The politics of Spain takes place under the framework established by the Constitution of 1978. Spain is established as a social and democratic sovereign country wherein the national sovereignty is vested in the people, from which the powers of the state emanate.
In Spain, an autonomous community is the first sub-national level of political and administrative division, created in accordance with the Spanish Constitution of 1978, with the aim of guaranteeing limited autonomy of the nationalities and regions that make up Spain.
The Senate is the upper house of the Cortes Generales, which along with the Congress of Deputies – the lower chamber – comprises the Parliament of the Kingdom of Spain. The Senate meets in the Palace of the Senate in Madrid. The presiding officer of the Senate is the president of the Senate, who is elected by the members at the first sitting after each national election.
Spain is a diverse country integrated by contrasting entities with varying economic and social structures, languages, and historical, political and cultural traditions. The Spanish constitution responds ambiguously to the claims of historic nationalities while proclaiming a common and indivisible homeland of all Spaniards.
Andalusian nationalism is the nationalism that asserts that Andalusians are a nation and promotes the cultural unity of Andalusians. In the past it was considered to be represented primarily by the Andalusian Party. However, the party disbanded in 2015; there are also lesser political organisations that identify with Andalusian nationalism. Some political forces without parliamentary presence like Nación Andaluza and Asamblea Nacional de Andalucía may be found advocating independence. There is also a movement defending the idea that Andalusian is not a dialect of Spanish, but a language of its own.
Nominally, a statute of autonomy is a law hierarchically located under the constitution of a country and, usually, over any other form of legislation. This legislative corpus concedes autonomy (self-government) to a subnational unit, and the articles usually mimic the form of a constitution, establishing the organization of the autonomous government, the electoral rules, the distribution of competences between different levels of governance and other regional-specific provisions, like the protection of cultural or lingual realities.
Both the perceived nationhood of Spain, and the perceived distinctions between different parts of its territory derive from historical, geographical, linguistic, economic, political, ethnic and social factors.
The Statute of Autonomy of Andalusia is a law hierarchically located under the 1978 Constitution of Spain, and over any legislation passed by the Andalusian Autonomous Government. During the Spanish transition to democracy, Andalusia was the one region of Spain to take its path to autonomy under what was called the "vía rápida" allowed for by Article 151 of the 1978 Constitution. That article was set out for regions like Andalusia that had been prevented by the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War from adopting a statute of autonomy during the period of the Second Spanish Republic. Following this procedure, Andalusia was constituted as an autonomous community February 28, 1980. The regional holiday of the Andalusia Day commemorates that date. The statute was approved the following year by the Spanish national government.
The 2007 Spanish regional elections were held on Sunday, 27 May 2007, to elect the regional parliaments of thirteen of the seventeen autonomous communities—Aragon, Asturias, the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Cantabria, Castile and León, Castilla–La Mancha, Extremadura, La Rioja, Madrid, Murcia, Navarre and the Valencian Community—, not including Andalusia, the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia, which had separate electoral cycles. 812 of 1,206 seats in the regional parliaments were up for election, as well as the 50 seats in the regional assemblies of Ceuta and Melilla. The elections were held simultaneously with local elections all throughout Spain.
A referendum on the approval of the Basque Statute of Autonomy was held in the Basque Country on Thursday, 25 October 1979. Voters were asked whether they ratified a proposed Statute of Autonomy of the Basque Country bill organizing the historical territories of Álava, Biscay and Gipuzkoa into an autonomous community of Spain. The final draft of the bill had been approved by the Basque parliamentary assembly on 29 December 1978, but it required ratification through a binding referendum and its subsequent approval by the Spanish Cortes Generales, as established by Article 151 of the Spanish Constitution of 1978.
A referendum on the approval of the Catalan Statute of Autonomy was held in Catalonia on Thursday, 25 October 1979. Voters were asked whether they ratified a proposed Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia bill organizing the provinces of Barcelona, Gerona, Lérida and Tarragona into an autonomous community of Spain. The final draft of the bill had been approved by the Catalan Assembly of Parliamentarians on 29 December 1978, and by the Congress of Deputies on 13 August 1979, but it required ratification through a binding referendum and its subsequent approval by the Spanish Cortes Generales, as established by Article 151 of the Spanish Constitution of 1978. The referendum was held simultaneously with a similar vote in the Basque Country.
