Elections in Spain

For the most recent general election, see Spanish general election, 2011.

Spain

This article is part of the series: Politics and government of Spain

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There are four types of elections in Spain: general elections, elections to the legislatures of the autonomous communities, local elections and elections to the European Parliament. General elections and elections to the legislatures of the autonomous communities are called after the mandate of the national or regional legislature expires, usually four years after the last election, although early elections may occur. Elections to local councils (municipal, insular or provincial) and to the European Parliament are held on fixed dates. For most elections party list PR is used, but the plurality system is used for the Senate.

General elections

Evolution of popular vote in the Spanish General Elections from the democratic transition until 2008. Voter turnout is usually high.

General elections are elections held for the national legislature, which is called in Spain Cortes Generales (literally "General Courts") and consists of two chambers, the Congress of Deputies (Congreso de los Diputados) and the Senate (Senado). The Congress and Senate serve concurrent terms that run for a maximum of four years.

Congress of Deputies

The Congress has 350 members, elected from each province for a maximum four-year term following the d'Hondt method of proportional representation. While the constitution allows limited flexibility in determining this system, it has not changed since the return of democracy.

Seats are allocated as follows: Two seats are given to each of the 50 provinces and one each to Ceuta and Melilla, and the remaining 248 are then allocated proportionally to population. In practice, this system overrepresents smaller provinces, and results in very low proportionality in all but the most populous such as Madrid and Barcelona. Additionally, since there are so many constituencies (52), most are relatively small. This effectively increases the legal 3% threshold to obtain seats in a constituency, radically decreases proportionality, and favors the two large parties and parties with concentrated regional strength, at the expense of national third parties.

Senate

The system for electing the Senate was first used in 1979, though with regard to the provinces the system is unchanged since 1977. Senators are elected directly from the provinces and indirectly from the autonomous communities; currently, there are 264 senators, 208 directly elected and 56 indirectly elected.

In the provinces, a majoritarian partial block voting system is used. All peninsular provinces elect four senators each; the insular provinces (Balearic and Canary Islands) elect one or three senators per island, and Ceuta and Melilla elect two senators each. Parties nominate three candidates; each voter has three votes (fewer in those constituencies electing fewer senators) and votes for candidates by name, the only instance of personal voting in Spanish national elections. The usual outcome is three senators for the party with the most votes, and one senator for the runner-up, except in very close races.

The autonomous communities receive one senator, plus one for each million inhabitants. They are entitled to determine how they choose their senators but are generally elected by the legislature of the respective community in proportion to its party composition.

List of general elections in Spain

Political position of the government

Social democratic, Socialist   Centre   Conservative, Liberal

Election	Result	Government	Prime Minister
15 June 1977	Hung parliament UCD short by 10 MPs	UCD Minority government		Adolfo Suárez González (1977-1979)
1 March 1979	Hung parliament UCD short by 8 MPs	UCD with support from AP, PA and PAR		Adolfo Suárez González (1979-1981; resigned) Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo y Bustelo (1981-1982)
28 October 1982	PSOE absolute majority Majority of 26	PSOE Majority government		Felipe González Márquez (1982-1986)
22 June 1986	PSOE absolute majority Majority of 8	PSOE Majority government		Felipe González Márquez (1986-1989)
29 October 1989	PSOE overall majority Short by 1 MP	PSOE with support from CC		Felipe González Márquez (1989-1993)
6 June 1993	Hung parliament PSOE short by 17 MPs	PSOE with support from CiU and PNV		Felipe González Márquez (1993-1996)
3 March 1996	Hung parliament PP short by 20 MPs	PP with support from CiU, PNV and CC		José María Aznar López (1996-2000)
12 March 2000	PP absolute majority Majority of 7	PP Majority government		José María Aznar López (2000-2004)
14 March 2004	Hung parliament PSOE short by 12 MPs	PSOE with support from IU and ERC		José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (2004-2008)
9 March 2008	Hung parliament PSOE short by 7 MPs	PSOE Minority government		José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (2008-2011)
20 November 2011	PP absolute majority Majority of 10	PP Majority government		Mariano Rajoy Brey (2011- )

