To the west, Spain borders Portugal, to the south, it borders Gibraltar (a British overseas territory) and Morocco, through its cities in North Africa (Ceuta and Melilla). To the northeast, along the Pyrenees mountain range, it borders France and the tiny principality of Andorra. It also includes the Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean Sea, the Canary Islands in the Atlantic Ocean and a number of uninhabited islands on the Mediterranean side of the strait of Gibraltar, known as Plazas de soberanía, such as the Chafarine islands, the isle of Alborán, the "rocks" (peñones) of Vélez and Alhucemas, and the tiny Isla Perejil. In the northeast along the Pyrenees, a small exclave town called Llívia in Catalonia is surrounded by French territory.

There are several competing hypotheses as to the origin of the Roman name "Hispania", the root of the Spanish name España and the English name Spain. These hypotheses are based on slender evidence and must be treated cautiously.

Prehistory and pre-Roman peoples in the Iberian Peninsula

Modern humans in the form of Cro-Magnons began arriving in the Iberian Peninsula from north of the Pyrenees some 35,000 years ago. The more conspicuous sign of prehistoric human settlements are the famous paintings in the northern Spanish Altamira (cave), which were done ca. 15,000 BCE.

The earliest urban culture documented is that of the semi-mythical southern city of Tartessos, pre- 1100 BCE. The seafaring Phoenicians, Greeks and Carthaginians founded trading colonies along the Mediterranean coast over a period of several centuries. The Greeks are responsible for the name Iberia, apparently after the river Iber (Ebro). The Carthigians struggled with the Greeks and then the Romans.

The native peoples which the Romans met at the time of their invasion were the Iberians, inhabiting from the southwest part of the peninsula and along the Mediterranean side through to the northeast part of it, with the Celts, mostly inhabiting the north and northwest part of the peninsula. In the inner part of the peninsula, where both groups were in contact, a mixed, distinctive, culture was present, the one known as Celtiberian.

Roman Empire and Germanic invasions

Hispania supplied Rome with food, olive oil, wine and metal. The emperors Trajan, Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius and Theodosius I, the philosopher Seneca and the poets Martial, Quintilian and Lucan were born in Spain. The Spanish Bishops held the Council at Elvira in 306. The collapse of the Western Roman empire did not lead to the same wholesale destruction of Western classical society as happened in areas like Britain, Gaul and Germania Inferior during the Dark Ages, even if the institutions, infrastructure and economy did suffer considerable degradation. Spain's present languages, its religion, and the basis of its laws originate from this period. The centuries of uninterrupted Roman rule and settlement left a deep and enduring imprint upon the culture of Spain.

The first hordes of Barbarians to invade Hispania arrived in the 5th century, as the Roman empire decayed. The tribes of Goths, Visigoths, Swebians (Suebi), Alans, Asdings and Vandals, arrived to Spain by crossing the Pyrenees mountain range. They were all of Germanic origin. This led to the establishment of the Swebian Kingdom in Gallaecia, in the northwest, and the Visigothic Kingdom elsewhere. For a while, the Germanic peoples lived under their own laws while the much larger romanized local populations continued to live under Roman-inspired law. The Visigothic Kingdom eventually encompassed the entire Iberian Peninsula with the Roman Catholic conversion of the Goth monarchs. The horseshoe arch, which was adopted and perfected by the later Muslim era builders, was in fact originally an example of Visigothic art.

Muslim Iberia

In the 8th century, nearly all the Iberian peninsula was quickly conquered (711–718), by mainly Berber Muslims (see Moors), who had crossed over from North Africa. Visigothic Spain was the last of a series of lands conquered by the Islamically inspired armies of the Umayyad empire. Indeed, they continued northwards until they were defeated in central France at the Battle of Tours, 732. Only three small Christian counties in the mountains of northern Spain managed to cling to their independence: Asturias, Navarra and Aragon, which were eventually to become kingdoms.
Interior of the Mezquita in Córdoba, a Muslim mosque until the Reconquest, after which it became a Christian cathedral.
Interior of the Mezquita in Córdoba, a Muslim mosque until the Reconquest, after which it became a Christian cathedral.

Under Islam Christians and Jews were recognised as "peoples of the book", and so given dhimmi status. Christians and Jews were free to practise their religion, but faced certain discriminations and financial burdens. Conversion to Islam proceeded at a steadily increasing pace, as it offered social and economic and political advantages. By the 11th century Muslims are believed to have outnumbered Christians in Al-Andalus.

The Muslim community in Spain was itself diverse and beset by social tensions. The Berber people of North Africa had provided the bulk of the armies, clashed with the Arab leadership from the Middle East. The Berbers soon gave up attempting to settle the harsh lands in the north of the Meseta Central handed to them by the Arab rulers. Over time the relatively tiny number of Moors gradually increased with immigration and inter-marriage. Large Moorish populations grew, most notably in the south, especially in the Guadalquivir River valley, and on the Mediterranean coastal plain of Valencia. Towards the end of their reign they became concentrated in the mountains around Granada.

Cordoba, Muslim Spain's capital, was the richest and most sophisticated city of medieval Europe. It was not until the 12th century that western medieval Christendom began reaching comparable levels of sophistication, and this was due in no small part to the stimulus coming from Muslim Spain. Mediterranean trade and cultural exchange flourished. Muslims imported a rich intellectual tradition from the Middle East and North Africa. Muslim and Jewish scholars played a major part in reviving and contributing to the tradition of classical Greek philosophy, mathematics and science in Western Europe. New crops and techniques led to a remarkable expansion of agriculture. Magnificent mosques, palaces, and other monuments were constructed. Outside the cities, the mixture of large estates and small farms that existed in Roman times remained largely intact because Muslim leaders rarely dispossessed landowners.

