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This paper examines the evolution of the Spanish gasoline market from the abolition of the state oil monopoly (January 1993) to "complete" liberalisation (October 1998). With the restructuring of the Spanish oil sector during the 1980s and early 1990s, a highly concentrated oligopoly emerged in the automotive fuels market. A system of price ceilings replaced the state administered prices in July 1990. Since then, new domestic and foreign operators have entered the market, particularly along the coast, near import terminals. Prices went up and then declined. These developments can be explained by an interplay of factors such as: the gradual decline in co-operation among the Spanish firms; the loss of market share of the largest of these, Repsol; the entry of independent operators and supermarkets; and the impact of the ceiling price system. By mid-1998 this system was abolished as the government considered it an "impediment" to further market liberalisation. However, some crucial barriers to the entry of new suppliers remain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expansion of the platform economy has altered the spatial organization of work and employment relations, leading to deregulation and eroding workers' social power. However, despite the radical individualization and precarization of platform work, workers demonstrate agency. This article explores the political strategies employed by place-based platform workers, with a particular focus on the spatiality of their collective action. Using an ethnographic methodology, the article analyses the case studies of drivers' trade associations in Chile and the couriers' organization in Spain. The results show significant similarities between the two groups: (a) non-conventional forms of labour activism; (b) using social media to share experiences, foster solidarity and organize collectively; (c) organizing in large cities; (d) starting locally and progressing to higher scales, and (e) building national and international alliances. The article concludes that workers respond to the spatial organization of work by platforms in a multi-scalar way that is strongly influenced by both their imaginaries and the political and regulatory context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dual character of the Spanish labor market, with permanent workers on the one hand and less favored peripheral workers on the other, became more pronounced following the deregulation of temporary employment. This paper uses the Spanish Labor Force Survey to assess whether, as predicted by labor market segmentation theories, temporary employment is non-transitional (permanent) and involuntary. An analysis of the rates and dynamics of transitions into and out of temporary employment across different groups of working-age respondents shows that much of Spanish temporary employment is involuntary, with temporary workers having limited opportunities for advancement. The evidence points to the need for public policy to address problems posed by the trap that temporary employment has apparently become for growing numbers of workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Platform capitalism is a growing reality with a widening social and economic impact. The rapid expansion of Short-Term Rental (STR) platforms has led to new challenges for policy regulation. The main objective of this paper is to shed some light on current conflicts surrounding the regulation of STR. The body of literature on this topic mainly focuses on the increasing substitution of sharing economy by commercial hosts. By contrast, we explain that the ideological notion of host hinders the understanding of the supply-side structure. A critical approach (as critique of ideology and ideological categories) should entail a class perspective based on rent theory and engage with critical works on platform capitalism. In this article, we propose an innovative analytical approach to STR supply-side supported by rent theory, which focuses on the relationship of agents with land and technology ownership and specialised management services, as these are forms of rent appropriation. From this point of view, these supply-side agents are not hosts, but class factions with common and competing economic interests in rent appropriation. Therefore, they can employ a variety of strategies to influence the political regulation of STRs. Based on in-depth interviews with landlords, individual managers, and corporate agencies in Andalusia (Southern Spain), we show the conflicting internal structure behind the ideological notion of host and even professionalisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite women being increasingly engaged in labor-platform activities, little of the research conducted on this topic to date has included a feminist perspective. However, the platform economy has direct impacts on the social organization of social reproduction and is changing the main dimensions of the world of work with crucial gendered effects. This study deploys a feminist political economics approach to assess the impacts of digital labor platforms on the reconfiguration and regeneration of intersectional inequalities. The findings of this analysis of digital platforms in the care sector in Spain reveal how they profit from regulatory contexts that perpetuate existing gender, race, and migrant status inequalities, as well as labor market vulnerability, with migrant women segregated into lower-paid and more insecure jobs. JEL Classification: J3, J5, J7, O3 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay is presented which explores the struggles of evicted homeowners in Barcelona, Spain. It notes that the collapse of the real estate sector in 2008 has resulted in many foreclosed communities in Spain where daily evictions reached an average of 184 in 2013. It attributes the failure of Spain's housing market to the government's emphasis on home ownership as a status symbol of professional success, deregulation of credit and lending, and overvaluing of property prices.