Election results 1977-2011

 Summary of Spanish elections for the Congress of Deputies, 1977-2011

Popular vote
Parties (listed by date of foundation)	1977*	1979	1982	1986	1989	1993	1996	2000	2004	2008	2011
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE)	29.3	30.4	48.1	44.1	39.6	38.8	37.6	34.1	42.6	43.9	28.8
Basque Nationalist Party (PNV)	1.6	1.7	1.9	1.5	1.2	1.2	1.3	1.5	1.6	1.2	1.3
Communist Party of Spain (PCE)/United Left (IU)	9.3	10.8	4.0	4.6	9.0	9.6	10.5	5.5	5.0	3.8	6.9
People's Alliance (AP)/People's Party (PP)	8.2	6.1	26.4	26.0	25.8	34.8	38.8	44.5	37.7	39.9	44.6
Union of the Democratic Centre (UCD)	34.4	34.8	6.8	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
Convergence and Union (CiU)	2.8	2.7	3.7	5.0	5.0	4.9	4.6	4.2	3.2	3.0	4.2
Democratic and Social Centre (CDS)	—	—	2.9	9.2	7.9	1.8	—	—	—	—	—
Union, Progress and Democracy (UPyD)	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	1.2	4.7
Other parties	14.4	13.5	6.2	9.6	11.5	8.9	7.2	10.2	9.9	7.1	9.6
Turnout	78.8	68.0	80.0	70.5	69.7	76.4	77.4	68.7	75.6	73.9	71.7
MPs (numbers in italics mean absolute majorities)
Parties (listed by date of foundation)	1977*	1979	1982	1986	1989	1993	1996	2000	2004	2008	2011
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE)	118	121	202	184	175	159	141	125	164	169	110
Basque Nationalist Party (PNV)	8	7	8	6	5	5	5	7	7	6	5
Communist Party of Spain (PCE)/United Left (IU)	19	23	4	7	17	18	21	8	5	2	11
People's Alliance (AP)/People's Party (PP)	16	10	107	105	107	141	156	183	148	154	186
Union of the Democratic Centre (UCD)	166	168	11	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
Convergence and Union (CiU)	11	8	12	18	18	17	16	15	10	10	16
Democratic and Social Centre (CDS)	—	—	2	19	14	—	—	—	—	—	—
Union, Progress and Democracy (UPyD)	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	1	5
Other parties	12	13	4	11	14	10	11	12	16	8	17
*The 1977 election was for the Constituent Congress.
Source: Ministerio del Interior

Latest elections

 Summary of the 20 November 2011 Congress of Deputies elections results
< 2008    2015 >

