Crecimiento y política territorial en las Islas Baleares (1955-2000)

Abstract

Growth and land-use policy in the Balearic Islands (1955-2000). In the second half of the twentieth century the Balearic Islands have experienced a profound economic and physiognomic transformation at the hands of tourism. Three phases can be clearly differentiated in the process; the boundary between the first and the second is the crisis of 1973, while the second and the third are divided by Spain's effective integration into the European economy, in the irst half of the 90s. The three pulses of growth have been addressed by national or autonomous community (since 1983) land-use policies that have periodically arrive too late to channel the expansive growth of each period. The latest products of Balearic land-use policies are the General Tourism Law (Ley General Turística) and the 1999 Regional Planning Directives (Directrices de Ordenación Territorial), which do not stop growth but do order it in space and time. Such ordinances seem to mark the end of a first stage, which has unfolded in three phases beginning in the middle of the 50s. This article analyses the process and attempts to lay out the possible scenario to which the prevailing tendencies seem to point.