Building Boom and Political Corruption in Spain

Abstract

Abstract As evidenced by the countless scandals of recent years, town planning has become a very serious source of political corruption in Spain. As will be analysed in this article, corruption was caused by the confluence of three major factors: the singularities of the Spanish town-planning model, defective oversight mechanisms for municipalities, and the extraordinary growth of housing construction during the last ten years. Finally, the new law on the subject is reviewed and solutions are suggested. Keywords: Political CorruptionTown PlanningBuilding BoomDefective Oversight Mechanisms of Local GovernmentLocal Government Autonomy Acknowledgements The author wishes to thank two anonymous reviewers for their very helpful comments. This research has been made possible thanks to a grant from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the research project CSO2008-03663/CPOL. Notes [1] As the Committee on Petitions of the European Parliament said in one of its working documents (European Parliament 2007 European Parliament (2007) Report on the Fact Finding Visit to Madrid, Valencia, Andalucia. Available online at: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2004_2009/documents/at/660/660551/660551en.pdf [Google Scholar], p. 4): 'Petitions have not stopped since [early 2003]. But, although the original focus was, and indeed remains on the Valencian region, more petitions have been reaching the Committee from other parts of Spain including Cantabria, Andalucía, Madrid, and Murcia. Persistent reports in the press about land rights abuse have also, throughout this period, added to the volume of information available. In no other EU country are citizens' rights to their property abused in this way or to this extent, and no petitions from any other EU country on such matters have been received.' [2] Although there are no official statistics on corruption cases in Spain, our research team has found public allegations of corruption in about 200 municipalities since 2003, most of them associated with urban planning. This is quite a worrying number, despite the fact that there are 8,112 town councils in Spain. [3] The definition of what is the public interest is of course a central and complex issue in discussion about corruption (Friedrich 1972 Friedrich, C. J. 1972. The Pathology of Politics; Violence, Betrayal, Corruption, Secrecy, and Propaganda, New York: Harper & Row. [Google Scholar]) and the quality of government (see Rothstein & Teorell 2008 Rothstein, B. and Teorell, J. 2008. What is quality in government? A theory of impartial government institutions. Governance, 21(2): 165–190. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Frederickson 1997 Frederickson, H. G. 1997. The Spirit of Public Administration, San Francisco: Jossey Bass. [Google Scholar]). [4] An evaluation of the fight against corruption during Zapatero's first term (2004–8) is in Fundación Alternativas (2008 Fundación Alternativas. 2008. Informe sobre la democracia en España/2008, Madrid: Fundación Alternativas. < http://www.falternativas.org> (in English) [Google Scholar], pp. 185–238). [5] This important characteristic of Spanish town planning arose in the mid nineteenth century after a serious fiscal crisis of the state that led policymakers to use this method to stimulate landowners to take on the costs of enlarging cities. See Fernández (2008 Fernández, G. R. 2008. Urbanismo y financiación local. Papeles de Economía Española, : 212–224. [Google Scholar]) for a complete account of the evolution of urban planning in Spain. [6] Regarding the concept developed by case law on municipal autonomy, and the expansion of urban corruption, see Fernández Farreres (2007a Fernández Farreres, G. (2007a) 'Autonomía municipal y urbanismo', lecture given in the course 'Territorio, urbanismo y corrupción' at the Universidad Internacional de Andalucía (International Andalusia University)(UNIA), Málaga, 9–12 July. [Google Scholar]). [7] See Wollmann (2008 Wollmann, H. (2008) 'Comparing local government reforms in England, Sweden, France and Germany. Between continuity and change, divergence and convergence', < www.wuestenrot-stiftung.de/download/local-government>. [Google Scholar], p. 363). I am indebted to one of the anonymous reviewers for calling my attention to this work. [8] Note that I am not taking part in the debate whether or not the 'flight of administrative law' fosters corruption, but simply arguing that all these reforms for a more flexible administration should take into account new forms of efficient accountability for the new institutions. On this debate see, for instance, Pierre