A statutory referendum on the approval of the Basque Statute of Autonomy was held in the Basque Country on Sunday, 5 November 1933. Voters were asked whether they ratified a proposed draft Statute of Autonomy of the Basque Country. Article 12 of the Spanish Constitution of 1931 allowed for Spanish provinces to be organized into "autonomous regions", provided that a regional Statute was proposed by a majority of the provinces' municipalities comprising at least two-thirds of the provincial population and that two-thirds majority of all those eligible to vote accepted the draft Statute.
The 2003 Spanish regional elections were held on Sunday, 25 May 2003, to elect the regional parliaments of thirteen of the seventeen autonomous communities—Aragon, Asturias, the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Cantabria, Castile and León, Castilla–La Mancha, Extremadura, La Rioja, Madrid, Murcia, Navarre and the Valencian Community—, not including Andalusia, the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia, which had separate electoral cycles. 792 of 1,186 seats in the regional parliaments were up for election, as well as the 50 seats in the regional assemblies of Ceuta and Melilla. The elections were held simultaneously with local elections all throughout Spain.
A referendum on the approval of the Galician Statute of Autonomy was held in Galicia on Sunday, 21 December 1980. Voters were asked whether they ratified a proposed Statute of Autonomy of Galicia bill organizing the provinces of La Coruña, Lugo, Orense and Pontevedra into an autonomous community of Spain. The final draft of the bill had been approved following an inter-party agreement on 26 September 1980, but it required ratification through a binding referendum and its subsequent approval by the Spanish Cortes Generales, as established under Article 151 of the Spanish Constitution of 1978.
The 1999 Spanish regional elections were held on Sunday, 13 June 1999, to elect the regional parliaments of thirteen of the seventeen autonomous communities—Aragon, Asturias, the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Cantabria, Castile and León, Castilla–La Mancha, Extremadura, La Rioja, Madrid, Murcia, Navarre and the Valencian Community, not including Andalusia, the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia, which had separate electoral cycles. 784 of 1,178 seats in the regional parliaments were up for election, as well as the 50 seats in the regional assemblies of Ceuta and Melilla. The elections were held simultaneously with local elections all throughout Spain, as well as the 1999 European Parliament election.
The Statute of Autonomy of Melilla is the basic institutional norm of the autonomous city of Melilla, in Spain. It is an organic law approved on 13 March 1995 and published in the Official State Gazette the following day, together with the equivalent of the city of Ceuta. It established Melilla as an autonomous city, because before it was a municipality belonging to the province of Málaga. It was the result of a 17-year process that originated from the Fifth Transitory Provision of the Constitution of 1978 that allowed the subsequent constitution of Ceuta and Melilla in autonomous communities.
The Statute of Autonomy of Ceuta is the basic institutional norm of the autonomous city of Ceuta. It was approved by the Cortes Generales through Organic Law 1/1995 of March 13, published in the Boletín Oficial del Estado the following day. At the same time, the Statute of Autonomy of Melilla was also approved.
A referendum on the approval of the Andalusian Statute of Autonomy was held in Andalusia on Tuesday, 20 October 1981. Voters were asked whether they ratified a proposed Statute of Autonomy of Andalusia bill organizing the provinces of Almería, Cádiz, Córdoba, Granada, Huelva, Jaén, Málaga and Seville into an autonomous community of Spain. The final draft of the bill had been approved by the Andalusian Assembly of Parliamentarians on 1 March 1981, but it required ratification through a binding referendum and its subsequent approval by the Spanish Cortes Generales, as established under Article 151 of the Spanish Constitution of 1978. The referendum was held simultaneously with a regional election in Galicia.
In Spain, a president of an Autonomous Community serves as the chief executive officer in each of the seventeen Autonomous communities and in the two Autonomous cities, where they receive the name of "Mayor-Presidents". As such, regional presidents are responsible for implementing regional laws and overseeing the operation of the state executive branch. As regional leaders, governors advance and pursue new and revised policies and programs using a variety of tools, among them executive laws, executive budgets, and legislative proposals.
Autonomous Parliament is the usual colloquial name given in Spain to the legislative power in each autonomous community. The autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla have assemblies without their own legislative capacity. The name in each community is established by the respective statutes of autonomy and depending on the community, the autonomous parliament is known as an assembly, courts or parliament. The 1978 Spanish Constitution refers to them as "assemblies" or "legislative assemblies".
