that division on issues of state emerged in Aznar's second term, as illustrated by Aznar's support of the Iraq War in the face of opposition from all other political parties and the public (Gillespie 2007).

It has been argued that polarisation is a deliberate strategy (denoted estrategia de la crispación) of the PP (Fundación Alternativas 2007; Sánchez-Cuenca 2009a). According to this argument, the PP is at an electoral disadvantage on traditional left–right ideological issues given the Spanish electorate's centre-left positioning. Therefore the PP chooses to polarise territorial issues and terrorism, as these are not clearly left–right ideological issues, in hopes of capturing more votes or of encouraging voters who would otherwise vote for the PSOE to stay home. Yet clearly polarisation also very prominently extended to topics that indeed had ideological, left–right dimensions, such as historical memory and issues with moral or religious content. To understand polarisation overall, therefore, it is also important to take into account the competitive electoral environment since 1993, leadership renovation and the greater ideological differentiation between the dominant political parties (Field 2005; 2008). Nonetheless, while polarisation is severe, it is a feature of Spanish politics that predates Zapatero's rise to power.

A Second Transition?

Ultimately, whether the Zapatero government represents a second transition—for better or worse—will likely depend on one's political preferences and expectations. Yet, in terms of clear departures in the areas of policy, political institutions and interparty politics analysed here, the terminology of a ‘second transition’ is likely overstated. This issue outlines clear policy changes under the Zapatero government vis-à-vis both the Aznar governments and others since the transition, amongst which historical memory and the salience of equality policies for disadvantaged groups are noteworthy. Yet there are other policy areas, such as economic and foreign policy, that were more resistant to change. The contributions to this issue clearly illustrate institutional modifications such as the extension of decentralisation, new courts and sex-based candidate quotas. Yet the macro-institutional framework of the democratic regime established during the transition to democracy remains intact. With regard to interparty relations, Spanish party politics is clearly polarised and acerbic. While there is evidence that polarisation on issues of state increased during the Zapatero government, there is also evidence that this was brewing during the prior Aznar administration. In fact, the substantial overall increase in polarisation predates Zapatero's rise to power. Whether or not political change under Zapatero warrants the second-transition label, the Zapatero government indeed stood out in important ways and likely represents a new era of Spanish politics.

Outline of the Contributions

The contributors to this issue explore in more depth the patterns of continuity and change manifested during the first Zapatero government.

Encarnación examines the origins of Zapatero's ‘new left turn’, which refers to a change in emphasis for leftist parties away from traditional material concerns toward issues such as gender equality, environmentalism and multiculturalism. The essay evaluates and discards explanations based on post-materialist values and the strength of civil society. Instead, the author provides a party-centric model that emphasises the PSOE's self-renovation driven by party crisis, political opportunity and new party leadership.

Using evidence from the Zapatero government, Field demonstrates that minority governments can shift alliances in the national parliament and, thereby, govern effectively. Governments may also or instead rely on alliances across governmental levels in this multilevel system through the vehicle of regional parties. The author concludes that the first Zapatero government represents a significant departure because it had viable alliance options in regional parties with governing responsibility at the regional level of both the left and right. Zapatero may well have rebranded the PSOE in some significant ways, as Encarnación argues, but bottom-up dynamics emanating from political changes at the regional level were also significant.

Royo analyses the continuity of macroeconomic policies between the Zapatero and prior governments. In this analysis, continuity between the Aznar and Zapatero governments is due to the inertia of economic success, leadership stability in economic policy, and ideological consensus around fiscal consolidation. The author's explanation of the longer-term continuities is based on the significant role of social bargaining since the democratic transition and the cross-party consensus on European integration.

Muro explores territorial politics under Zapatero, including the failed reform of the Basque statute of autonomy (the Ibarretxe Plan) and the successful reform of the Catalan statute of autonomy (Nou Estatut), which was followed by five additional statute reforms. The author highlights the complex multilevel and competitive party dynamics that characterised territorial politics, and argues that while political decentralisation experienced a qualitative jump under the Socialists, there was much continuity in the patterns of both centre–periphery relations and party politics.

Richards investigates the government's and unions' responses to the dramatic increase of the immigrant population. While the author considers several important pieces of Zapatero's immigration policy, such as the regularisation process in 2005 and the Plan for Africa, the author finds that to date their effects have been limited. Also, the essay is critical of the unions' ability to represent the immigrant population. Overall, the labour market discrimination faced by immigrant workers, who are concentrated in the most precarious and least regulated jobs, had not improved by the end of the first Zapatero government.

Calvo and Martín survey the significant developments in the arena of women's rights and policies, and confront the important theoretical question of whether the highly symbolic policies increased women's interest in politics or altered their voting behaviour. Contrary to expectations, the gender gap in political interest did not narrow and the policies did not significantly alter voting behaviour. After identifying intervening variables that may have reduced the policies' impact, they conclude that political attitudes are very resistant to change.

Closa argues that the Zapatero government's EU policy combined continuity with Socialist policies of the 1990s with some new additions in the form of a commitment to domestic constitutional reform that included a reference to the EU in the Spanish constitution. The use of a referendum to ratify the EU constitution also fitted with Zapatero's republican preferences. The author concludes that, though there were innovations, it would be difficult to conclude that the changes amounted to a second transition.

Powell presents a sweeping analysis of all other areas of foreign policy. The author argues that Zapatero was largely driven by an ideologically motivated desire to reverse the major foreign policy initiatives of Prime Minister Aznar, and that in doing so he was not afraid to depart from the policies once pursued by his Socialist predecessor González. However, the author demonstrates that undoing the policies of earlier governments often proved more difficult than initially anticipated, and that even when it was possible it did not always achieve the intended results.

Acknowledgements

The author thanks Anna Bosco, Kerstin Hamann and the reviewers for comments on previous versions of this work. The author also thanks Omar Encarnación for his initial leadership in assembling a group of scholars interested in the second-transition theme.

Notes

[1] ‘Peripheral’ or ‘regional nationalists’ in the Spanish context refer to those who advocate greater autonomy or even outright independence from the Spanish state.

[2] The Economist, ‘The second transition’, 26 June 2004 (US edn).

[3] El Mundo, ‘ERC pide a Zapatero una “segunda transición”’, 30 March 2004; ‘CiU advierte a Zapatero de que aspira a una nueva transición’, 11 September 2004; ‘Maragall denuncia el intento de boicot de la “segunda transición”’, 22 May 2005; ‘Llamazares cree que la aprobación del nuevo texto provocará otra transición’, 11 July 2005.

[4] El Mundo, ‘Major Oreja reclama al PP que inicie el tercer gran proyecto del centroderecha español’, 22 July 2005.

[5] Spanish election statistics are from the Ministry of the Interior ( < www.mir.es>).

[6] In 2008, Zapatero chose not to seek the favourable investiture votes of other political parties, and instead was elected prime minister with only the votes of his party in a second-round investiture vote that only requires a simple majority of more yes than no votes.

[7] In his second term, he appointed more women than men, including a female minister of defence.

[8] See Platero (2008) for a critical analysis of the limitations of this legislation.

[9] I thank Charles Powell for this quip.