Autonomous Communities of Spain

Spain 's fifty provinces (provincias) are grouped into seventeen autonomous communities (comunidades autónomas), in addition to two African autonomous cities (ciudadesautónomas) ( Ceuta and Melilla ).

Formation and Powers

Centralism, nationalism and separatism played an important role in the Spanish transition . For fear thatseparatism would lead to instability and a dictatorial backlash, a compromise was struck among the moderate political partiestaking part in the drafting of the SpanishConstitution of 1978 . The aim was to appease separatist forces and so disarm the extreme right. A highly decentralized state was established, compared both with the previous Francoist regime and with most modern territorial arrangements in WesternEuropean nations.

The autonomous communities have wide legislative and executive autonomy, with their own parliaments and regional governments.As an example, in Catalonia the regional government has allowed registered partnership between homosexuals in order to bringtheir rights on a par with heterosexual married couples, whereas this form of partnership has no legal standing in the rest ofSpain. Similar laws have been enacted by some cities, though.

The distribution of competences is different for every community, collected in the "autonomy statute" (estatuto deautonomía). There is a de facto distinction beween "historic" communities (Basque Country, Catalonia, Galicia, andAndalusia) and the rest. The historic ones initially received more functions, including the ability of the regional presidents tochoose the timing of the regional elections (as long as they happen at most 4 years apart). As another example, the BasqueCountry and Catalonia have full-range police forces of their own: Ertzaintza inthe Basque Country and Mossos d'Esquadra in Catalonia . Other communities have a limited-bailiwick one or none at all.

The Constitution recognizes the historical rights of regions in general terms. This is a reference to the special status ofcertain regions with respect to the whole as a result of past agreements between the central government and the region, sometimes centuries ago. It is understood that those rights need to be actualized through the estatuto de autonomía. Thisexplains why the Basque Country and Navarre collect taxes and negotiate with the Spanish government on how much they mustcontribute to the state's treasury while the rest receive allocations according to the "transferred" government functions.

The initial intent was not that every part of Spain should become part of an autonomous community, but that only the"historic" communities would be created. However, shortly after the Constitution was approved, a wave of creation of autonomouscommunities ensued. This was dubbed café para todos ("coffee for everybody") by critics of the decentralization.

There has been a tendency for "slow-track" communities to aspire to the function range of their elders. Even in communitieswithout a separatist tradition, the local branches of parties fight for more power and budgets. Current points of disagreementare tax collection and representation at institutions of the EuropeanUnion .

The Spanish Constitution of 1931 gave autonomy to Catalonia and the Basque Country , but the Spanishwar crushed this experiment.

List

Here is a list of the communities and provinces.

See also:

• List ofSpanish autonomous communities by area
• List of Spanish autonomous communities by population
• List of ISO 3166 codes for Spanish autonomous communities andprovinces

The map is stable, though some minorities claim separate communities for León, Orihuela and Álava. Also, there is an enclaveof Burgos (Castilla y León) inside Álava (País Vasco), called Condado de Treviño where some inhabitants would like to leave Burgos and joinÁlava.

Plazas de soberanía

There are five "places of sovereignty" ( plazas desoberanía ) near Morocco , under direct Spanish administration:

• Ceuta and Melilla have a status betweenplain cities (they can produce regulations to execute Acts , withhigher regulation competencies than normal city councils ) and autonomouscommunities (these cities cannot produce autonomous Acts).
• Islas Chafarinas ,
• Peñón de Alhucemas ,
• and Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera

External link

• Spanish autonomouscommunities (Rulers.org)