Spain's Voters Take a Middle Road
VALLS-RUSSELL, JANICE
THE TASK FOR GONZALEZ Spain's Voters Take a Middle Road BY JANCE VALLS-RUSSELL Madrid Unlike their French neighbors, who ousted the governing Socialists last April, Spaniards on June 6...
...they believe their regions are destined to be subdivisions of an EC that will one day become a supranational entity...
...The 40-year-old PP leader, Jose Maria Anzar, was impressive in a televised debate with the Prime Minister...
...Church weddings, with all the attendant family rejoicing, remain hugely popular...
...They found that at present one Spaniard in three never goes to church, but one in four still does so at least once a week (compared with 40 per cent in '81...
...Yet as was shown by an opinion poll released late in 1992, to little notice outside Spain, this society has not abandoned traditional values altogether...
...In contrast to 1981, when a handful of officers held Parliament hostage, a contingent of young Spanish soldiers is serving under the UN flag in Bosnia, where two have been killed...
...The Basques are quietly setting up a "national" (i.e...
...Voters gently clipped the wings of their vision, though...
...Still, the population is by no means politically apathetic: June 6 saw a turnout of 77 per cent...
...The pollsters used questions asked in 1981 and compared the results...
...regional) bank—not to print their own money, they are quick to add, but to control the area's reserves...
...Today they sprawl in front of their televisions watching videocassettes...
...The outcome of the coalition talks aside, Gonzalez should be able to hammer out a broad agreement with the regional parties and the United Left on the need for investment in basic infrastructure and for putting emphasis on vocational training...
...Recent Socialist scandals and discord did not blot out appreciation for the many reforms brought about under Gonzalez...
...That would seem to explain the independent personalities he persuaded to join his ticket, such as Battasar Garzon, an outstanding judge and a friend of Italy's late anti-Mafia investigator, Giovanni Falcone...
...Spanish women have flocked to the universities (where they currently outnumber men) and gone on to become teachers, journalists and managers—without burning their bras or rejecting their home lives...
...The June 21 car bombing that killed seven in downtown Madrid, for which the Basque separatist organization ETA is believed to be responsible, was a stark reminder that violence of that sort is not over...
...Gonzalez' failure to secure a clear majority in the Cortes, or Parliament, reflects a widespread disenchantment with the perceived snobbery of some Socialist deputies and the involvement in financial scandals of others...
...He would prefer a deal with the Basques and the Catalans...
...And the voters have made clear that they expect their politicians to start working together—like a big Spanish family...
...Certain cultural habits, meanwhile, have faded...
...Suarez, who found himself heading a minority Center-Right government in 1979, was unable to muster broad parliamentary support...
...civil marriage and living out of wedlock appeal to merely 7 per cent and 6 per cent, respectively...
...Moderation has reaped rewards...
...This pincer movement killed the Democratic and Social Center (CDS), founded in the '80s by former Prime Minister Adolfo Suarez, who masterminded the postFranco transition to democracy...
...During the heady democratic rebirth of the late 1970s and early '80s, young people sat in tapas cafes until the early hours of the morning and remade the world...
...Similarly, the PSOE has shed most of its economic ideology...
...But for the first time since Gonzalez' sweeping victory in 1982, they established a solid parliamentary opposition by according the Center-Right People's Party (PP) 34.8 per cent of the ballots cast...
...During the Socialist 1980s Spain shook off the last rigid trappings of Catholicism and the Franco dictatorship...
...He has warned the Prime Minister against trying to go it alone...
...One of the most graphic has been the overhaul of the Armed Forces, quietly executed by Serra...
...THE TASK FOR GONZALEZ Spain's Voters Take a Middle Road BY JANCE VALLS-RUSSELL Madrid Unlike their French neighbors, who ousted the governing Socialists last April, Spaniards on June 6 renewed the mandate of the Socialist Party (PSOE) headed by Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez, giving it 38.6 per cent of the vote...
...Another deeply ingrained custom, becoming part of the underground economy, also helps to explain how the country can manage with a high proportion of its work force officially jobless (government statistics loosely estimate unemployment at 17 to 21 per cent...
