New Spain, new Spaniards: European, democratic, and multi-cultural

Few things changed in the immediate aftermath of the Bourbon restoration of 1975. Most of the political figures who had served in the last years of the Franco regime continued to serve under King Juan Carlos, including Carlos Arias Navarro, the prime minister. The continuity dismayed Spaniards and outsiders hoping for dramatic change, but it provided stability and reassurance for Spaniards who feared change and the disruption it might bring. Newspapers and magazines debated the future of Spain in serious articles and political cartoons alike. The new daily newspaper El Pais began as a voice for change, strongly allied to the still clandestine Socialist Party but aiming to provide analysis rather than polemic. Farther to the left, the weekly magazine Cambio16 emerged as a harsher critic of the government and its continuity with the Franco regime. Beneath the surface, however, the king and his close advisers prepared to transform Spanish political life. Inadvertently, the assassins of Admiral Carrero Blanco in 1973 had made a transition toward democracy easier, removing a powerful opponent of change. One of the first indications of that transformation occurred seven months after Juan Carlos came to the throne. Carlos Arias met with the king on July 1, 1976, at the latter's request, and resigned as prime minister after the meeting. Arias had taken on a difficult and thankless task two and a half years earlier and had presided over the administration during a crucial period.