31/07/2013
Fundación para el Progreso
After overcoming the most urgent issue, which was to avoid sinking as a country, it's time for Spain to devote itself to the important issues: tackling the underlying problems that led it to the brink.
These problems are many and varied in nature. Suffice to name here some of the best documented: a labour market where the privileges of some are paid by the defencelessness of most; an inefficient and fragmented State, penetrated by localism and corruption; universities conspicuous by their absence among the best in the world and a very expensive and poor school system; a notable lack of internationally important innovation and a model of economic growth with declining productivity. These and other problems attest to an institutional system that threatens the welfare of the Spanish due to their inability to generate sustainable growth, i.e., based on knowledge and innovation.
One of the essential reforms that lie ahead in this regard is the Welfare State. Its extensive features have made it a central pillar of social welfare, but it is not less important than systems that support an economy based on talent, knowledge and innovation. Therefore, a welfare state that is unable to reinvent itself before current and future challenges is doomed to become a decisive burden for social development as a whole. This is precisely the current situation in Spain.
What needs to be changed is not merely a matter of organisation, but something much more profound: the relationship between State and civil society, making the State a source of support and not a substitute for the actions of citizens. This involves empowering civil society, giving it full right to decide, through their free choice, who should produce publicly guaranteed services. This is already a reality in countries like Sweden, where a broad public-private partnership system based on free enterprise gives citizens empowered with welfare checks or bonds a real chance to choose what they, and not politicians, want. This not only creates a State at the service of citizens but also a welfare system that is far more efficient, flexible, pluralistic and dynamic. This is one of the reasons that make Sweden stand out today as the most successful Western country of the European Union.