The food delivery app business has grown in recent years, with an increasing number of customers and workers on these platforms. Food delivery apps are also an iconic example of the increasing precarity of working conditions. Delivery app workers have mobilised to demand greater stability and regulation, with one of their main demands being to switch from their current status as self-employed workers to being employees of these companies. However, in Spain, those who want to remain self-employed have also mobilised, demanding better wages and improved conditions from the platforms. In this article, we focus on the mobilisation of delivery workers in Spain, exploring the characteristics of the main actors involved and the evolution and current situation of the conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the synergies between press and politics in the debate on the regulation of complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) in Spain between 1979 and 2018. We argue that longitudinal analysis and comparison of this interaction and synergy reveal how the mainstream discourse has shifted. We use a dataset of news (N = 2,059), a news sample (n = 325) and a dataset of parliamentary records (N = 86). Using both quantitative and qualitative approaches, the dynamics of the interaction between the different institutions and actors involved is assessed. Specifically, the study analyses the media and parliamentary attention to CAM issues (agenda setting), how CAM is addressed (framing), and the actors who have a voice in the discourse (costructuring of power relations). The results indicate that relevant changes in the public debate on CAM have only occurred over the last few years, corresponding to three overlapping dynamics of influence of the media on politics: amplification, framing, and costructuring of power relations. This recent period has seen convergence in the discussion and narratives/frames used, which also corresponds to more widespread skepticism regarding CAM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes an analytical–methodological approach to understand this historical conjuncture of speculative urbanism in which global finance capital plays an increasingly important role in urban transformation. Whereas the scholarship on urban financialization makes sharp distinctions between what occurs in the global North and the South, portraying the process in the South as one of subordination or peripheralization and in the North as mature and stable (although volatile), this article seeks to demonstrate that the North–South divide is less effective as an explanatory power. Instead, it presents an analytical approach that is attuned to the relentless dynamism and inter-scalar hyper-mobility of finance capital working across the postcolonial map—in other words, a relational–conjunctural approach. The article suggests the method of "following the financial strategy" by analyzing urban forms and projects as processes constituted by the nexus of practices in finance and city planning. It looks closely at finance's use of inter-scalar financial tools (such as arbitrage, interest rate swaps, collateralized debt obligations, and currency hedges) across borders, sectors, infrastructures, and conditions, as mediated by national and international state actors. The value of this analytical–methodological approach will be illustrated through notable financial transactions occurring in and across cities to emphasize their speculative and financial characteristics—specifically highlighting investments traversing cities of Spain, the USA, and India. The focus here is on financial strategies emerging from the detritus of the 2008 global financial crisis and shaped by the expanding discursive-material formation of speculative urbanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 2008 financial crisis, Europe's largest banks have largely remained unchallenged. Is this because of the structural power banks continue to hold over states? This article challenges the view that states are sheer hostages of banks' capacity to provide credit to the real economy—the conventional definition of structural power. Instead, it sheds light on the geo-economic dimension of banks' power: key public officials conceive the position of "their own" banks in global financial markets as a crucial dimension of state power. State priority toward banking thus results from political choices as to what structurally matters most for the state. Based on a discourse analysis of parliamentary debates in France, Germany, and Spain, as well as on a comparative analysis of the implementation of a special tax on banks, this article shows that power dynamics within states largely shape political priorities toward banking at both domestic and international levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite recent attention to the economic and political consequences of automation and technological change for workers, we lack data about concerns and policy preferences about this structural change. We present hypotheses about the relationships among automation risk, subjective concerns about technology, and policy preferences. We distinguish between preferences for compensatory policies versus "protectionist" policies to prevent such technological change. Using original survey data from Spain that captures multiple measures of automation risk, we find that most workers believe that the impact of new technologies in the workplace is positive, but there is a concerned minority. Technological concern varies with objective vulnerability, as workers at higher risk of technological displacement are more likely to negatively view technology. Both correlational and experimental analyses indicate little evidence that workers at risk or technologically concerned are more likely to demand compensation. Instead, workers concerned about technological displacement prefer policies to slow down technological change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past two decades, the creation of the European border regime has increasingly sparked acts of protest and resistance by immigrants and led to the creation of initiatives to defend immigrant rights. This activism has provoked many European states to formalize what is known in the literature as 'crimes of solidarity' in their legal systems. Taking the Spanish case as an example, the objective of this article is to analyse the 'crimmigration' of protest and activism defending the rights of irregular immigrants at Europe's southern border. This analysis describes the development and implementation of the repressive tactics employed by the state against activists, including forms of police control of protests, informal and formal dissuasion techniques, and the use of administrative and criminal sanctions. This work provides valuable insight into the practical impact of these crimmigration processes, particularly how they have affected activists, social organizations and immigrants, as well as how they have extended beyond the territory of the state (externalizing punishment). