ABSTRACT
One of the most seminal articles on the transformation of the public policy process in Spain was written by Richard Gunther. There, he clearly sees a relationship between the quality of public policy and regime change from authoritarian dictatorship to democracy. Gunther’s assessment is that the democratisation of the public policy process made the outcomes of implementation accountable to the population which is able to show support or disappointment every four years. A major aspect of public policy is that the share of the budget related to the redistribution of social policies and education has increased considerably in the 1980s and 1990s. The policies of the Socialist government of the 1980s were important redistributive ones, in order to create a more democratic society. Another aspect that Gunther mentions is the fact that the new public policies were better integrated into global trends set up by the OECD than the previous Francoist regime. Another feature of the new democratic political system was the growing inclusion of interest groups in the policy process. Although civil society was and is still quite anaemic in comparison to other West European countries, democratic conditions allowed for the emergence of interest groups which are more or less successfully influencing the policy process.
