Pestel Analysis for Spain free essay sample

Castilian Spanish (official), Catalan, Galician and Basque. Exports : Machinery, motor vehicles, foodstuffs, pharmaceuticals, medicines, and other consumer goods Imports : Machinery and equipment, fuels, chemicals, semi-finished goods, foodstuffs, consumer goods, measuring and medical control instruments Map of Spain [pic] Introduction The country analysis report on Spain provides a wide array of analytical inputs to analyze the country’s performance, and the objective is to help the reader to make business decisions and prepare for the future. The report on Spain analyzes the political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental (PESTLE) structure of Spain. The report provides a holistic view of Spain from historical, current and future perspective. Insightful analysis on critical current and future issues is presented through detailed SCPT (strengths, challenges, prospects and threats /risks) analysis for each of the PESTLE segments. EU membership has given the country an opportunity to undertake measures to meet the environmental and technological standards of its EU peers. The country’s performance on environmental indicators, despite lagging behind other EU nations, has shown improvement. PESTLE analysis of Spain identifies issues that affect the country’s performance through the prism of current strengths (strengths), current challenges (weaknesses), future prospects (opportunities) and future risks (threats). PESTLE Analysis [pic] Political Analysis Spain’s transition from monarchy to democratic nation involved numerous political upheavals. After the French and British rule, the nation passed nto a dictatorial regime under the leadership of a fascist dictator, General Francisco Franco. After Franco’s death, Spain embarked on the path to democracy, and a modern constitution based on rules of law was promulgated in 1978. The initial years of democracy were dominated by two distinct ideologies; those of the center right PP, and those of the center left PSOE. The PSOE received popular support in the early years of democracy a s it was seen as a viable alternative to the PP, whose image was sullied because of its perceived closeness to Franco’s regime. After failing to win in first four consecutive elections, the PP emerged as the largest single grouping in 1996 elections, allowing it to form a coalition government with some smaller regional parties. In 2000, leveraging strong economic growth, the PP returned to power with an absolute majority. Despite its economic successes, the PP’s two-term Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar has seen his domestic popularity decline due to his support for the US’s Iraq policy. The PSOE came to power in the 2004 and 2008 elections under the leadership of Jose Zapatero. The new government initiated policies for economic reforms along with the process of fiscal discipline. The economic recession of the country has put tremendous pressure on the survival of the government because of declining public support. The ruling party’s relation with its coalition partners has been under strain too. In order to tackle the deteriorating scenario as a result of credit crisis, Prime Minister Zapatero took direct control of the economic policies, which is likely to continue for some time. Spain – key political events since 1935 [pic] Spain has been successful in overcoming its dictatorial past and now has well established democratic principles in place. The countrys EU membership has bound the government to reform its economic and social policies. The country assumed the EU presidency in January 2010 and got off to an inauspicious start. In early January 2010, Prime Minister Zapatero launched a proposal that the EU should consider imposing corrective measures on countries that fail to meet commonly agreed economic objectives. This met with a dismissive response from a number of EU member countries and widespread skepticism from international media, which have questioned whether it is appropriate that Zapatero should be leading plans for an economic recovery program for Europe, given the poor state of the Spanish economy. Economical Analysis Spain’s economy, which was underdeveloped until the 1980s, began a period of growth when the country became a member of the EU in 1986. Subsequently, the government initiated a number of economic reform programs and initiated fiscal discipline measures to meet the objectives set under the Maastricht Treaty. Spain’s economy has shown steady progress since the 1990s, driven primarily by mass tourism and European subsidies. In fact, since the mid-1990s Spain outperformed the rest of the Eurozone, particularly the larger countries. Economic growth between 1997 and 2000 was above 4%, but declined to 3. 5% in each of the years during 2001–03, before recovering again. Despite the growth the country has not been able to create enough employment opportunities and the level of unemployment remains one of the highest in the Eurozone. The economy lost its momentum and began to decline in 2008. Its dependence on real estate aggravated the impact of global financial turbulence, which started with the US sub-prime crisis. The speculative price rises in the real estate market and the property boom came to an end in 2007. The economic crisis deepened in 2009–10 following weak domestic demand and rising inflation. The government has taken a number of initiatives, including increased public sector spending to revive the sliding economy. However, there is a need for large scale structural reforms or else the government will be in deficit once again.