ABSTRACT
The origins of the present Spanish political system must be found after the death of Franco – who had managed to assert his rule over the country after the Civil War (1936–39) that put to an end the liberal democratic regime of the Second Republic (1931–36). Following Franco's demise in November 1975, his successor as Head of State. King Juan Carlos I, opened the transition to democracy. To lead the process the King appointed in July 1976 as Prime Minister a young member of the reformist sector within the regime. Adolfo Suárez. In his first government, Suárez had to cope with strong pressures coming from both the more recalcitrant sectors of the Franco regime and the democratic opposition – the former opposed to any kind of move towards democracy, and the latter demanding a complete rupture with the previous regime. The Transition became a process of reforma pactada/ruptura pactada through elite settlement allowing the institutions of the Franco regime to be substituted for democratic ones with the new status quo accepted by the opposition as it was comparable to many contemporary western democracies. Democracy was finally re-established with the general election of June 1977, inaugurating a constituent period ending up with the institutionalization of parliamentary monarchy in the 1978 Constitution (Linz et al. 2003; Linz and Stepan 1996: ch. 6).