Party		Leader(s)	Popular Vote			Seats
			Votes	%	+/–	Seats	+/–
	People's Party Partido Popular – PP	Mariano Rajoy Brey	10,866,566	44.63	4.69	186	32
	Spanish Socialist Workers' Party Partido Socialista Obrero Español – PSOE	Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba	7,003,511	28.76	15.11	110	59
	United Left Izquierda Unida – IU	Cayo Lara Moya	1,685,991	6.92	3.15	11	9
	Union, Progress and Democracy Unión, Progreso y Democracia – UPyD	Rosa Díez González	1,143,225	4.70	3.51	5	4
	Convergence and Union Convergència i Unió – CiU	Artur Mas i Gavarró	1,015,691	4.17	1.14	16	6
	Amaiur Amaiur	Iñaki Antigüedad Auzmendi	334,498	1.37	1.37	7	7
	Basque Nationalist Party Euzko Alderdi Jeltzalea – EAJ/PNV	Iñigo Urkullu Renteria	324,317	1.33	0.14	5	1
	Republican Left of Catalonia Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya – ERC	Oriol Junqueras i Vies	256,393	1.05	0.11	3	0
	Galician Nationalist Bloc Bloque Nacionalista Galego – BNG	Guillerme Vázquez Vázquez	184,037	0.75	0.08	2	0
	Canarian Coalition Coalición Canaria – CC	Claudina Morales Rodríguez	143,881	0.59	0.09	2	0
	Coalition Commitment Coalició Compromís	Enric Morera i Català	125,306	0.51	0.39	1	1
	Asturian Forum Foru Asturies – FAC	Francisco Álvarez Cascos	99,473	0.41	0.41	1	1
	Yes to the Future Geroa Bai	Uxue Barkos Berruezo	42,415	0.17	0.07	1	0
	Other parties		790,072	3.24	0.25	0	0
Blank votes			333,461	1.37	0.26
Valid votes			24,348,837	98.70	0.66
Invalid votes			317,555	1.30	0.66
Totals and voter turnout			24,666,392	68.94	4.91	350	—
Electorate			35,779,208	100.00	—
Source: Ministerio del Interior de España

 Summary of the 20 November 2011 Senate of Spain elections results

Parties		MPs
		2008	2011	±
	People's Party	101	136	35
	Spanish Socialist Workers' Party	88	48	40
	Convergence and Union	4	9	5
	Entesa pel Progrés de Catalunya	12	7	5
	Basque Nationalist Party	2	4	2
	Amaiur	—	3	3
	Canarian Coalition	1	1	0
Total elected		208	208	0
Members appointed by the regional legislatures		56	58	2
Total		264	266	2
Source: Ministerio del Interior de España

Elections to legislatures of the autonomous communities

Elections to the unicameral parliaments of the autonomous communities of Spain are held every four years. Thirteen of the seventeen autonomous parliaments (Aragon, Asturias, Balearic Islands, Canary Islands, Cantabria, Castile and León, Castile-La Mancha, Extremadura, La Rioja, Madrid, Murcia, Navarre and Valencia) take place the same day, the fourth Sunday of May of the year before a leap year; the last election was held in May 22, 2011.

The other four communities can place their elections in separate dates: last elections in Andalusia were in 2008, together with the general election; Euskadi and Galicia had elections in 2009, and Catalonia in 2010.

Local elections

Elections in the municipalities take place in all the country in the same day as the 13 regional elections, in May of the year before a leap year. Last time was May 22, 2011.

Electoral procedures

The laws regulating the conduct and administration of elections are laid out in detail in the 1985 electoral law. (Ley Orgánica del Régimen Electoral General.) Under this law, the elections are supervised by the Electoral Commission (Junta Electoral), a permanent body composed of eight Supreme Court judges and five political scientists or sociologists appointed by the Congress of Deputies. The Electoral commission is supported in its work by the Interior Ministry. On election day, polling stations are run by electoral boards which consist of groups of citizens selected by lottery.

The format of the ballot paper is designed by the Spanish state, however, the law allows political parties to produce and distribute their own ballot papers, either by mailing them to voters or by other means such as street distribution, provided that they comply with the official model. The government then covers the cost of all printed ballot papers. These must then be marked by voters, either in the polling station or outside the polling station and placed inside sealed envelopes which are then placed inside ballot boxes in the polling station. Following the close of polls, the ballots are then counted in each individual polling station in the presence of representatives of the political parties and candidates. The ballots are then immediately destroyed, with the exception of those considered invalid or challenged by the candidates' representatives, which are retained for further scrutiny. The result is that full recounts are impossible.

See also

• Electoral calendar
• Electoral system

External links

• General Directorate of Domestic Politics, archived results back to 1976 (Spanish)
• Adam Carr's Election Archive
• Parties and elections
• NSD: European Election Database - Spain publishes regional level election data; allows for comparisons of election results, 199-2008