The relative social peace broke down with the later, stricter Muslim ruling sects of Almoravids and Almohads.

Roman, Jewish, and Muslim culture interacted in complex ways, giving Spanish culture — religion, literature, music, art and architecture, and writing systems — a rich and distinctive heritage. However, as the 11th century drew to a close most of the north and centre of Spain was back under Christian control.

Fall of Muslim rule and unification

The long period of expansion of Spain's Christian kingdoms, beginning in 722 with the Muslim defeat in the Battle of Covadonga and the creation of the Christian Kingdom of Asturias, only eleven years after the Moorish invasion, is called the Reconquista. As early as 739 Muslim forces were driven out of Galicia, which was to host one of medieval Christianity's holiest sites, Santiago de Compostella. Areas in the north became a base for the Christians. The breakup up of Al-Andalus into the competing Taifa kingdoms helped the consolidating Christian kingdoms. The 1085 conquest of the central city of Toledo largely completed the reconquest of the northern half of Spain. As the Reconquista advanced south the Muslim population either fled or was required to convert to Catholicism. Mosques and synagogues were converted into churches.

After a revival of Moorish fortunes in the 12th century the great Moorish strongholds in the south fell to Christian Spain in the 13th century - Córdoba in 1236 and Seville in 1248. This soon left only the small Muslim enclave of Granada as a tributary state in the south. It came to an end in 1492 when Isabella and Ferdinand captured Granada. The Treaty of Granada[3] guaranteed religious tolerance toward Muslims while Spain's Jewish population of over 200,000 people was expelled that year. At Ferdinand's urging the Spanish Inquisition had been established in 1478. With a history of being invaded by three Islamic empires (Ummayad, Almoravid and Almohad), and a fourth attempt (Marinids), it was feared that local Muslims were a danger. Aragonese labourers were angered by landlords' use of Moorish workers to undercut them. A 1499 Muslim uprising, triggered by forced conversions, was crushed and was followed by the first of the expulsions of Muslims, in 1502. The year 1492 was also marked by the discovery of the New World. Isabella I funded the voyages of Christopher Columbus. Ferdinand II and Isabella I, as exemplars of the Renaissance New Monarchs, consolidated the reform of their respective economies that had been pursued by their predecessors and enforced reforms that weakened the position of the great magnates against the new centralized crowns. In their contests with the French army in the Italian Wars, Spanish forces under Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba eventually achieved success, against the French knights, thereby revolutionizing warfare. The combined Spanish kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, vibrant and expansive, emerged as a European great power.

With the union of Castile and Aragón in 1479 by Isabella I and Frerdinand II and the subsequent conquest of Granada in 1492 and Navarre in 1512, the word Spain (España, in Spanish - derived from the ancient "Hispania") began being used only to refer to the new united kingdoms (they kept their separate laws and institutions) and not to the whole of Hispania.

Rise as a World Power: From the Renaissance to the nineteenth century

Until the late 15th century, Castile, León, Aragón, and Navarre were four independent states, with independent languages, laws, monarchs, armies and, in the case of Aragon and Castile, two empires: the former with one in the Mediterranean and the latter with a new, rapidly growing one in the Americas. The process of political unification continued into the early 16th century. It was the unification of these separate Iberian empires that became the base of what is now referred to as the Spanish Empire. The political, social and military adaptations of the 15th century and with the rising output of the American silver mines from the middle of the 16th century, made Spain the most powerful country in Europe throughout the 16th century and the first half of the 17th century.
An anachronous map showing areas pertaining to the Spanish Empire at various times over a period exceeding 400 years. For detailed key click on map. The Spanish colonial empire at its territorial height in 1790. Regions of influence (explored/claimed but never controlled or vice versa) or short-lived / disputed colonies. Portuguese possessions ruled jointly under the Spanish sovereign, 1580–1640. Territories lost at, or prior to, the 1714 Peace of Utrecht.
Equatorial Guinea, Spanish Morocco and West Africa, 1884–1975.
An anachronous map showing areas pertaining to the Spanish Empire at various times over a period exceeding 400 years. For detailed key click on map. The Spanish colonial empire at its territorial height in 1790. Regions of influence (explored/claimed but never controlled or vice versa) or short-lived / disputed colonies. Portuguese possessions ruled jointly under the Spanish sovereign, 1580–1640. Territories lost at, or prior to, the 1714 Peace of Utrecht. Equatorial Guinea, Spanish Morocco and West Africa, 1884–1975.

It was in the 16th century, during the long reigns of the first two Spanish Habsburgs (Charles I and Philip II) that Spain reached its apogee. The Spanish Empire covered most territories of South and Central America, Mexico, the south of North America (New Spain), some of Eastern Asia (including the Philippines), the Iberian peninsula (including the Portuguese empire (from 1580), southern Italy, Sicily, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. It was the first empire about which it was said that the sun did not set. It was an Age of Discovery, with daring explorations by sea and by land, the opening up of new trade routes across oceans, conquests and the beginning of European colonialism. Along with the arrival of precious metals, spices, luxuries, and new agricultural plants the explorers, soldiers, sailors, traders and missionaries also brought back with them a flood of knowledge that transformed the European understanding of the world.

Of note during the 16th and 17th centuries was the cultural efflorescence now known as the Spanish Golden Age and the intellectual movement known as the School of Salamanca.

