Recent events in Spain deem it necessary to revisit the Spanish transition to democracy from a different perspective. There is still enough evidence to support the claim that, albeit not without its problems, the Spanish transition succeeded in developing a strong market economy within the framework of integration into Europe, raising the welfare indicators to Western European levels and establishing a robust democracy (Waisman, 2005: 1-3). However, the idea that the ‘viability of Spain’s democracy’ has been achieved to ‘some cost to its quality’ (McDonough et al., 1998: 1) seems to be more relevant than ever. This paper seeks to re-examine the role the process of European integration – by influencing the speed with which the process was completed, as well as the nature of how this was achieved (via pacts) – played in shaping some of the peculiarities of Spanish democracy that helps us explain the current democratic crisis.
