The design of a “strong government” in interwar Spain

Abstract

The formation of a strong executive in interwar Spain was greatly influenced by the flawed structure of the party system. After the Glorious Revolution (1868), there was a veritable explosion of political parties, most of them based purely on personality, which led to difficult governance and, consequently, weak executives. During the “Restauración” (1876-1931), an attempt was made to
alleviate this situation by imposing a two-party system (Liberal and Conservative), which would take turns in government by rigging the elections. It was then that a strong and stable government emerged, but one based on corruption in which, in reality, it was the government that determined the composition of Parliament, and not the other way around as would be typical of a parliamentary
system. During Primo de Rivera’s brief dictatorship, an attempt was made to overcome this model with a constitutional project that would establish a monarchical system inspired by presidentialism, in which the executive (the king, the Council of the Realm, and the Council of Ministers) would be the main political driving force. The establishment of the Second Spanish Republic represented the main attempt to create a strong and modern executive, based on the rationalized constitutionalism described by Mirkine Guetzevitch, whose influence in Spain was decisive. Even so, the deficient configuration of the head of state (a hybrid of presidentialism and parliamentarism) and parliamentary control meant that, in practice, it also failed to achieve the objective of establishing a truly strong executive branch.