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the global financial crisis of 2007/2008, five European countries called for external financial assistance. Austerity policies were implemented, but the extent to which the bailout deal impacted the Portuguese and Spanish public service broadcasters has not been yet thoroughly investigated. Both born in dictatorial regimes, these public service broadcasters in democratic contexts followed different solutions for governance and funding. This article investigates the changes produced in the Portuguese and Spanish public media under the austerity era, analysing the policy measures implemented, as well as the economic and ratings performance of both public service broadcasters. The aim is to assess if external factors (such as external assistance) originated similar effects in both countries. Results show that, in spite of different funding and governance models adopted, both public services were heavily impacted in terms of revenues and ratings and that the austerity period provided the context to set up a neoliberal ideological point-of-view. Both public services lost legitimacy and their cultural and political role was undermined by a discussion that was grounded on economic factors alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-haul tourist arrivals depend on the airline market, its size, and the degree of competition. This article studies the entry and exit of full service carriers (FSCs), charter carriers (CCs) and low-cost carriers (LCCs) from two origins: the United Kingdom and Germany, and five sun-and-beach destinations in Spain. The relationship among all types of airlines is captured with a trivariate structural time series model to disentangle the airlines' responses under common shocks of airlines' entry and/or exit and provides estimates of immediate responses and indicators of responses over time. The results show that in the British market, the entry of LCCs has crowded out FSCs and CCs. However, in the German market, the results are heterogeneous and overall do not support the existence of such crowding out effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes how the neoliberal policies, such as the politics of austerity (with considerable cuts to social policy expenditures including medical care and public health services) and the privatization of health services, imposed by many governments on both sides of the North Atlantic, considerably weakened the capacity of the response to the coronavirus pandemic in Italy, Spain, and the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2008 economic and political crisis produced a favourable opportunity structure for the emergence of new and innovative left-wing political projects and trade union strategies in Spain, especially in relation to remunicipalisation processes that sought to revert the neoliberal policy making at the local scale. The article deploys a Gramscian analysis on trade union discourse production in order to discern complex process of working-class formation and intra-class conflict in the beach cleaning units of the Andalusian city of Cádiz. Crucially, the oppositional stand defended by one of the largest trade unions in Spain towards remunicipalisation shows that trade unions can act as 'retaining walls' against political change in periods of social upheaval. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the relationship between manufacturing firms' innovation activity (measured by product innovation, process innovation, and R&D activities) and their numerical flexibility (proxied by the rate of fixed-term contracts). Estimates using data from Spain's Survey on Firms' Strategies (EESE) for the years 2000--2002 reveal a non-monotonic relationship: a firm's probability of innovating and carrying out R&D increased as the rate of use of temporary and other non-core workers increased, but only up to a threshold, beyond which this probability decreased. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study measured profit efficiency and its determinants in the hotel sector in Spain from 2010 to 2014, using a Bayesian stochastic frontier approach. This model provides estimates of efficiency and more accurate confidence intervals than the traditional frequentist approach. The results revealed that the hotels are operating with significant profit inefficiencies. These inefficiencies are significantly affected by size, location, occupancy rate by region, customer satisfaction, and whether the hotel is affiliated or independent. Finally, the study points out the strategic implications of these findings, to improve the efficiency of the hotels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using empirical data drawn from multiple sources, including interview material, the author examines Spanish trade unions' responses to the reorganization of Spain's economy and changes in the structure of industrial production in the 1980s and 1990s. She argues that Spanish unions, though not in a strong position compared to unions in other Western European countries, avoided a crisis situation by designing flexible strategies and redefining some aspects of Spain's industrial relations institutions. This quick adjustment was possible, the author argues, because the organizations, institutions, and strategies requiring change were not deeply ingrained, given the short history of democratic politics in Spain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports evidence gained by the SOPHIE Project regarding employment and labor market-related policies. In the first step, quality of employment and of precarious and informal employment in Europe were conceptualized and defined. Based on these definitions, we analyzed changes in the prevalence and population distribution of key health-affecting characteristics of employment