Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 05/2012

Civil Society After Dictatorship: a Comparison of Portugal and Spain, 1970s–1990s

Tiago Fernandes

March 2012

The Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies

Abstract

This paper explains variations in patterns of civil society among third-wave democracies by comparing the cases of Portugal and Spain. In the former a civil society developed that had a tendency to be more oriented toward national issues and politics, whereas in the latter civil society tended to be more local, social, and disconnected from politics. Portugal, although having both a less developed economy and historically a weaker democratic tradition than Spain’s, was a democracy that between the early 1970s and the mid-1990s offered more opportunities for the organized civic expression of popular interests. I argue that these different patterns of civil society were the consequence of the mode of transition from authoritarian rule. In Portugal the rupture with the nondemocratic regime took a revolutionary form. During the transition the pressures of this popular mobilization acted vigorously upon the newly created political, state, and party institutions. This opened up a path of civil society consolidation in which associations representing popular groups were more recognized and able to draw support and resources from the regime. In Spain, by contrast, the continuity with the previous authoritarian regime was stronger, and consequently the pattern of civil society that had been formed during the last years of the dictatorship tended to persist during the transition to democracy. Although Spanish civil society had become richer and denser since the late 1960s, it was still very much local and largely disconnected from politics. Finally, I also aim to contribute to theorizing about the relationship between modes of transition from authoritarianism and the quality of subsequent democratic regimes. Much research has been done about the relationship between modes of transition and democratic consolidation, but less attention has been paid to the effects of different modes of transition on democratic quality. I argue that a revolutionary path to democracy has a positive impact on the capacity for self-organization of popular groups, thus augmenting the quality of democracy.