ABSTRACT
King Juan Carlos Ia Borbo´n y Borbo´n Born in Rome in 1938. He lived in exile until the late 1940s. He studied at the academies of the Spanish Army, Navy and Air Force. He completed his studies in law and economics at the Complutense University in Madrid. In 1969, he was nominated as the successor of dictator Francisco Franco. After Franco’s death he became the new king of Spain and steered the democratic transition. The new constitution of 1978 legitimised the re-establishment of the monarchy and Juan Carlos I as the formal head of state, which he has been for the past twenty-eight years.
