ABSTRACT
In the past 30 years Spanish society has experienced considerable social changes. According to the Spanish Institute National of Statistics (Instituto Nacional de Estadistica – INE) between 1975, the year of dictator Francisco Franco’s death and 1 January 2006 Spanish population has grown by 8.7 million, giving a total of 44.7 million persons. (Anuario El Pais, 2007: 115) Although the birth rate among Spaniards is declining in Spain, as in most countries, immigration has been a major factor to offset the loss of population. Spain is one of the countries with the highest level of immigration along with other west European countries such as the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy. On 1 January 2005, 3.7 million were immigrants working and well-integrated in Spanish society; they represented 8.5 per cent of the population. (Fundación Encuentro, 2006: 219). This contrasts heavily with the postwar period during the Franco period, for which Spain was known as a emigration country to the more industrialised countries of Western Europe such as Belgium, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, France and Germany. It is estimated that between 1961 and 1970 1.7 million Spaniards emigrated to western Europe representing at that time 6.3 per cent of the population. Due to the recession of the mid 1970s in most west European countries, emigration declined considerably after 1973-4 (Cazorla-Perez andMontabesPereira, 1983: 185;Cazes, Domingo and Gauthier, 1985: 76-7). Today, Spain is a destination for immigrants around the world, particularly Latin America and the Maghreb.