The lingering “decline of Spain” set in during the 17th century. This stagnation was a complex phenomena involving political, social and economic factors, but key to it was the strain of ever expanding military efforts. For a long time these were generally successful (with the notable exception in the north of the Low Countries) in defending the territorial and religious integrity of the scattered Habsburg’s empire. But these massive ongoing commitments ultimately bankrupted and bled Spain dry during the vast Thirty Years War that tore Europe apart. By 1640 rebellions led to the succession of Portugal and Catalonia. With forces stretched to the limit across Europe, Spain still managed to recover Catalonia and the Italian territories but not Portugal, thereby also losing those territories ruled from Lisbon, including Brazil, and strongholds in Africa and India and with it a good deal of the lucrative eastern spice trade and most of the Atlantic slave trade. The growing beggary forced many to live by their wits and picaresque literature flourished.

With the death of a childless Spanish Habsburg king controversy over succession to the throne consumed much of Europe during the first years of the 18th century. The War of Spanish Succession, which combined a wide ranging international conflict with a civil war, finally cost Spain its European empire and its postion as a leading power on the Continent, although it retained its overseas territories.

A new dynasty—the French Bourbons—was installed, and with it a true Spanish state was established when the absolutist first Bourbon king Philip V of Spain in 1707 dissolved the pro-parliamentary Aragon court and unified the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon into a single, unified Kingdom of Spain, abolishing many of the regional privileges and autonomies (fueros) that had hampered Habsburg rule. The National Day of Catalonia still commemorates this defeat.

Following the wars at its commencement the 18th century saw a long, slow recovery, with an expansion of the iron and steel industries in the Basque Country, a growth in ship building, a gradual increase in trade and the growth of Castile’s population. The new Bourbon monarchy drew on the French system in trying to modernize the administration and economy, in which it was much more successful in the former than the latter. With the ending of Cadiz's royally granted trade monopoly with the American territories trade finally began to grow strongly in the last years of the century. Spain's effective military assistance to the rebellious British colonies in the American War of Independence won it renewed international standing.

Napoleonic rule and its consequences

The reform efforts of Charles III and his ministers led to a profound gap between partisans of the Enlightenment (Afrancesados) and partisans of the Old Spain. The subsequent war with France in 1793 polarized the country in an apparent reaction against the Gallicised elites. Spain made peace with France in 1795, and in 1796, Spain, in support of France, declared war against Britain and Portugal. The disastrous Spanish economic situation, and controversial relations with the juggernaut that was Napoleonic France, led to the Mutiny of Aranjuez on March 17, 1808, and forced the abdication of the king in favour of Joseph Bonaparte. The abdication was masterminded by Napoleon, who distrusted the unreliable ally that Spain was under the House of Bourbon.

The new foreign monarch was regarded with scorn. On May 2, 1808, the people of Madrid took up arms in a nationalist uprising against the French army. A massively destructive and savage war ensued, known to the Spanish as the War of Independence, and to the English as the Peninsular War. Napoleon was forced to intervene personally, bringing the Spanish army to its knees and driving the Anglo-Portuguese forces out — but triggering a massive guerrilla war as a result. The guerrillas and Wellington's Anglo-Portuguese army were very effective: their actions, combined with Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia, led to the ousting of the French from Spain in 1814, and the return of King Ferdinand VII.

The French invasion had numerous consequences for Spain. The war proved disastrous for Spain's economy, reversing the improvements of the late 18th century. It also brought a political and territorial legacy, and left a deeply divided country that was prone to political instability for more than a century. In 1812, the Liberal Courts of Cádiz redacted a Constitution, bringing to the country a new form of government under which future monarchs would be obliged to rule, more or less willingly. The power vacuum between 1808 and 1814 enabled local juntas in the Spanish colonies in the Americas to rule independently. Starting in 1809, the hemisphere began the process of freeing itself from Spanish rule. By 1825, Spain had lost all of its colonies in Latin America, with the exception of Cuba and Puerto Rico.

Spanish-American War

At the end of the 19th century, Spain lost all of its remaining old colonies in the Caribbean and Asia-Pacific regions, including Cuba, Puerto Rico, Philippines, and Guam to the United States after unwittingly and unwillingly being thrust into the Spanish-American War of 1898. In 1899 Spain sold its remaining Pacific possessions to Germany.

"The Disaster" of 1898, as the Spanish-American War was called, gave increased impetus to Spain's cultural revival (Generation of '98) in which there was much critical self examination, and relieved it from the burden of its last major colonies. However, political stability in such a dispersed and variegated land, caught between pockets of modernity and large areas of extreme rural backwardness and strongly differentiated regional identities and deep divisions over legitimacy originating from the Napoleonic period, would elude the country for some decades yet, and was ultimately imposed only by a brutal dictatorship in 1939.

The 20th century

The 20th century initially brought little peace; Spain played a minor part in the scramble for Africa, with the colonization of Western Sahara, Spanish Morocco and Equatorial Guinea. However the area assigned to Spain was mostly abrupt terrain populated by warlike tribesmen with an age-old history of fighting outsiders. A poorly planned advance into the interior due to political pressure led to military disaster in Morocco in 1921. This contributed to discrediting the monarch and worsened political instability. A period of dictatorial rule under General Miguel Primo de Rivera (1923–1931) ended with the establishment of the Second Spanish Republic. The Republic offered political autonomy to the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia (where the autonomy did not have any effect due to the civil war) and gave voting rights to women.

Right-Left tensions continued to mount in spite of the 1936 elections, with the destruction of Church property and political assassinations. A coup failed but the bitterly fought Spanish Civil War (1936-39) ensued. Three years later the Nationalist forces, led by General Francisco Franco, emerged victorious with the support of Germany and Italy. The Republican side was supported by the Soviet Union and Mexico, but was crucially left isolated through the British-led policy of Non-Intervention. The Spanish Civil War has been called the first battle of the Second World War. Spanish involvement in the Second World War was in fact a continuation of its civil war. Under Franco Spain was neutral though sympathetic to the Axis.