and work between times of economic prosperity and economic crisis in Europe and investigated their impact on health outcomes. Additionally, we examined the effects of several employment and labor market-related policies on factors affecting health equity, including a specific analysis concerning work-related gender equity policies and case studies in different European countries. Our findings show that there is a need to standardize definitions and indicators of (the quality of) employment conditions and improve information systems. This is challenging given the important differences between and within European countries. In our results, low quality of employment and precarious employment is associated with poor mental health. In order to protect the well-being of workers and reduce work-related health inequalities, policies leading to precarious working and employment conditions need to be suspended. Instead, efforts should be made to improve the security and quality of employment for all workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the aftermath of the Great Recession, public health scholars have grown increasingly interested in studying the health consequences of macroeconomic change. Reflecting existing debates on the nature of this relationship, research on the effects of the recent economic crisis has sparked considerable controversy. On the one hand there is evidence to support the notion that macroeconomic downturns are associated with positive health outcomes. On the other hand, a growing number of studies warn that the current economic crisis can be expected to pose serious problems for the public’s health. This article contributes to this debate through a review of recent evidence from three case studies: Iceland, Spain, and Greece. It shows that the economic crisis has negatively impacted some population health indicators (e.g., mental health) in all three countries, but especially in Greece. Available evidence defies deterministic conclusions, including increasingly “conventional” claims about economic downturns improving life expectancy and reducing mortality. While our results echo previous research in finding that the relationship between economic crises and population health is complex, they also indicate that this complexity is not arbitrary. On the contrary, changing social and political contexts provide meaningful, if partial, explanations for the perplexing nature of recent empirical findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research in economic geography has provided a critical examination of securitization's role in the recent global financial crisis. Building on earlier studies which interrogated the development of US securitization, contemporary research has explored how securitization has been adopted in different political economies. Although these novel studies have begun to highlight the geographies of securitization, our knowledge of the historical spread of securitization remains underdeveloped. This paper seeks to address this issue by exploring how securitization emerged within different European financial spaces. In doing so, the paper examines the cases of France, Spain and Italy to identify how securitization circulated through space and across communities of practice, facilitating the co-creation of new knowledge. The paper provides deeper insight into how securitization became established within European financial centres throughout the 1990s, shaping contemporary financial networks and the spread of the credit crunch. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We analyze the effect of munificence on the development of a proactive environmental strategy (PES) and firm performance. In addition, we examine the moderating role of perceived munificence on the association between innovation capabilities and PES and between PES and firm performance. These relationships are tested in a sample consisting in 263 Spanish agricultural firms operating in three different geographical clusters. Our results broadly support our hypotheses and suggest that although perceived munificence favors the development of a PES, it is in hostile environments where PES generates competitive advantages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Literature on corporate social responsibility (CSR) has tended to treat economic benefits to the firm as unintentional spillovers that result from laudable CSR behavior. Empirical studies of the relationship between CSR and corporate financial performance (CFP) have reported mixed findings. This article shifts the conceptual and empirical focus to investigate the conditions under which intentional profit-seeking through corporate social action projects can create economic value for the firm. The article uses resource-dependency theory and the resource-based view to define the firm’s external and internal environments respectively. From that perspective, the article looks at how corporate social action creates economic value through strategic social planning and strategic social positioning. A survey instrument was developed and applied to 110 large Spanish firms. In that sample, munificence and continuous innovation positively affect social positioning, while nongovernmental organization salience and social responsibility orientation positively affect social planning. Both social positioning and social planning in turn contribute to corporate ability to create value. The article concludes with a discussion of the research and managerial implications of these findings. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article presents the results of a study analysing the perceptions held by both Spanish public service television (TVE) news professionals and viewers as regards the main challenges faced by Spanish public service broadcasting (PSB), some of which are also common to European PSB. The global changes of the last decade have created a new social, economic, political and technological context to which PBS channels must adapt. Achieving the pluralism demanded by public institutions, differentiating themselves from commercial channels and forging a closer relationship with their audiences are three of the chief hurdles that must be overcome. PSB channels in the Mediterranean region are faced with a further obstacle: maintaining their independence from government, an issue that has led TVE to implement a number of reforms and counter-reforms in the period from 2006–2012. Regarded as a symbol of the public service duty of state-owned broadcasters, news programmes are central to achieving these goals. Therefore, this work intends to contribute to a research agenda, linking audience research to production studies and analysing the broader media policy context (Livingstone, 1998: 2–5), by approaching the complex dynamics between communication policies and specific interpretations of media discourses in Europe. In the case of Spain, this analysis shows that in the period from 2006–2011, PSB news professionals highly valued their new-found independence. However, the seemingly modest increase in viewers’ support does not bode well for the healthy development of PSB in Spain in a scenario in which institutional support is weak. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the European debt crisis, neoliberal reforms question the legitimacy of the state in the direct provision of basic services. Water governance mirrors such issues. In Metropolitan Barcelona (northeast Spain) the water cycle is being redrawn with the leasing to private hands of the regional public bulk water supplier. The unbearable debt accumulated by the Catalan Water Agency is used as the discursive justification of the 'inevitability' of granting to private capital the control over the water cycle. We attempt to demonstrate that this debt is the result of large investments, required by European directives (Wastewater Directive, Drinking Water Directive, and European Water Framework Directive) to improve the quality of rivers and water bodies. These directives, combined with the restrictions imposed on budget deficits by the European Union and the inadequate regional financing model of water have put the Catalan Water Agency against the wall. The financial crisis, wreaking havoc in Spain and Catalonia, has finally exacerbated the tensions around the water cycle as the Catalan administration has observed how international markets turned off the credit tap. In the paper we wish to elucidate pervasive processes of private participation in Metropolitan Barcelona and analyze the intricate relationship between the emergence and deepening of the recent crisis, scalar processes of ecological modernization, and the production of neoliberal natures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to understand differences in the evolution of policies to combat domestic violence against women in the Netherlands and Spain. Although policy change is often viewed as incremental change toward more progressive policies, the two countries studied here reflect opposing dynamics. The Netherlands moved from being a pioneering country to one that gradually marginalized the policy issue, whereas Spain, in contrast, recently developed innovative and far-reaching policies after a long period of low to moderate state responses. The case study points to the central role of frame negotiation, left-wing governments, and strong feminist mobilization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explains the political causes of the current financial crisis of the eurozone peripheral countries (Spain, Greece, Portugal, and Ireland) and how the crisis affects their welfare states. It examines how their profoundly conservative governments (dictatorships in Spain, Portugal, and Greece and authoritarian regime in Ireland) during the post-World War II period and the dominance of their states by right-wing forces have made these countries very vulnerable to the speculations of the financial markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a consequence of labor market flexibilization, nonstandard employment has expanded and standard employment has declined. In many cases, these transformations are best described as an evolution toward precarious employment, which is considered a major determinant of health and health inequalities. Using the Employment Precariousness Scale (EPRES), this study aims to determine the prevalence of precarious employment in the waged and salaried workforce in Spain, to describe its distribution across social groups defined by occupational class, gender, age, and immigrant status, and to estimate the proportion of cases of poor mental health potentially attributable to employment precariousness. Data are from the Psychosocial Work Environment Survey conducted in 2004-5 on a representative sample of the Spanish workforce. Findings indicate a high prevalence of employment precariousness, affecting nearly 6.5 million workers, with almost 900,000 of them exposed to high precariousness. These estimates are higher than the proportion of fixed-term employment reported in regular statistical sources but may today be an underestimation, given the current economic crisis. Additionally, a significant proportion of cases of poor mental health are potentially attributable to employment precariousness. Both the proportion of cases of poor mental health attributable to and the prevalence of employment precariousness were highly unequally distributed across the study sample, indicating that this may be a significant contributor to social inequalities in mental health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an openly hostile environment in which public service broadcasting (PSB) has to justify its mere existence, its relationship with new technologies and its transformation into Public Service Media (PSM) have been the subject of controversy in Europe, with respect to the legitimate use of new technologies by a public broadcasting service. Making use of qualitative techniques with a case study, this article illustrates how the Catalan public broadcaster iCat fm uses diverse technological distribution platforms in order to successfully achieve its public service remit proposals and provides an example of a successful public service radio that uses diverse technological distribution platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