and Rothstein (2008 Pierre, J. & Rothstein, B. (2008) 'How should the state behave? The new public management versus the new Weberianism', paper presented at the conference on New Public Management and the Quality of Government, University of Gothenburg, 13–14 November, < http://www.qog.pol.gu.se/working_papers/SOG%20papers/Pierre%20&%20Rothstein%20-%20SOG%20Conference%20Nov08.pdf>. [Google Scholar]). [9] The reader should take into account that the more than 8,000 town councils in Spain have almost 60,000 councillors. [10] Of course, this is not to say that Spaniards' environmental concern is particularly low in comparative terms. In fact, the level of environmental awareness in Spain (25.4) is similar to that in other countries, such as Ireland (25.5), the United States (25.1), Great Britain (25.0) and Germany (24.8), judging from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) 2000 data (see Franzen 2003 Franzen, A. 2003. Environmental attitudes in international comparison: an analysis of the ISSP surveys 1993 and 2000. Social Science Quarterly, 84(2): 297–308. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], Table 1, p. 300). However, some indicators of this variable, such as the preference for either 'protecting the environment' or 'economic growth and creating jobs', as alternative policy goals, have been notably fluctuating and have been highly dependent on the march of the economy and particularly on the evolution of unemployment (Díez-Nicolás 2000 Díez-Nicolás, J. 2000. "La escala de postmaterialismo como medida del cambio de valores en las sociedades contemporáneas". In España 2000, entre el localismo y la globalidad, Edited by: Elzo, J. and Orizo, F. A. 283–310. Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto. [Google Scholar], p. 293). For instance, according to the World Values Survey 1999–2000, while in Spain 47.9 per cent pointed to 'protecting the environment' as their preferred policy goal, 35.0 per cent marked 'economic growth and creating jobs'. The data for Sweden were 69.4 per cent for 'protecting the environment' and only 19.3 per cent for the economy alternative (all data at < http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/>). [11] Reforms undertaken during these years have simply managed not to increase delay. The steady increase in demand for contentious justice effectively annuls the organisational reforms undertaken. [12] These data come from the report drafted by the Spanish Sustainability Observatory (Observatorio de la Sostenibilidad en España 2006 Observatorio de la Sostenibilidad en España. 2006. Cambios de ocupación del suelo en España: implicaciones para la sostenibilidad, Madrid: Mundiprensa. [Google Scholar]). Artificial land is all land transformed from its natural or rural state into either urban or infrastructure (roads, highways, railways, etc.) uses. [13] See El País, 24 November 2008. [14] Spain is one of the European countries (together with Slovenia and Hungary) where the proportion of empty houses is higher than that of leased ones, according to the Observatorio de la Sostenibilidad en España (2007 Observatorio de la Sostenibilidad en España. 2007. Sostenibilidad en España, 2007, Madrid: Mundiprensa. [Google Scholar]). [15] All this despite the fact that the option to expand through urban development has given rise to considerable expense for local councils. Urban development brings about a population increase that, in turn, results in a rise of state subsidies given to the town. However, such population and urban area increases also involve a rise in expenditure on services for town councils. Pou (2007 Pou, V. (2007) 'El impacto del mercado inmobiliario en las finanzas públicas'. Available online at: http://serviciodeestudios.bbva.com/KETD/fbin/mult/ESIES_0701_situacioninmobilaria_18_tcm346-176812.pdf?ts=7112009 [Google Scholar]) states that the expenses directly associated with urban planning rose from 31 per cent in 1992 to 36 per cent in 1994 as a proportion of town council overall expenditure. [16] DT∖660551EN.doc, 28 March 2007. Presenters: Marcin Libicki and Michael Cashman. [17] Again, the comparison with the Swedish case is worth making. All development plans in Sweden (including the most detailed municipal plans) have to pass through a double round of very open public debate (including public administration at all levels), which enhances transparency in this crucial policy (see Wollman 2008 Wollmann, H. (2008) 'Comparing local government reforms in England, Sweden, France and Germany. Between continuity and change, divergence and convergence', < www.wuestenrot-stiftung.de/download/local-government>. [Google Scholar], pp. 358, 362).