Kingdom+of+Spain

This page has been created by Celia Pastor Carbonell.

toc =My Country Facts=

Official Name of the Country
The Kingdom of Spain

Year that country joined the UN
1955

People:
1. What are the people from the country called?

They are called Spanish.

2. What is the official language? What other languages do people speak ?

The official language is Spanish but Aranese, Basque, Catalan, Valencian and Galician are other recognized regional regions.

3. What is the most-practiced religion?

The most-practiced religion is Christianity but there are some people who practice Islam, Judaism or other religions.

4. What is the population density of your country?

The population density of Spain is 91,13 inhabitants per kilometre square.

Government:
1. What is the name of thee leader of the country?

The king's name is Juan Carlos I and the prime minister's name is Jose Luis Rodríguez Zapatero.

2. What type of government is the country ruled by?

The type of government of Spain is a parliamentary democracy and a costitutional monarchy, so the Monarch is the head of State and the President of the government is the head of government in a multi-party system.

3. What are the main political parties of the country?

Some of the main political partiesof Spain are the Socialist Party, the People's party, the United Left and the convergence and Union. The Spanish Socialist Party is the ruling political party in Spain and it was founded in 1833. It identifies its self as a centre-left, social-democratic, democratic socialistic and progressive party. It was founded with the purpose of representing and defending the interests of the workers' class, which was born in the industrial revolution in the 19th century. The ideology of the Spanish Socialist Party has involved throughout the 20th century, due to historical events and social development. In 1979, the party abandoned the marxist (Karl Marx, philosopher) thesis. From that moment, several events demonstrated that the projects from the Spanish Socialist Party were similar to other parties' projects. Currently, the Socialist Party is focused on the sociodemocray.

The People's Party is a center right political party in Spain. It was a re-foundation of the People's Alliance, a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne. Its ideology is based on the conservatism, liberal conservatism, Christian democracy and National Catholitism.

- Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maint of traditional institutions and supports minimal and gradual change in society. - Liberal conservatism is a variant of political conservatism which incorporates liberal elements. - Christian democracy is a political ideology that usually applies Christian principles to public policy. - National Catholitism was part of the ideological identity of Francoism. Its most visible manifestation was the hegemony that the Catholic Church had in all aspects of public and private life.

4. Was your country ever a colony? If so, when did it gain its independence?

It gained its independence after the independence war in 1814, when the French were expelled. Some territories that belonged to Sapin are America, the actual countries of the Dominican Republic, the Bahamas Islands, San Cristóbal, Asia, the North of Taiwán, Ternate and Tidore (Indonesia), Mocao (China), Nagasaki (Japan), Malaca (Malasia), Africa, Bugía, Trípoli, Túnez, Portugal, Naples Kingdom and the Low Countries.

5. How is Spain politically divided?

Spain is politically divided into 19 autonomous comunities like Madrid or Castilla and León.

Geography:
1. Where is the country?

It is situated on the western Europe. It occupies most of the Iberian Peninsula, and out of it, Spain owns two archipelagoes: the Baleares Islands and the Canary Islands, two cities: Ceuta and Melilla, and in the north of Africa, the Alborán Island.

2. What other nations border the country?

The physical borders of Spain are the following ones: in the west, Portugal; in the south, it borders Gibraltar and Morocco. In the northeast, it borders France and the tiny principality of Andorra along the Pyreenes mountain ranges.

3. What kind of landscape does the country have?

Spanish relief is very elevated, with an average of 660 metres. It is mountanious if we compare it with other European countries. The relief is accumulated around a Central Plate, which occupies most of the Iberian Peninsula. The main mountanious ranges are: the Pyrenees, the Iberic range, the Central range, the Cantabric mountain range and the Betic mountain ranges.

4. What type of climate does your country have?

Due to Spain's geographical situation and orographic (relief) conditions, the climate is extremely diverse; besides the mountain climate, it canbe divided into five areas:

- A continental Meditarranean climate in the inland areas of the Peninsula. - An Oceanic climate or arid Mediterranean in the southeast. - A Mediterranean climate region extends from the Andalusian plain along the southern and eastern coasts up to th ePyrenees, on the seaward side to the mountain ranges that run near the coast. Also in Ceuta and Melilla. - A semiarid climate or arid Mediterranean in the southeast. - A subtropical climate in the Canary Islands and some areas in the coast of Granada and Málaga. The rain in Spain does not fall mainly in the plain. It falls mainly in the northern mountains.

Economy:
1. What is the most common sector of employment in the country?

The most common sector of employment in Spain is the services' sector.

2. What is the unemployment rate in your country?

Unemployment stood at 7.6% in October 2006 and by the endof May 2009, it has already reached 18.7%.

3. Which is the currency of your country?

The Spanish coin is the euro.

The most surprising thing I learned about my country was the amount of territories Spain has owned throughout history.

=My predictions=

I do not think Spain is going to be in favour of the wild animal traffic. Firstly, Spain doesn't get any benefit of animal traffic because the people who do it don't have to pay any taxes to take the species inside or outside the country because it's ilegal and they have to do it secretly if they don't want to be arrested by the police. On the other hand, if there is a lot of animal traffic in a country that country gets a bad image and that doesn't help to this country's economy. So, if you get this point of view, animal traffic is damaging for everybody. We must take into account that it's not just an economic problem but also to the species that are being trafficked. The only people who gets some benefit from animal traffic are the ones who sell the species and get the money but, fortunately, they are caught sometimes and the exchange stops. It's a very good idea, specially for developed countries like Spain, that every country contributes to the stop of animal traffic, for example, expending more money to hire a bigger amount of policemen who persecute traffickers for these to be taken to cites where they can be judged farely. Spain tries to stop traffic markets and I think Spain and other countries in which there is a lot of animal traffic should offer more jobs to people for them to have another way to earn money and prevent the growth of this problem. There should also be a good security system in other countries, as there is in Spain, to prevent species to be taken outside the country.

Spain isn't in favour of child labour either because there have been created several laws against that and if the police arrestes people who has participated in anything related to child labour the sentence is quite severe. However, there are always going to be people who break the law and hire children to work in factories where they can hurt themselves and only because they work for less money. This happens all over the world, not just in Africa (where only a quarter of all the children in the world work) as many people think. There should also more policemen hired to solve this problem because it's unfair that so young children are doing those hard works. After that, new schools could be created for these children who have been working for so long to integrate them in society again and for them to learn things and get a good job one day.

Kingdom of Spain's Position Paper (1st draft)