Over a hundred thousand highly motivated Spanish Civil War veterans were to give both sides the benefit of their experience throughout the Second World War in Europe, the Eastern Front and North Africa. Many in the French Resistance were Spanish as was the 9th Armoured Company that spearheaded Général Leclerc's 2nd Armoured Division's liberation of Paris. On the other side, about 40,000 Spaniards fought against the Soviet Union in the Wehrmacht's División Azul (Blue Division).

The only legal party under Franco's regime (see Spain under Franco) was the Falange española tradicionalista y de las JONS, formed in 1937 by the forcible fusion of the pseudo-fascist Falange and the monarchist Carlist movement. The party emphasized anti-Communism, Catholicism, nationalism, and imperial expansion, and was one of the regime's major instruments of internal control.

After World War II Spain was politically and economically isolated, and was kept out of the United Nations until 1955, when it became strategically important for US president Eisenhower to establish a military presence in the Iberian peninsula. In the 1960s, Spain began to enjoy economic growth (Spanish miracle) which gradually transformed it into a modern industrial economy with a thriving tourism sector.

Upon the death of General Franco in November 1975, his personally designated heir Prince Juan Carlos assumed the position of king and head of state. With the approval of the Spanish Constitution of 1978 and the arrival of democracy, were given some political autonomy, which was then soon extended to all Spanish regions. In the Basque Country, moderate Basque nationalism coexists with radical nationalism supportive of the terrorist group ETA. In 1982, the Spanish Socialist Worker's Party (PSOE) came to power and played a crucial role leading the country down the road to Community membership. One of the essential objectives of the party was attaining EU membership, which they associated with modernization.
The scene of one of the Madrid bombings.
The scene of one of the Madrid bombings.

On January 1, 1999 Spain adopted the Euro as its national currency.

Since the current Constitution was passed in 1978, Spain has had 5 Presidentes del Gobierno (Prime Ministers) as of September 2006.

21st century

On November 18, 2002, the oil tanker Prestige sank near to the Galician coast, causing a huge oil spill. It has since been regarded as one of the worst environmental disasters in Spanish history.

On March 11, 2004, a series of bombs exploded in commuter trains in Madrid, Spain. This act of terror killed 191 people and wounded 1,460 more, besides having arguably a dramatic effect on the upcoming national elections. The 11 March 2004 Madrid train bombings had an adverse effect on the then-ruling conservative party Partido Popular (PP) which polls were giving as a likely winner of the elections, thus helping the election of Zapatero's Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE). There were two nights of incidents around the PP headquarters, with PSOE accusing the PP of hiding the truth by saying that the incidents were caused by ETA even though new evidence that pointed to an islamic attack started appearing. These incidents are still a cause of discussion, since some factions of the PP suggest that the elections were "stolen" by means of the turmoil which followed the terrorist bombing, which was, according to this point of view, backed by the PSOE. These incidents did interfere with the last day of campaigning when, according to the Spanish electoral system regulations, any kind of political propaganda is prohibited and PP's candidate (Mariano Rajoy) appeared in some newspapers as interior minister. March 14 2004 saw the PSOE party elected into government, with Zapatero becoming the new PM of Spain. Since the PSOE's election victory Zapatero's government has withdrawn Spanish troops from Iraq and tackled a series of social issues, including same-sex marriages, gender-violence and divorce. Zapatero also presided over the Spanish Parliament's approval of the new (and controversial) Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia. Spain has also experienced increasing immigration since the start of the twenty-first century. On the 15 March 2006, ETA declared a "fire out" which ended on the 30 December 2006 after the killing of two Ecuadorians in a terrorist attack at Madrid Barajas International Airport.

Politics

Spain is a constitutional monarchy, with a hereditary monarch and a bicameral parliament, the Cortes Generales. The executive branch consists of a Council of Ministers presided over by the President of Government (comparable to a prime minister), proposed by the monarch and elected by the National Assembly following legislative elections.

The legislative branch is made up of the Congress of Deputies (Congreso de los Diputados) with 350 members, elected by popular vote on block lists by proportional representation to serve four-year terms, and a Senate or Senado with 259 seats of which 208 are directly elected by popular vote and the other 51 appointed by the regional legislatures to also serve four-year terms.

Spain is, at present, what is called a State of Autonomies, formally unitary but, in fact, functioning as a highly decentralized Federation of Autonomous Communities, each one with slightly different levels of self-government. The little differences within this system are due to the fact that the devolution process from the centre to the periphery was a process initially thought to be asymmetrical, granting a higher degree of self government only to those autonomous governments ruled by nationalist parties (namely Catalonia and the Basque Country) who were much more vocal in the matter and seeking a more federalist kind of relationship with the rest of Spain. Conversely the rest of Autonomous Communities would have a lower self-government. This pattern of asymmetrical devolution has been described as a coconstitutionalism and the devolution process adopted by the United Kingdom since 1997 shares traits with it.

However, as years passed, the Autonomous Communities which in the beginning were thought to have a lower profile have caught up in terms of self-government with the nationalist ruled Autonomous communities and the gap in terms of self-government is not that wide anymore.

In the end, Spain is regarded as probably the most decentralized State in Europe at the present moment, with all of its different territories managing locally their Health and Education systems (just to mention some aspects of the public budget) and with some other territories (the Basque Country and Navarre) even managing their own public finances without hardly any presence of the Spanish central government in this regard or, in the case of Catalonia and the Basque Country, equipped with their own, fully operative and completely autonomous, police corps which widely replaces the State police functions in these territories (see Mossos d'Esquadra and Ertzaintza).

