Spain

Governmental equality bodies

The Ministry of Equality and the Inter-Ministerial Commission for Equality between Women and Men are the two main entities in charge of conducting the governmental gender equality policy. In March 2020, the former body transitioned from the Secretariat of State for Equality Policies (Secretaria de Estado de Igualdad) within the Ministry of the Presidency, Parliamentary Relations, and Equality (MPR) to the status of a full Ministry.

The Ministry of Equality (Ministerio de Igualdad)^[7] is the highest governmental body for the promotion of gender equality in Spain. The Ministry is also in charge of other equality grounds.

134 people currently work for the Ministry of Equality and they allocate 75%-100% of their time to gender equality work.

The Ministry of Equality is consulted by departments or ministries in other policy fields about almost all new or existing policies, laws or programmes developed. Indeed, draft laws, royal decree laws, legislative royal decrees, and regulatory proposals, as well as plans of special economic, social, cultural, and artistic relevance which are submitted to the Council of Ministers, are also systematically sent to the Ministry of Equality for comment.

The Inter-ministerial Commission for Equality between Women and Men is responsible for the coordination and mainstreaming of the principle of equal treatment and opportunities across government departments. This structure was created by the Organic Act 3/2007. All ministries participate in the Commission and meet at least twice a year (Article 5 of Royal Decree 1370/2007).

Besides the Inter-Ministerial commission, the Gender Equality Units, created within each ministry, are a key organisational instrument to ensure effective mainstreaming and to monitor the application of equality legislation through reports and gender impact assessments of legislative and regulatory proposals or plans, as regulated by the Royal Decree 259/2019, of April 12.

Independent equality body

The Institute of Women (Instituto de las Mujeres)^[9] is an independent gender equality body that was established in 1983 by Law 16/1983, of October 24. While the Institute is autonomous, it is nonetheless attached to the Ministry of Equality and was previously located in the General Directorate for Equal Opportunities. Under Law 15/2014, of September 16, the powers of the General Directorate for Equal Opportunities were integrated within the tasks and structure of the Institute of Women. The Institute of Women was called the ‘Institute for Women and Equal Opportunities’ until 2014 when it was changed in the General State Budget Law for 2021, Fourth Additional Provision.

The Institute is regularly invited by other departments or ministries to consult on new policy plans, which, in nearly all cases, leads to relevant adjustments.136 people work for the Institute of Women. The Institute for Women and Equal Opportunities runs a gender mainstreaming programme, co-financed by the European Social Fund (ESF)^[10]. 

The key objectives of the programmes are:

• Supporting the General State Administration in the integration of a gender perspective in its policies;
• Supporting the European Social Fund in the incorporation, monitoring and assessment of gender mainstreaming in the action at the regional level;
• Incorporating equal opportunities in transnational projects and activities;
• Advising and supporting the European Gender Mainstreaming Network; and
• Strengthening the women's associative movement and promoting its participation in the development of public equality policy.

Parliamentary bodies

Both chambers of the Spanish Parliament - the Congress of Deputies and the Senate - have a Commission of Equality (Comisión de Igualdad). Created as a single commission for both chambers in 1988, this body was split in two in 2008. It monitors the role of government in gender equality issues, as well as the effective fulfilment of related laws. High representatives of the Ministry of Equality regularly present the main lines of action and projects before this Committee at least twice a year, where parliamentary initiatives related to gender equality are also discussed.

Consultation with civil society

Consultation with civil society in Spain primarily takes place through the Women's Participation Council^[11], which is a collegiate advisory body created to provide a participation and dialogue channel between women’s rights NGOs and the government. Among its main functions, the Council aims to collect and support proposals from civil society organisations active in the field of equality between women and men. The Council also reports on debates and organises meetings of women's organisations and associations at an institutional level, to provide them with information on the social reality of women.

Regional structures

The regional level is truly relevant to gender equality and gender mainstreaming in Spain, as regions have devolved competences on specific issues, such as employment, education, housing, and social services. Regions also have shared competence for gender equality policy with the central state, thus they have developed their own laws for gender equality. The autonomous communities took the European guidelines as a starting point for their public policies, sometimes even making more progress than the central state. Although the approval of the Organic Law of Effective Equality of Women and Men in 2007 was a key moment for gender equality in Spain, it was not the first gender equality law in Spain. The Equality Law did provide a legal basis for parity in elected bodies of different autonomous communities (Article 44bis). However, some of them had already approved their own regional equality laws. Nevertheless, Article 21 of the Equality Law states that Spanish regions should cooperate with the national government to achieve effective gender equality, providing the legal basis for gender mainstreaming at the regional level.

In practice, the regions vary considerably in their mechanisms, competence and available resources^[12]. According to the Spanish regional system, each region approves its Statute (which is then approved by the Spanish parliament) and local gender equality bodies thus have different structures.

Twelve regions have at least one governmental body for the promotion of gender equality and five do not, however, in those who do not have one, such tasks are carried out by an independent body for the promotion of gender equality in the form of an Institute of Women and/or Equal Opportunities. Some autonomous communities have created autonomous administrative bodies responsible for gender equality policies, while others have designated a specific department or office such as Andalucía and Castilla la Mancha. Other regions have integrated into the equality body within a ministry dedicated to women’s rights and social policy, for example, the region of Murcia.

Article 21 of the Equality Law states that local authorities should cooperate with other public administrations (within their competence) to achieve effective gender equality. At the local level, Councils of Equality (Consejos de Igualdad) have been created in most large municipalities, which assume responsibility for gender equality policy and are, in some cases, responsible for the implementation of gender mainstreaming as well. Some municipalities are very committed to gender mainstreaming, with Bilbao, Madrid and Barcelona City Councils being good examples. These local administrations have incorporated key instruments to implement gender mainstreaming, such as sex-disaggregated data, gender impact assessments or gender budgets^[13][14][15].