The Activation of Religious Vote in Spain (1979-2011)

Abstract

Spanish religious indicators have experienced one of the most drastic
declines in Europe. The low levels of church attendance and religious
denomination contributed to reject the perception of religiosity as a
relevant explanatory factor of electoral behavior. However, leaders
continued introducing debated related to secular education, divorce and
abortion not only during the eighties, but also more recently from 2004 to
2011. The facts encourage us to reconsider the strength of the religious
vote. Is the political elite able to mobilize religious voting through the
inclusion of such issues in the electoral debate? In this paper I
demonstrate that religiosity has been and still is a key element to
understand Spanish electoral behavior, especially in those elections in
which the political elite has focused the debate on issues related to moral
issues.