The Government of Spain has been involved in a long-running campaign against Basque Fatherland and Liberty (ETA), a terrorist organization founded in 1959 in opposition to Franco and dedicated to promoting Basque independence through violent means. They consider themselves a guerrilla organization while they are actually listed as a terrorist organization by both the European Union and the United States in their watchlists on the matter. Although the current nationalist led Basque Autonomous government does not endorse any kind of violence, their different approaches as to how to terminate ETA and their different approaches to the separatist movement are a source of tension between the central and Basque governments.

Initially ETA targeted primarily Spanish security forces, military personnel and Spanish Government officials. As the security forces and prominent politicians improved their own security, ETA increasingly focused its attacks on the tourist seasons (scaring tourists was seen as a way of putting pressure on the government, given the sector's importance to the economy, although no tourists were injured) and local government officials in the Basque Country. The group carried out numerous bombings against Spanish Government facilities and economic targets, including a car bomb assassination attempt on then-opposition leader Aznar in 1995, in which his armoured car was destroyed but he was unhurt. The Spanish Government attributes over 800 deaths to ETA during its campaign of rebellion.

On 17 May 2005, all the parties in the Congress of Deputies, except the PP, passed the Central Government's motion giving approval to the beginning of peace talks with ETA, without making political concessions and with the requirement that it give up its weapons. PSOE, CiU, ERC, PNV, IU-ICV, CC and the mixed group —BNG, CHA, EA y NB— supported it with a total of 192 votes, while the 147 PP parliamentarians objected. ETA declared a "permanent cease-fire" that came into force on March 24, 2006. In the years leading up to the permanent cease-fire, the government had had more success in controlling ETA, due in part to increased security cooperation with French authorities.

On February 20, 2005, Spain became the first country to allow its people to vote on the European Union constitution that was signed in October 2004. The rules state that if any country rejects the constitution then the constitution will be declared void. Despite a very low participation (42%), the final result was very strongly in affirmation of the constitution, making Spain the first country to approve the constitution via referendum (Hungary, Lithuania and Slovenia approved it before Spain, but they did not hold referendums).

Administrative divisions

Spain is divided into 17 autonomous communities (comunidades autónomas) and 2 African autonomous cities (ciudades autónomas) - (Ceuta and Melilla. These autonomous communities are subdivided into 50 provinces (provincias).

Traditionally and historically, some provinces are also divided into comarcas (singular comarca). A comarca is roughly equivalent to a US "county" or an English district. In some of the regions (e.g. Catalonia) their borders are clear so they are easy to identify. In some other (e.g. Extremadura) their legal status is not very formal so they rather correspond to natural areas (valleys, sierres and so on).

The lowest administrative division of Spain is the municipality (municipio).

Geography

Mainland Spain is dominated by high plateaus and mountain ranges such as the Pyrenees or the Sierra Nevada. Running from these heights are several major rivers such as the Tajo, the Ebro, the Duero, the Guadiana and the Guadalquivir. Alluvial plains are found along the coast, the largest of which is that of the Guadalquivir in Andalusia, in the east there are alluvial plains with medium rivers like Segura, Júcar and Turia. Spain is bound to the south and east by Mediterranean Sea (containing the Balearic Islands), to the north by the Cantabrian Sea and to its west by the Atlantic Ocean, where the Canary Islands off the African coast are found. Spain shares borders with Andorra 63.7 km, France 623 km, Gibraltar 1.2 km, Portugal 1,214 km and Morocco 6.3 km.

Due to Spain's own geographical situation which exposes only its northern part to the Jet Stream's typical path and due to its own orographic conditions, its climate is extremely diverse. It can be roughly divided in the following areas:

* The Northern and Eastern Mediterranean coast (Catalonia, Northern half of the Valencian Community and the Balearic islands): Warm to hot summers with relatively mild to cool winters. Precipitation averaging 600 mm (23.6 in) a year. These show an average Mediterranean climate.
* The South East Mediterranean coast (Alicante, Murcia and Almería): Hot summers and mild to cool winters. Very dry, virtually sub-desertic, rainfall as low as 150 mm (5.9 in) a year in the Cabo de Gata which is reported to be the driest place in Europe. These areas qualify mostly as Semiarid climate in terms of precipitation.
* Southern Mediterranean coast (Málaga and Granada's coastal areas): Warm summers, very mild winters. Average yearly temperatures close to 20 degrees Celsius (68°F) and wet. Close to Subtropical climate.
* The Guadalquivir valley (Seville, Cordoba): Very hot and dry summers and mild winters. Relatively dry climate.
* South West Atlantic coast (Cadiz, Huelva): Pleasant summers, very mild and temperate winters. Relatively wet climate.
* The inner land plateau (Madrid, Valladolid, Toledo) and the Ebro Valley (Zaragoza): Cold winters (depending mostly on altitude) and hot summers, close to the Continental climate. Relatively dry weather (400-600mm or 15.7 - 23.6 in per year).
* Northern Atlantic coast or "Green Spain" (Galicia, Asturias, Coastal Basque country): A very wet climate (averaging 1000 mm. or 39.4 in a year, some spots over 1200 mm. or 47.2 in), with mild summers and mild to cool winters. These show mostly an Oceanic climate.
* The Pyrenees: overall wet weather with cool summers and cold winters, the highest part of it has an Alpine climate.
* The Canary Islands: Subtropical climate in terms of temperature, being these mild and stable (18 °C to 24 °C; 64 °F to 75 °F) throughout the year. Desertic in the Eastern islands and moister in the westernmost ones.

At 194,884 mi² (504,782 km²), Spain is the world's 51st-largest country (after Thailand). It is comparable in size to Turkmenistan, and somewhat larger than the US state of California.

