LA ENSEÑANZA RELIGIOSA ESCOLAR EN LOS GOBIERNOS DEL PSOE Y DEL PP

Abstract

This essay focuses on the recent history of the teaching of religion in schools in Spain, its point of departure being the legacy of the last years of Francoism and first educational reforms issued by the former UCD between 1975 and 1982. The first part of this essay analyses the educational reforms made from 1982-1990 by the party Partido Socialista Obrero Español (labour Socialist Party), up to the most emblematic moment of its educational policy: the passing of the LOGSE law in 1990. The second part of the essay sheds light upon the place that the teaching of religion occupies for the government of the Partido Popular (Popular Party, 1996-2004), whose most important contribution to the educational system finally crystalized in the failed LOCE; law was conceived by its mentors as the best opportunity to regenerate a system that was prematurely exhausted. The third part of the essay studies the first consequences that the return of socialism had for the teaching of religion since 2004. Within the frame of a contemporary polemic scenery of recent reforms where the new law of education, LOE, has still to be fully developed, this last part offers more of a prognosis more than an analysis, a group of quick impressions more than a variety of consolidated truths.