The Kingdom of Spain is a constitutional and parliamentary monarchy with a hereditary monarch who operates as the Head of State and a bicameral Parliament, the General Courts. Juan Carlos I has been the King of Spain since 1975. Spain has been a member of the European Union since 1986 and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation-NATO since 1982. Executive power is formed by the Council of Ministers, chaired by the President who rules as Head of Government. The King proposes the President of the Government after the general elections and supports him in his role while retaining the confidence of the Congress of Deputies. Legislative Power resides in Parliament, the supreme representative body of the Spanish people. This comprises a Lower House, or Chamber of Deputies, and an Upper House, the Senate. Congress has 350 members, 128 of whom are women (36.6%), and the Upper House has 263 members, 81 of whom are women (30.8%).
Since 2004, the Spanish Socialist Workers Party-PSOE (social democrats) leader Jos Luis Rodr-guez Zapatero, re-elected in 2008, has ruled the Government. The next elections shall be held in 2012. Spain is strongly decentralised and the central government shares power with 17 autonomous governments. The main opposition party is the Popular Party (right). Nationalist parties represent the cultural and linguistic minorities. The judiciary is independent by law and in practice.
According to the 2010 Amnesty International report , allegations of torture and other abuse by officers responsible for law enforcement have continued, though their numbers have decreased at the police stations, where close-circuit television cameras have been installed. Reforms have been introduced to asylum legislation which recognises gender and sexual orientation as grounds for persecution, but restrictions and procedures for requesting asylum have also increased. Migrants and asylum seekers continue to risk their lives trying to get to Spain via dangerous land and sea routes, although official data has reflected a relative decrease in the number of those arriving on pateras.Spain still has one of the lowest recognition rates of the right to asylum in the EU.
The armed Basque group Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) has continued its violent activities and claimed responsibility for several murders, attacks and street violence (kale borroca) and continues to practice extortion to finance its activities.
Victims of gender-based violence receive increasingly adequate protection and assistance from the State, in particular since the approval of the Organic Law against Gender-Based Violence. However, reports of women murdered in the hands of their partners or ex-partners continue, despite the existence of restraining orders in several cases. The importance of education to produce the cultural changes that may contribute to eliminating this problem are increasingly evident. It is in this sense that the Government has approved directives to improve the sexual and affective education provided by the schools.
Investigation into the victims of disappearances and murders of the Civil War and Francos Dictatorship, and the opening of relevant mass graves, continue to be obstructed. Spain ratified the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearances. However, forced disappearance still does not figure as a crime in Spanish law. In December 2008, the National High Court decided that it was not competent to investigate cases of forced disappearances that date from the time of the Spanish Civil War and Francos regime; therefore, it referred the 114,266 reported cases of disappearance to the 43 examining magistrates court at the locations where mass graves had been found. 13 courts then classified the cases as common crimes and archived the investigations, arguing that they were barred by the statute of limitation. Only 3 of the local courts classified the cases as crimes under international law that were never barred by the statute of limitation. In contrast, in 2010, Judge Baltasar Garzn of the National High Court was suspended from duty and accused of having exceeded his powers by trying to make progress with regard to the recovery of the remains of many victims who remain in mass graves without having been identified by their families.
The law prohibits discrimination based on race, gender, disability, language or social status. The law is enforced, but some groups continue to be discriminated against. Freedom of expression and the press is guaranteed and respected. Reporters Without Borders indicates that ETA uses terror against any media that opposes its point of view. The Spanish media is very active and expresses a wide variety of views. Internet access is not restricted. The law recognised access to Government information.

Education is compulsory and free up to the age of 16 and free up to the age of 18. The education enrolment rates are very high at all levels, with girls and boys treated equally in education.

In the PISA 2010 report, Spain ranks in 33rd place for reading comprehension (481 points), 34th in mathematics competency (483 points), and 36th in science competency (488). It has recovered in relation to the decline it suffered in 2006, but is still 12 points from the OECD average.

A three-year programme starts at aged three. 32% of education is private at this level. The Net Enrolment Rate (NER) is 98%. There are 89,607 primary school teachers (88% women). The PTR is 14:1.

Education is compulsory from the age of 6 to 16. Primary education starts at 6 years old and lasts for 6 years. 33 % of education is private at this level. The Net Enrolment Rate (NER) is 99% (with 48% girls). There are 179,324 primary school teachers (70% women). The PTR is 13:1.

Secondary education starts at the age of 12 and lasts for 6 years. 29% of education is private at this level. 37% of students in lower secondary education study in technical vocational programmes. The NER is 96%. There are 274,801 secondary teachers (55% female), with 150,478 teaching in lower secondary and 124,323 in upper secondary schools. The PTR is 11:1 in lower secondary and 13:1 in upper secondary.

1,800,834 students (54% women) are enrolled in tertiary institutions, with a Gross Enrolment Rate of 73%. Foreign students studying in Spain are from North America and Western Europe (6,526), Latin America and the Caribbean (5,151), the Arab States (1,591), Central and Eastern Europe (804), Sub-Saharan Africa (589) and Asia (384) At the same time, 25,691 Spanish students are studying abroad, mainly in the UK (6,105), Germany (6,014), France (3,928), the USA (3,631) and Belgium (1,042).