Territorial disputes

Territories claimed by Spain

Spain has called for the return of Gibraltar, a small but strategic British overseas territory which lies near the Peninsula's southernmost tip, in the Eastern side of the Strait of Gibraltar. It was conquered during the War of the Spanish Succession in 1704 and was ceded to Britain in perpetuity in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht. An overwhelming majority of Gibraltar's 30,000 inhabitants want to remain British, as they have repeatedly proven in referenda on the issue. The UN resolutions (2231 (XXI) and 2353 (XXII)) call on the UK and Spain to reach an agreement to resolve their differences over Gibraltar, while Spain does not recognize this border and so it is ordinarily kept under strict traffic scrutiny (in the recent past it was often closed as a means to put pressure to Gibraltar, since its economy is partially dependent on Spanish goods and workers).

Moreover, the exact tracing of the demarcation line established by the Treaty of Utrecht is disputed between both sides (Spain claims that the UK is also occupying a tract of land around the airport which was not originally included in the Treaty provisions).

Gibraltar is officially a non-self governing territory or colony according to the UN original definition; in this regard, article 103 of the UN Charter states, universally speaking, that the right of self-determination of the people from the non-self governing territory should be the paramount and overriding principle. To this, the Spanish position objects that it would overrule the only other legal document available on the matter, the Treaty of Utrecht, which states that the area must return to Spain should the UK renounce to it.

Spanish territories claimed by other countries

Morocco claims the Spanish cities of Ceuta and Melilla and the Vélez, Alhucemas, Chafarinas, and Perejil islands, all on the Northern coast of Africa. Morocco points out that those territories were obtained when Morocco could not do anything to prevent it and has never signed treaties ceding them, but Morocco did not yet exist in the 14th and 15th century when these places became Spanish possessions. Spain claims that these territories are integral parts of Spain and have been Spanish or linked to Spain since before the Islamic invasion of Spain in 711; the Ceuta area (including the islet of Perejil) returned to Spanish rule in 1415 and the rest did so only a few years after the conquest of Granada in 1492. Spain claims that Morocco's only claim on these territories is merely geographical. Parallelism with Egyptian ownership of the Sinai (in Asia) or Turkish ownership of Istanbul (in Europe) is often used to support the Spanish position.

Portugal does not recognize Spain's sovereignty over the territory of Olivenza. The Portuguese claim that the Treaty of Vienna (1815), to which Spain was a signatory, stipulated return of the territory to Portugal. Spain alleges that the Treaty of Vienna left the provisions of the Treaty of Badajoz (1801) intact.

Economy

According to World Bank, Spain's economy is the eigth biggest worldwide and the fifth largest in Europe. As of 2005, GDP was valued at $1.12 Trillion, just after Italy and before Canada (see List of countries by GDP (nominal)).

Spain's mixed economy supports a GDP that on a per capita basis is 90% of that of the four leading West European economies and slightly above the European Union average. The centre-right government of former Prime Minister Aznar worked successfully to gain admission to the first group of countries launching the European single currency, the euro, on 1 January 1999. The Aznar administration continued to advocate liberalization, privatization, and deregulation of the economy and introduced some tax reforms to that end. Unemployment fell steadily both under the Aznar and Zapatero administration. It affects now 7.6% of the labour force (October 2006) having fallen from a high of 20% and above in the early 1990s. It also compares favourably to the other large European countries, most notably, Germany with an unemployment of approximately 12%. Growth of 2.4% in 2003 was satisfactory given the background of a faltering European economy, and has steadied since at an annualized rate of about 3.3% in mid 2005 and 3.5% in the first quarter, 3,7% in the second quarter and 3,8% in the third quarter of 2006. There is a widespread concern that the growth is too concentrated upon a few sectors (mainly residential building and those related to it). The current Prime Minister Rodríguez Zapatero has pointed out as matters to be addressed during his administration plans to reduce government intervention in business, combat tax fraud, and support innovation, research and development, but also intends to reintroduce labour market regulations that had been scrapped by the Aznar government. Adjusting to the monetary and other economic policies of an integrated Europe — and reducing unemployment — will pose challenges to Spain over the next few years.

There is general concern that Spain's model of economic growth (based largely on mass tourism, the construction industry, and manufacturing sectors) is faltering and may prove unsustainable over the long term. The first report of the Observatory on Sustainability (Observatorio de Sostenibilidad) — published in 2005 and funded by Spain's Ministry of the Environment and Alcalá University — reveals that the country's per capita GDP grew by 25% over the last ten years, while greenhouse gas emissions have risen by 45% since 1990. Although Spain's population grew by less than 5% between 1990 and 2000, urban areas expanded by no less than 25% over the same period. Meanwhile, Spain's energy consumption has doubled over the last 20 years and is currently rising by 6% per annum. This is particularly worrying for a country whose dependence on imported oil (meeting roughly 80% of Spain's energy needs) is one of the greatest in the EU. Large-scale housing and tourism development are placing severe strain on local land and water resources. Meanwhile, global warming paints a bleak future for much of Spain for the next century, with the potential to turn areas that are already fairly arid into semi-desert. The prospects for Spain's tourist industry are also dire. Recent developments to deal with the country's growing water shortage include the building of reverse osmosis plants along the Spanish Costas. These heavy energy using facilities are unlikely to supply much over 1% of Spain's total water needs, although they will provide an important contribution to local water supplies. Future water shortages are likely to be made even more acute by the building of golf courses along Spain's Mediterranean coast. Other perennial weak points of Spain's economy include one of the lowest rates of investment in Research and Development, and an education system slated in OECD reports as one of the worst in Western Europe. Many manufacturing jobs are being lost to cheaper workforce countries in Eastern Europe and Asia.

On the brighter side, the Spanish economy is credited for having avoided the virtual zero growth rate of some of its largest partners in the EU (namely France and Germany) by the late 90's and beginning of the 21st century, in a process which started with former Prime Minister Aznar's liberalization and deregulation reforms aiming to reduce the State's role in the market place. Thus in 1997, Spain started an economic cycle - which keeps going as of 2006 - marked by an outstanding economic growth, with figures around 3%, often well over this rate.[4] In fact, the country's economy has created more than half of all the new jobs in the European Union over the past five years.

