Redistributive policies in non-democratic Spain: From protecting industry to assisting farmers (1950–1975)

Abstract

As suggested by the developmental pattern, policies to support farmers’ income developed in Spain from the 1960s onwards, when the country saw a process of rapid economic growth. Direct subsidies promptly increased and price-support policies, similar to those applied for more advanced countries from 1950, expanded for many commodities. Budgetary restrictions were not an obstacle to the redistribution of resources to agriculture, because farm support in Spain was based essentially on market intervention and pricesupport policies. In fact, only 10–20 per cent of today's net transfers to agriculture in advanced countries come from subsidies and monetary transfers. From the 1960s, the intensity of support to Spanish farmers, as measured by the Nominal Protection Coefficient (NPC) and the Producer Support Estimate (PSE), was similar to that in the EEC. This result contradicts both Lindert's assumption that agriculture gets more protection under democratic regimes and the olsonian view that large-scale intervention in agricultural markets results from the collective action of lobby groups.