...Approximately 1 million adults under 30 are unemployed, and the vast majority of them have simply continued to live at home...
...The caution and mild reproval of the Spaniards comes at the end of a decade of considerable social evolution...
...Four years at the helm of the opposition will give Anzar a chance to show whether he has the fiber to lead the country one day...
...Nevertheless, the two could play a key role in Gonzalez' fourth term...
...In fact, only the People's Party scored a major gain at the national level, increasing its representation in the 350-seat Lower House of Parliament from 109 to 141...
...In addition, Gonzalez took Spain into the European Community (EC) and it ratified the Maastricht Treaty with overwhelming support in Parliament and in the street...
...Most of the people polled said they tend to agree with their parents on ethical, religious, sexual, and political matters...
...Criticism of the military has been muted as well by its efficient response to terrorism...
...Pujol would like to levy taxes...
...failing that, he wants 15 percent of the income tax collected in Catalonia for local projects...
...Both the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) and Catalonia's Convergence and Union Party (CiU) lost ground to the Socialists...
...Gonzalez' best ambassador in Catalonia is Narcis Serra, once Mayor of Barcelona...
...Only the Communist limb of the misnamed United Left, a formation that includes Greens, feminists and disgruntled ex-Socialists, objected to Maastricht...
...The Socialists and regionalists are also anxious to cut inflation (running at 4.5 per cent) and to reduce Spain's deficit (standing at 5 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product...
...The CDS lost all of its 14 Cortes seats...
...In return for their backing, the Basques and Catalans will expect greater autonomy...
...One in five attends services only at Christmas and Easter (up from 4 per cent), both occasions for family gatherings...
...With only 159 Socialist deputies in the new Parliament, he knows he cannot rely on his party alone, and some observers here say he does not really want to...
...At this writing Gonzalez is trying to form a coalition, the alternative being a minority government that would require negotiating support issue by issue...
...To a lesser extent so did moderate regionalists in Euskadi and Catalonia...
...But by granting extensive devolution to Euskadi while rounding up terrorists and dismantling their financial network, the authorities have done much to weaken and isolate the group...
...Despite three devaluations of the peseta in the past nine months, Gonzalez hopes to meet Maastricht's terms for monetary union and thus place Spain nearer the top of the European league...
...Separatists in Euskadi, Spain's Basque region, lost popular support as well...
...The mainstream parties of Catalonia and Euskadi are overwhelmingly pro-European...
...Jordi Pujol, the party's leader and head of the Catalan administration for 13 years, is more cautious...
...And that—providing the politicians take the hint—could produce the political balance needed to deal with Spain's economic crisis...
...One of them has described him as "a leader who has grown weary of his party, before his party could grow weary of him...
...Janice Valls-Russell writes about French and Spanish affairs for the NL...
...Catalan economists believe Madrid should raise funds by selling off state enterprises that compete with the private sector, but many are losing money and may prove difficult to unload—not to mention shut down—in a time of recession...
...Trade unionists and a group of PSOE members favor an agreement with the United Left, but the Prime Minister has misgivings about its anti-Maastricht element...
...PNV leader Xabier Arzallus says his party is prepared to back Gonzalez, although doing so would be tantamount to a sellout in the eyes of many Basques...
...Among his personal friends in the CiU is its second-ranking figure, Miguel Roca, who has indicated an eagerness to join a new Madrid government...
...The Center-Right imploded the following year, leaving the Socialists with virtually no opposition throughout most of the '80s...
...The PP attracted votes by moving centerward on controversial issues...
...for example, it now accepts Spain's restrictive abortion law...
...The PSOE was further hurt by internal squabbling between what the press here calls the "apparatchiks," led by old-fashioned Leftist Alfonso Guerra, and the more business-oriented "renovators," made up of men respected outside the party, such as former Defense Minister and outgoing Deputy Prime Minister Narcis Serra...
...Family solidarity has cushioned the impact of Spain's severe recession...
...Plagued by economic problems, terrorist attacks and military plots, he resigned in early 1981—precipitating a failed coup attempt...
...That too, of course, will require broad domestic political cooperation...
Vol. 76 • June 1993 • No. 8