This has narrowed steadily the economic gap between Spain and its leading partners in the EU over this period. Hence, the Spanish economy has been regarded lately as one of the most dynamic within the EU, even able to replace the leading role of much larger economies like the aforementioned, thus subsequently attracting significant amounts of foreign investment.

Demographics

Spain's population density, at 87.8/km² (220/sq. mile), is lower than that of most Western European countries and its distribution along the country is very unequal. With the exception of the region surrounding the capital, Madrid, the most populated areas lie around the coast.

The population of Spain doubled during the twentieth century, due to the spectacular demographic boom by the 60's and early 70's. Then, after the birth rate plunged in the 80's and Spain's population became stalled, a new population increase started based initially in the return of many Spanish who emigrated to other European countries during the 70's and, more recently, it has been boosted by the large figures of foreign immigrants, mostly from Latin America (38.75% of them), Eastern Europe (16.33%), Maghreb (14.99%) and Sub-Saharan Africa (4.08%).[6] Also some important pockets of population coming from other countries in the European Union are found (20.77% of the foreign residents), specially along the Mediterranean costas and Balearic islands, where many choose to live their retirement or even telework. There has also been a steady influx of English, French, German, and Dutch immigrants since the 70's. However, the pattern of growth was extremely uneven due to large-scale internal migration from the rural interior to the industrial cities during the 60's and 70's. No fewer than eleven of Spain's fifty provinces saw an absolute decline in population over the century.

Immigration in Spain

According to the Spanish government there were 3.7 million foreign residents in Spain in 2005; independent estimates put the figure at 4.8 million or 15.1% of total population (Red Cross, World Disasters Report 2006). According to residence permit data for 2005, around 500,000 were Moroccan, another half a million were Ecuadorian, more than 200,000 were Romanians and 260,000 were Colombian. Other important foreign communities are British (8.09%), French (8.03%), Argentine (6.10%), German (5.58%) and Bolivian (2.63%). In 2005, a regularization programme increased the legal immigrant population by 700,000 people. Since 2000 Spain has experienced high population growth as a result of immigration flows, despite a birth rate that is only half of the replacement level. This sudden and ongoing inflow of immigrants, particularly those arriving clandestinely by sea, has caused noticeable social tensions.

Spain currently has the second highest immigration rates within the EU, just after Cyprus, and the second highest absolute net migration in the World (after the USA).[7] This can be explained by a number of reasons including its geographical position, the porosity of its borders, the large size of its submerged economy and the strength of the agricultural and construction sectors which demand more low cost labour than can be offered by the national workforce. In fact, booming Spain has been Europe's largest absorber of migrants for the past six years, with its immigrant population increasing fourfold as 2.8 million people have arrived. Spectacular growth in Spain's immigrant population comes as the country's economy has created more than half of all the new jobs in the European Union over the past five years. [2]

On the other hand this unprecedented wave of immigration has put downward pressure on the wages of Spanish born workers in sectors which formerly were in need of a bigger work force supply such as construction and agriculture, also in a number of service sector jobs - at a time of booming residential prices and rising rents (Spain traditionally has had a very high rate of home ownership). While it is thought that this massive arrival of immigrants has actually reinvigorated the national economy, it could eventually end up in aggravated social tensions in the event of economic deceleration.

Most populous metropolitan regions

1. Madrid 5,946,572
2. Barcelona 5,315,758
3. Valencia 1,623,724
4. Sevilla 1,317,098
5. Málaga 1,074,074
6. Bilbao 946,829

Identities

The Spanish Constitution of 1978, in its second article, recognizes historic entities ("nationalities“, a carefully chosen word in order to avoid the more politically loaded "nations") and regions, inside the unity of the Spanish nation. Spain's identity is for some people more an overlap of different regional identities than a sole Spanish identity. Indeed, some of the regional identities may be even in conflict with the Spanish one.

In particular, a large proportion of Catalans, Basques and Galicians, quite frequently identify, respectively, primarily with Catalonia, the Basque Country, and Galicia, with Spain only second or not at all. For example, according to the last CIS survey,[citation needed] 44% of Basques identify themselves first as Basques (only 8% first as Spaniards); 40% of Catalans do so with Catalonia (20% identify firstly with Spain), and 32% Galicians with Galicia (9% with Spain). The majority of these groups though, identify both as Basques, Catalans or Galicians and Spaniards at the same time.

Almost all communities have a majority of people identifying as much with Spain as with the Autonomous Community (except Madrid, where Spain is the primary identity, and Catalonia, Basque Country, Galicia, and the Balearics, where people tend to identify more with their Autonomous Community). It is this last feature of "shared identity" between the more local level or Autonomous Community and the Spanish level which makes the identity question in Spain complex and far from univocal.

Languages

The Spanish Constitution, although affirming the sovereignty of the Spanish Nation, recognizes historical nationalities.

Castilian (called both español and castellano in the language itself) is an official language throughout Spain, but other regional languages are also spoken, and are the primary languages in some of their respective geographies. Without mentioning them by name, the Spanish Constitution recognizes the possibility of regional languages being co-official in their respective autonomous communities. The following languages are co-official with Spanish according to the appropriate Autonomy Statutes.

* Catalan (català) in Catalonia (Catalunya), the Balearic Islands (Illes Balears), parts of Valencia (València) (as Valencian). Not officially recognized in La Franja and Carxe.
* Basque (euskara) in Basque Country (Euskadi or País Vasco), and parts of Navarre (Nafarroa or Navarra). Basque is not known to be related to any other language.
* Galician (galego) in Galicia (Galicia or Galiza). Not officially recognized in Asturias and Leon.

