ABSTRACT
Political scientists have often described the Spanish transition as a smooth, consensual, peaceful and elite-driven process. According to Juan Linz, the Spanish model of political engineering is a paradigmatic case of “pacted democratic transition and rapid democratic consolidation, much as the Weimar Republic became paradigmatic for the study of democratic breakdown” (Linz and Stepan 1996, 87). Following the death of Francisco Franco in 1975, the authoritarian structures were gradually replaced by democratic institutions and practices that aimed at preventing the polarization and instability that had condemned the 1930s Second Republic. This exercise of democratic crafting was the result of internal factors and also of the international context that was common to other third wave transitions. The roles of both regime reformers and opposition moderates, especially those who had witnessed the civil war, were instrumental in creating an atmosphere in which pacts, consensus and moderation were possible. The number of strikes, marches and demonstrations during the mid-1970s remained high but opposition parties were sometimes ready to push for social demobilization in order for agreements to prosper. Both “agency” and “structure” contributed to a successful process of institutionbuilding, which was completed by December 1978. However, this idealized picture of a tightly controlled transformation can only be accurate if we consciously exclude the Basque Country from the analysis as the transition in this region displayed very different characteristics (Piñuel 1986; Ugarte 1996; Aguilar 1998; Edles 1998; Rivera 2000; Llera Ramo 2002; Garaikoetxea 2002; Gurrutxaga 2005).