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We represent the Spanish wholesale market as a supply function competition model. Theoretically, the larger generators' supply curves for each plant should be to the left of the supply curves of plants owned by smaller generators. We test this prediction for fuel plants using data from the Spanish Market Operator (OMEL) from January 2002 to December 2005. Our empirical results are consistent with the model predictions and suggest that the supply function model better fits data than a discrete-bid auction model since large generators behave as price-makers irrespective whether they are the marginal firms at the auction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an address at a Jobs with Justice conference, a veteran organizer takes a look at the value of cooperatives in boosting economic conditions and at his union's agreement with one such organization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyses the evolution in large firms' strategy and structure in a new spatial and temporal context (Spain 1993-2003). The central question of this work is to determine whether transformations undergone in this country have led Spanish companies' strategies and structures to converge with those of other European countries, following the predictions of 'universalistic' theories of strategy and organization; or whether cultural/institutional effects have remained strong, following a path-dependence/cultural-lag type logic. The Spanish experience is particularly significant for theory in general because its late development and very distinctive institutional origins allow us to test theories applied before in a new country and more recent time period. Our findings show that a changing context (e.g. liberalization) has led Spanish firms to converge with those of other European economies in the pattern of strategy and structure (increasing levels of diversification and divisionalization). Thus, the findings of this study in a new context are consistent with universalistic predictions that strategies and structures will evolve towards a common model of corporate development, as Chandler postulated initially. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To determine whether the increase in plasma levels of C-Reactive Protein (CRP), a non-specific reactant in the acute-phase of systemic inflammation, is associated with clinical severity of peripheral arterial disease (PAD). Methods and Results: This is a cross-sectional study at a referral hospital center of institutional practice in Madrid, Spain. A stratified random sampling was done over a population of 3370 patients with symptomatic PAD from the outpatient vascular laboratory database in 2007 in the order of their clinical severity: the first group of patients with mild chronological clinical severity who did not require surgical revascularization, the second group consisted of patients with moderate clinical severity who had only undergone only one surgical revascularization procedure and the third group consisted of patients who were severely affected and had undergone two or more surgical revascularization procedures of the lower extremities in different areas or needed late re-interventions. The Neyman affixation was used to calculate the sample size with a fixed relative error of 0.1. A homogeneity analysis between groups and a unifactorial analysis of comparison of medians for CRP was done. The groups were homogeneous for age, smoking status, Arterial Hypertension HTA, diabetes mellitus, dyslipemia, homocysteinemia and specific markers of inflammation. In the unifactorial analysis of multiple comparisons of medians according to Scheffé, it was observed that the median values of CRP plasma levels were increased in association with higher clinical severity of PAD (3.81 mg/L [2.14-5.48] vs. 8.33 [4.38-9.19] vs. 12.83 [9.5-14.16]; p < 0.05) as a unique factor of tested ones. Conclusion: Plasma levels of CRP are associated with not only the presence of atherosclerosis but also with its chronological clinical severity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article challenges dominant explanations in the comparative political economy literature on the origins and purposes of social protection. Far from being a tool of working-class mobilization, social protection in southern Spain was strategically employed by a left party to politically demobilize its supposedly "natural" constituencies. This peculiar outcome is the result of a setting that is common in welfare states outside of northern Europe: the context of a divided left, in which parties and unions are seeking to mobilize different constituencies and in which left parties are themselves divided between moderate and far-left groups. The result in Spain was that social policy became a weapon in parties' efforts to undermine their political competition. This suggests the need to rethink the received wisdom about what the welfare state does to build working-class power in the context of a divided left. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emigration within the European Union has increased, especially toward southern countries. This places complex demands on health care providers and community pharmacists, yet there is no E.U. policy that harmonizes health care services and pharmacy practice across member countries. This exploratory study examined immigrants' experiences with community pharmacy services. A survey of 1,000 Finnish immigrants living in Spain's Costa del Sol region was performed in 2002, using a questionnaire that included structured and open-ended questions. Respondents were mostly satisfied with pharmacy services; however, some services had higher medication safety risks—related to medication counseling (for prescription and non-prescription medicines) and obtaining some prescription drugs without a prescription—due mainly to lack of a common language. Pharmacy services in the European Union may not provide adequate assurances of medication safety for immigrants. Consistent E.U.