ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces some key issues of the general history and migrations history of the Iberian countries, focusing on Barcelona and Lisbon. Today, the Iberian Peninsula is situated in south-western Europe, separated from the rest of the continent by the Pyrenees. Iberian relations with Europe have been influential, and after the seventeenth century have determined its situation. Iberian countries during the eighteenth century lost their leading role and became increasingly dependent on other European countries. In a more modest and informal way, Portuguese people saw the participation of a few European comrades in the revolutionary process after 1974. The chapter examines the debates over post-dictatorship immigration in Spain and Portugal, and it describes social and economic conditions which confront migrants when they arrive in Barcelona and Lisbon. Official statistics on foreign immigrants in Spain only allow a general indication of the real composition of the immigrant population, owing to the existence of a significant number of dedocumented immigrants.