Catalan, Galician and Castilian are all descended from Latin and some of them have their own dialects, some championed as separate languages by their speakers. A particular case is Valencian, the name given to a variety of Catalan, that also has the co-official language status recognized in Autonomous Community of Valencia.

There are also some other surviving Romance minority languages: Asturian / Leonese, in Asturias and parts of Leon, Zamora and Salamanca, and the Extremaduran in Caceres and Salamanca, both descendants of the historical Astur-Leonese; the Aragonese or fabla in part of Aragon; the fala, spoken in three villages of Extremadura; and some Portuguese dialectal towns in Extremadura and Castile-Leon. Unlike Catalan, Galician, and Basque, these do not have any official status.[8]
Spain's legacy: a map of the Hispanophone world.
Spain's legacy: a map of the Hispanophone world.

The Andalusian dialect (also called andaluz) of European Spanish is spoken in Andalusia. There are several phonetic differences from Castilian Spanish, some of which are reflected in Andalusian-influenced Latin American Spanish. This differences can be seen in the phonology as well as in the intonation and vocabulary.

In the tourist areas of the Mediterranean coasts and the islands, English and German are widely spoken by tourists, foreign residents and tourism workers. On the other side, recent African illegal immigrants and large minority of their descendants speaks the official European languages of their homelands (whether standard Portuguese, English, French, or its Creoles.)

Minority groups

Since the 16th century, the most famous minority group in the country have been the Gitanos, a Roma group.

Spain has a number of black African-blooded people — who are descendants of populations from former colonies (especially Equatorial Guinea) but, much more important than those in numbers, immigrants from several Sub-Saharan and Caribbean countries who have been recently settling in Spain. There are also sizeable numbers of Asian-Spaniards, most of whom are Chinese, Filipino, Middle Eastern, Pakistani and Indian origins; Spaniards of Latin American descent are sizeable as well and a fast growing segment. Other growing groups are Britons and Germans and other immigrants from western and eastern Europe[3].

The important Jewish population of Spain was either expelled or forced to convert in 1492, with the dawn of the Spanish Inquisition. After the 19th century, some Jews have established themselves in Spain as a result of migration from former Spanish Morocco, escape from Nazi repression and immigration from Argentina. Currently, Melilla shows the highest ratio of Jews (and Muslims) in Spain. The Spanish law allows Sephardi Jews to claim Spanish citizenship.

A sizeable and increasing number of Spanish citizens also descend from these communities, as Spain applies jus soli and provides special measures for immigrants from Spanish-speaking countries to obtain Spanish citizenship.

Religion

Roman Catholicism is the most popular religion in the country. According to several sources (Spanish official polls and others), about 76% self-identify as Catholics, about 2% with another religious faith, and about 19% identify as non-believers or atheists. Many Spaniards identify themselves as Catholics because they were baptized, and many do not participate in religious services. A study conducted in October 2006 by the Spanish Centre of Sociological Investigations[9] shows that from the 76% of Spaniards who identify as Catholics or other religious faith, 54% hardly ever or never go to church, 15% go to church some times a year, 10% some time per month and 19% every Sunday or multiple times per week. About 22% of the whole Spanish population attend religious services at least once a month.
Barcelona Cathedral
Barcelona Cathedral

Evidence of the secular nature of contemporary Spain can be seen in the widespread support for the legalization of same-sex marriage in Spain — over 70% of Spaniards support gay marriage according to a 2004 study by the Centre of Sociological Investigations.[10] Indeed, in June 2005 a bill was passed by 187 votes to 147 to allow gay marriage, making Spain the third country in the European Union to allow same-sex couples to marry after Belgium and the Netherlands. This vote was split along conservative-liberal lines, with PSOE and other left-leaning parties supporting the measure and PP against it. Proposed changes to the divorce laws to make the process quicker and to eliminate the need for a guilty party are also popular.

There are also many Protestant denominations, all of them with less than 50,000 members, and about 20,000 Mormons. Evangelism has been better received among Gypsies than among the general population; pastors have integrated flamenco music in their liturgy. Taken together, all self-described "Evangelicals" slightly surpass Jehovah's Witnesses (105,000) in number. Other religious faiths represented in Spain include the Bahá'í Community.

The recent waves of immigration, especially during and after the 90's, have led to an increasing number of Muslims, who have about 1 million members. Muslims had ceased to live in Spain for centuries, ever since the Reconquista, when they were given the ultimatum of either convert to Catholicism or leave the country. By the 16th century, most of them had left the Spanish kingdom. However, the colonial expansion over Northern and Western Africa during the 19th and 20th centuries supposed that large numbers of Muslim populations (those in the Spanish Morocco and the Sahara Occidental) were again under Spanish administration, with a minority of them getting full citizenship. Nowadays, Islam is the second largest religion in Spain, after Roman Catholicism, accounting for approximately 3% of the total population. Hindus and Sikhs account for less than 0.3%.

Along with these waves of immigration, an important number of Latin American people, who are usually strong Catholic practitioners, have helped the Catholic Church to recover part of the congregations that regular masses (Sunday mass) used to have in the sixties and seventies and that was lost in the eighties.

Since the expulsion of the Sephardim in 1492, Judaism was practically nonexistent until the 19th century, when Jews were again permitted to enter the country. Currently there are around 50,000 Jews in Spain, all arrivals in the past century and accounting less than 1% of the total number of inhabitants[citation needed]. There are also many Spaniards (in Spain and abroad) who claim Jewish ancestry to the Conversos, and still practise certain customs. Spain is believed to have been about 8% Jewish on the eve of the Spanish Inquisition.