Pre-Trip Information

Spain has an estimated total population of over 47 million. From the 1930s to the 1980s, Spain's population increased in accordance with an annual growth rate ranging from 0.8 percent to 1.2 percent. Growth rates leveled off  to a slight decline  for the remainder of the 20th century;  by 2010 and beyond, the growth rate stood at 0.5 percent.  The country's birth rate was 10.91 births per 1,000 population in recent years.

 

Castilian Spanish is the official language and is dominant in usage, especially in formal settings. Still, it is estimated that one out of four Spanish citizens had a different mother tongue. The new 1978 Constitution allows for other languages to be "co-official" within respective autonomous communities. Catalan, Galician, Euskera (the Basque language), Valencian, and Majorcan had such status by 1988.

 

 

Predominantly, Spaniards are a mix of Mediterranean and Nordic ethnic types. Various ethnic groups are resident, including Basques, Catalans, Andalusians, Valencians, Asturians, Navarrese, Aragonese and Galicians. There are also a small number of Roma ("Gypsies"; this term is generally regarded as pejorative and the term "Roma" is preferable in use across Europe). The Spanish state encompassed numerous distinct ethnic and cultural minorities. The aforementioned 1978 Constitution recognizes and guarantees autonomy of nationalities and regions making up Spanish state, and 17 autonomous communities existed in late 1980s. Ethno-nationalistic sentiment and commitment to the ethnic homeland varies among and within ethnic communities. Nationalist and separatist sentiments run deepest among Basques.

 

 

In terms of religious affiliation, Spain historically has had close ties to the Roman Catholic Church. Most of the population, approximately 94 percent, is at least nominally Catholic. A small remainder of the population, around 6 percent, belong mostly to other Christian denominations, although there are small Jewish and Muslim communities. Society is generally becoming more secular as the society and the economy became more modern and developed. Nevertheless, religious freedom is guaranteed by the 1978 Constitution, which formally disestablishes Roman Catholicism as official religion. The church still enjoys a somewhat privileged status, regardless of this change in law. Continuing governmental financial aid to church was a contentious issue in the late 1980s.

 

 

 

In terms of social stratification, Spain has a socio-economic class structure typical of countries entering the advanced stage of industrialization. In general terms, the society is becoming more differentiated along class, occupational, and professional lines, with an expanding middle class and a decreasing proportion of rural poor. Although Spain had not yet reached the degree of social differentiation seen in other advanced industrial democracies in Western Europe, it is clearly moving in the same direction. As in other areas, however, Spain is modernizing in a distinctly Iberian style, retaining some important social characteristics from an earlier era.

 

 

Primary education (from age six to 14) is free and compulsory. By 1965, the country had achieved nearly universal enrollment in primary grades. There is, however, an insufficient number of state schools and teachers to meet this goal in the face of rising enrollment. The gap is filled by private schools, which are themselves subsidized by state. By the early 1980s, 40 percent of all schools were private. Secondary school attendance is optional, but students deciding not to attend secondary school must attend vocational training until the age of 16. In 1985, an estimated 89 percent of students attended secondary school, and 26 percent attended university. By the late 1980s, the adult population literacy rate was approximately 94-97 percent literate. In recent years, the rate has stabilized around 98 percent.

 

 

Uneven provision of health care is one of the major social problems facing Spain. The poor distribution of health care resources within the state's welfare system resulted in poor service in many areas, especially working-class neighborhoods of large cities. There is a high ratio of doctors to inhabitants, but a low ratio of nurses to inhabitants and relatively low public expenditures on health care, as compared with other West European countries. Tuberculosis, typhoid, and leprosy are surprisingly not entirely eradicated. Still, there has been some improvement over the last decade and a half.

 

The infant mortality rate was 10 per 1,000 live births in 1985, but that rate was cut in half by 2001, according to estimates of that year. In 2003, the infant mortality rate was estimated at 4.85 per 1,000 live births.  By 2010 and beyond, the infant mortality rate had further dropped to 3.42 deaths per 1,000 live births.

Life expectancy was 74 years for males and 80 for females in late 1980s. Estimates from 2003 suggested that the life expectancy rate was averaged at 79 years of age, with the life expectancy for males increasing to 76 years of age, and 83 years of age for females.  From 2010 and beyond, average life expectancy was 81 years of age, with the life expectancy of males moving slightly up to 78 years of age, and the life expectancy for females increasing to 84 years of age.

These rates illustrate Spain's human development challenges, as well as the manner in which the country has responded to them in the last decade and a half.

Note: About 9.7 percent of GDP is spent on health expenditures in this country; about 4.3 percent of GDP is spent on educational expenditures.  Access to education, sanitation, water, and health is regarded to be very good.

 

One notable measure used to determine a country's quality of life is the Human Development Index (HDI), which has been compiled annually since 1990 by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The HDI is a composite of several indicators, which measure a country's achievements in three main arenas of human development: longevity, knowledge and education, as well as economic standard of living. In recent rankings of 169 countries, the HDI placed Spain in the very high human development category, at 20th place.

Note:  Although the concept of human development is complicated and cannot be properly captured by values and indices, the HDI, which is calculated and updated annually, offers a wide-ranging assessment of human development in certain countries, not based solely upon traditional economic and financial indicators.