-wide minimum pharmacy practice standards for immigrant populations are needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article deals with the work of journalists in newsrooms that produce content for multiple media: print, radio, television, the internet and others. It builds on the relevant literature about the implementation of newsroom convergence in Europe and the USA. Specifically, the study analyses change in journalistic practice and newsroom workflow in the newsrooms of two Spanish multimedia groups: (a) La Verdad Multimedia, a regional media group owned by Vocento, which publishes the newspaper La Verdad, the online site La Verdad.es, the local radio station Punto Radio and the television station Punto TV; and (b) Novotécnica, a regional independent company which publishes the newspaper La Voz de Almería and also owns both Radio Almería (Cadena Ser) and Localia television. Researchers interviewed reporters and news directors and observed newsroom practices. The results suggest the emergence of two different models of newsroom convergence: the integrated model and the cross-media model, each with a different production system, newsroom organization, degree of journalists' multi-skilling and business strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores and tests the differences in downsizing behaviour depending upon three ownership-based traits of the largest Spanish companies: stock versus privately held corporations, foreign versus domestic firms and state-owned versus private companies. From a theoretical standpoint, we develop an explanatory model of downsizing that accounts for techno-economic, institutional, and socio-cognitive explanations which serves as a conceptual basis for generating hypotheses on the role of ownership in downsizing decisions. Probit estimates using a sample of large Spanish firms (1990-1998) confirm that stock corporations and state-owned firms engaged in a privatization process are more likely to downsize than privately held domestic companies. We found less conclusive results about the downsizing behaviour of foreign firms. Finally, our findings corroborate the relevance of organizational decline and institutional factors for predicting the downsizing event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The proponents of globalization contend that European countries are now converging on an Anglo-American model of capitalism. Contrary to this prediction, this article shows that in Spain, globalization and the European Monetary Union have promoted rather than undermined cooperation among economic actors. Unable to escape from economic interdependence, they have developed coordinating capacities at the macro and micro levels to address and resolve tensions between economic interdependence and political sovereignty. In particular, this article analyzes the resurgence of national-level social bargaining in Spain in the 1990s. This development was partly the result of the reorientation of the strategies of trade unions. They have supported social bargaining as a defensive strategy to retake the initiative and influence policy outcomes. This article shows that successful social bargaining depends on not only the organization of the social actors, the main claim of the neocorporatist literature, but also the interests and strategies of the actors themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many societies demand that independent professionals (e.g. auditors) certify the performance of firms. The value placed on such certification (i.e. the public perception of reliability/unreliability that may impact on an organization's success/failure) is not uniform, however, but contingent upon changing political contexts. This study presents and analyses data on the entire population of newspapers in Spain from 1966 to 1993, a time of peaceful transition from military dictatorship to capitalist democracy. Our results highlight the contingent nature of institutional life, demonstrating how changes in political contexts are associated with varying understandings of institutions. In particular, our findings support the prediction that, under a dictatorship, independently certified performance is not instrumental in organizational success or failure whereas, in a modem democracy, the certification process has a positive effect on the survival chances of firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article looks at the specific processes by which policies are formulated, implemented, and changed. The case study considered posits that privatization may mean different things depending on the formula used, the assets transferred, and the resulting potential for change in the regulatory framework where the privatized firm is to operate. Any interpretation of economic policy concerning privatization should, therefore, examine the details of each operation to identify the ultimate goals, priorities, and economic transmission mechanisms involved. Here, the case of Spain is used to illustrate the various economic policy objectives (consolidating the production system, reducing public sector funding requirements, rebalancing the private and public sectors, etc.) that guide decisions on privatization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper demonstrates the strategic importance of developing a capability to manage human resources based on a set of social responsibility principles (normative and structural) with the aim of responding to the interests of the employees. Such corporate social responsiveness will encourage employees' collaboration and could distinguish the company from other organizations. We have tried empirically to test the existence of a significant and positive relationship between organizational results and the institutionalization of a social responsiveness toward employees. To this end, we carried out a study in the Spanish savings bank sector to analyse the strategic value of corporate responsiveness toward employees from the resource-based view. Our results seem to show that those savings banks that have institutionalized high-commitment practices toward employees have greater profitability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Argues that to better understand the repeated electoral success of the Spanish Socialist Party (SSP), three additional factors have to be taken into account, the party system, compensatory policies and internal party politics. Reason voters choose parties; Analysis on the SSP; Conclusion.

This article seeks to explain the Spanish Socialist Party's (PSOE's) failure to reverse Spain's dismal employment record during the course of its long government tenure from 1982 until 1996. Most efforts to explain Spain's position at the extreme of the unemployment spectrum in Europe follow the prevalent tendency in the comparative political economy literature by giving causal primacy to labor market institutions. This article challenges this labor-market-centered view by arguing that the failure of the Socialist government's economic policy strategy is to be found in the interaction of two other factors: the biased course of financial liberalization and the perverse effects of the PSOE's macroeconomic policy strategy on inflation and on the process of social concertation (national wage bargaining). The article also seeks to explain the PSOE's choices in these policy areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]