Discrimination against persons with disabilities is illegal in education and in other state services, and the law is enforced. Reports do not cite discrimination against persons with disabilities. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child commended the Plan of Action on Disabilities but not all the autonomous communities have implemented the plan uniformly. The Committee urged Spain to improve the collection of statistics and data. Levels of assistance to disabled children are reported to differ by region, and a rural/urban divide is also noted. The Law on the Promotion of Personal Autonomy and Care for dependent persons was a big step forward from a legislative point of view, but bureaucratic hurdles in its application are still to be overcome.

The law provides for the granting of asylum and refugee status in accordance with the 1951 UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol, and the Government has established a system for providing protection for refugees. The Government collaborates with the UNHCR. However, Amnesty International (AI) and other international human rights organisations have expressed concern about policies and practices that affect the people who reach Spain and seek asylum. AI documents cases of maltreatment of unaccompanied children in Ceuta and Melilla, foreigners and members of ethnic minorities, in particular to Gypsies, in identity checks or at police stations. It also underlines the excessive use of force when expelling foreign citizens.

Reports indicate the persistence of cases of discrimination against minorities. The Gypsy community continues to face difficulties in terms of access to education, employment and housing. The poverty index and illiteracy are very high in the community, which in turn generates a higher unemployment rate than the national average. The Ministry of Education and Culture and the Gypsy Secretariat Foundation signed an agreement to improve the school enrolment rate for Gypsy children and offer education to the adults of this community. The schooling of students of gypsy ethnicity continues to be a pending issue. Only two in ten Gypsy students who begin compulsory secondary education (CSE) manage to complete their studies, according to data from the Gypsy Secretariat Foundation.

According to data provided by UNICEF, there are 971,479 foreign children living in Spain, representing 13.5% of the population under 18 years old. The most common origin is Morocco (18.7%), followed by Romania (14%) and Ecuador (10.2%).

Reports do not indicate restrictions on academic freedom. The Basque Country has continued to report cases of threats against professors and academics on the part of the armed group ETA.

Women have the same rights as men, but different salaries exist between them. In the country as a whole, the average annual wage for women is 16,943, representing a 25.6% lower wage than the wage for men, which amounts to 22.780.

Women hold fewer senior management positions than men. Sexual harassment in the workplace is illegal but is reported to still be problematic.
The peculiarity of Spanish law on full protection against gender-based violence provides a global response to the violence that is exercised against women. The scope of the law covers both preventive and educational initiatives, social care and aftercare for victims, in addition to the civil law that affects the family or living area where the attacks mainly occur. Similarly, it deals with the sanctions and penalties which all forms of violence that the law regulates must receive. Additionally, the law also extends immediate care to those affected and increases employment and economic support to the victims who have priority access to subsidised housing, or a public care home in the case of the elderly. However, cases of women being murdered continue to be reported, which relates to the importance and the need for action through education in order to change attitudes and practices marked by inequality between women and men.

In March 2010, a new Organic Law was passed on sexual and reproductive health and termination of pregnancy which extends the time limit for abortion to 14 weeks, in line with European legislation in this area. The law deals with protection and fully guarantees the rights relating to sexual and reproductive health. It introduces definitions of the World Health Organisation on health, sexual health and reproductive health and the adoption of a set of actions and measures, both in healthcare and education.

The minimum age for employment of children is 16. This coincides with the end of compulsory school education. Minors under 18 cannot be employed at night or in sectors considered dangerous. The legislation is rigorously enforced in the formal sector and in special economic areas, but less so on small farms and in family-owned businesses.
In Spain, according to UNICEF,Childhood in Spain: 2010/2011,24.1% of children are at risk of relative poverty, that is, they live in homes subsisting on salaries 60% below the national average. This information ranks Spain at the tail end of the 27 EU member countries, only surpassed by Romania, Bulgaria, Latvia and Italy, therefore increasing considerably the risks associated with falling prey to child labour. Since the 2008 economic crisis there have been an increasing number of children on the city streets, most whom are undocumented immigrants and children from the Gypsy community.

Workers have the right to form and join trade unions, except military service personnel, judges, magistrates and prosecutors. 15% of the work force is unionised. Collective bargaining is permitted, including in the case of public sector workers, except military personnel. Collective bargaining is widespread and in the public sector includes salaries and employment conditions. 85% to 90% of workers in the private sector have their terms and conditions of work determined by collective contracts negotiated by the unions. The right to strike is guaranteed. Forced or compulsory labour is prohibited but reportedly exists among the victims of the persons trafficked for sexual exploitation or in some cases for domestic work, in general carried out by immigrant women. The law sets a 40-hour work week.

In December 2010, the Teaching Federations UGT and CC.OO expressed their opposition to the measure announced in the Congress of Deputies by the President of the Government, Jos Luis Rodrguez Zapatero, which provides for the termination of the Passive Class System and Mutual Fund for State Civil Servants (MUFACE). This would mean that new civil servants would be integrated into the General Social Security System. The measure is part of a package of other measures aimed at the gradual privatisation of public services and to undermine the work and social conditions of public employees.