Policy Report Spain (Eng)

1 ACCOUNTABILITY AFTER CRISIS SPAIN Photo: Democracia Real YA!, by Alvaro Herraiz San Martin is licensed by CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 2 Table of Contents Preface ....................................................................................................... 3 Acknowledgements & Disclaimer ................................................................... 4 Executive Summary ...................................................................................... 5 Brief Summary ............................................................................................. 6 Glossary ...................................................................................................... 8 Introduction ................................................................................................. 9 I.The Background to the Crisis .................................................................... 10 II.The Blame Game: Narratives of the Crisis ................................................. 12 III.The Tools of Accountability ..................................................................... 15 Parliamentary Commissions of Inquiry ............................................................................................. 15 Prosecutions ..................................................................................................................................... 17 Apologies .......................................................................................................................................... 21 V.Learning and Reform ............................................................................... 24 Traditional Political Parties: Adaptation to Context Rather than a Learning Process ....................... 24 Superficial Reforms in Justice and the Gattopardo Approach .......................................................... 25 International Actors as Primarily Responsible for Most Substantial Reforms ................................... 28 Conclusion ................................................................................................ 31 Further Reading ......................................................................................... 32 References ................................................................................................ 32 3 Preface This report was commissioned as part of the Accountability After Economic Crisis project – a three-year initiative funded by the Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC-ES/M011321/1). Members of the project are based at City, University of London, Queens University Belfast, and the University of Kent. The project explores the policies of accountability deployed in the aftermath of the global 2008 economic recession (the ‘Great Recession’). Using six case studies (Cyprus, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Portugal, and Spain), we approach political accountability through a comparative and thematic framework that focuses on the use of specific tools of accountability following the financial crisis. The policies of accountability include prosecutions, fact-finding commissions and truth commissions and official apologies. At base, the project hopes to make contributions both to the theory of ‘crisis governance’ as well as to the practice of how governments react to economic crises. More than 100 elected officials, civil servants, academics, journalists, and activists were interviewed for the project. We also developed a novel database with prosecutions, truth commissions and apologies in the aftermath of the crisis in the six countries. Drawing on a experts’ testimonies and the use of a new database, the project provides policy makers with concrete advice for pursuing accountability in future economic crises. The country reports have a wide readership envisioned, including policy makers in all countries and at various levels of government (including international bodies); scholars; activists; and journalists. They have been written without academic jargon, and in both English and relevant local languages, to facilitate their practical utility. We hope that you will find the report useful and urge you to share it amongst your colleagues and networks. For further information about the wider project please feel free to contact us at: https://accountabilityaftereconomiccrisis.com/contact-the-team/ Iosif Kovras, PhD Principal Investigator, Accountability After Economic Crisis Project March 2018 4 Acknowledgements & Disclaimer This report was prepared by Dr Rubén Ramas Ruiz, in association with the Accountability After Economic Crisis project. All views expressed, and any errors, remain the responsibility of the authors. This report is made available free of charge. The views and opinions it contains are those of the author, not of the Economic & Social Research Council. You may use and copy it in whole or in part for educational purposes provided that you (i) do not alter or adapt the content; (ii) use the material on a not-for-profit basis; and (iii) acknowledge the copyright owners and source in any extract from the report. To the fullest extent permitted by law, the authors exclude all liability for your use of the report. The authors assert their moral right under the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the authors of this work. ISBN: 9781903957387 5 Executive Summary In Spain, over the course of 2008, the impact of the global financial crisis contributed to the bursting of a housing bubble, provoking a sharp economic downturn. Since 2010, a social and politico-institutional crisis has followed the economic crisis. This report examines this period with a focus on how reforms and several mechanisms of accountability were implemented. The first section describes the background to the crisis. The causes of the financial crisis in Spain were both internal and international. Nevertheless, several domestic factors explain the scope and intensity of the Spanish banking crisis, and more particularly, the collapse and restructuring of the savings banks, a critical segment of the Spanish financial system. As the executive boards of the savings banks were staffed by political parties apart from banking officers, the apportioning of responsibility to these same actors mostly remained in the hands of the media as well as civil society and grassroots initiatives. In the second section of the report, the narratives over who was to blame for the crisis are tackled. The third section deals with the mechanisms of accountability, prosecutions connected with corruption foremost among them. Indeed, the breadth and scale of judicial action is the primary reason to contest the notion of impunity and the most effective mechanism in recovering the public’s trust in institutions. Nevertheless, delays in legal proceedings and sentencing, as well as the perceived low levels of accountability among powerful individuals, still contribute to the scepticism of Spanish society. Another tool of accountability put into action in Spain has been Parliamentary Commissions of Inquiry (PCIs). However, traditional parties took advantage of their absolute parliamentary majorities to block the creation of PCIs. Until 2016, when the incorporation of Podemos and Ciudadanos into the national parliament broke the Popular Party’s power to veto commissions, PCIs were established exclusively in regional parliaments. To date, while PCIs have been useful instruments for raising critical issues on the public agenda, the regulatory weakness of the PCIs and their politicised nature damage their efficiency as tools of accountability. The section fourth deals with the reform process led by the traditional parties and how it was motivated by the compulsion to adapt to a new political and social context rather than any genuine interest in a learning process based on mechanisms of accountability. As a result, the political and institutional reforms they initiated are mostly superficial, and those that are substantial were implemented only after decisive pressure from international actors, as was the case in the banking sector and the development of effective anti-corruption legislation. The report concludes by noting how the overall analysis of the institutional reforms undertaken to avoid future crises reflects badly on Spanish legislators and other domestic institutional decision- makers. However, the crisis motivated the awakening of an aware and critically engaged society, and this challenges the widespread perception of impunity. 6 Brief Summary Background • The causes of the financial crisis were both internal and international. Nevertheless, domestic reasons explain the magnitude of the collapse and restructuring of the savings banks, a critical segment of the Spanish financial system. Savings banks remained vulnerable to the interference of regional political parties, entrepreneurs’ associations and trade unions, which occupied their executive boards. • The economic and financial dimensions of the crises were accompanied by a social and a politico- institutional crisis. Civil society and grassroots initiatives such as the 15M protest movement, along with the media put the traditional political elites under real pressure, contributing to the challenging of the widespread perception of impunity. Between 2014 and 2016, a sequence of European, Regional and General elections confirmed the end of bipartisanism, and the consolidation of a new four party system. The emergent parties Podemos and Ciudadanos were added to the traditional PP and PSOE. Political Narratives • The joint

Load more