Does Spain have a social class system?

Social class isn't a subject that comes up regularly in conversation in Spain, nor do Spaniards really ever ask themselves what class they belong to and secretly aspire to move up the social ladder.

This may come as some surprise to Brits in Spain, as their home country has such a culturally entrenched class system.

Writer Sergio del Molino noted in an interview with El Español that “In Spain we are not aware of elitism: we live in a country where there is classism, as in all countries, but it is not marked.

"Class exclusion in Spain is always very subtle, usually only noticed by those who suffer it," he concluded.

That's not to say that Spain doesn't have a clase obrera or trabajadora (working class), clase media (middle class) and clase alta (high class), but the lines are not as clearly defined as in the United Kingdom.

Is there a posh accent in Spain?

Spain doesn't really have an equivalent of the Queen's English or Received Pronunciation (RP) than indicate that a person is of higher class.

"Although we imitate the posh, there is no defining upper-class accent," Molina says.

"People from the Salamanca neighbourhood [of Madrid] like to be down-to-earth: they swear like sailors.”

Spain has other divides relating to access, with southern accents such as Murcian, Andalusian and Canary ones often being deemed 'worse' than those from the upper half of Spain, but high class people from these southern areas will not adapt their speech to adopt a more 'posh' accent.

"In France and England the accent is much more marked, almost regional. … The exception in Spain is Catalonia. There is a very clear linguistic mark that makes it possible to distinguish the upper and dominant class from the nouvinguts (newcomers), who don't speak Catalan or speak it very badly. There is a very deep mark of accent and class there."

Fashion and hobbies as a class marker

There is a distinctive perennial look for men in Spain who could be defined as pijos (posh). They will often have a mid-length floppy hairstyle, wear polo tops or shirts along with a quilted vest, chinos and moccasins. During the winter months, their dress code looks closer to what you'd expect English lords in hunting gear to wear.

Women are more prone to following the latest fashion trends (often going for the boho chic look), and will almost always be impeccably dressed and impossibly tanned.

Upper class hobbies in Spain include going to see the bullfighting, golf, tennis and sailing.

Is there an upper-class party in Spain?

Spanish politicians and voters tend (with some exceptions) to communicate political identity and party affiliation in different ways: regional and linguistic markers for example, or interpretations of history and the sort of country they think Spain really is or should be.

Of course, you’ll sometimes hear Spanish trade unionists or far-left politicians talking about la clase obrera, but in large part Spanish society feels framed more by sociocultural factors than it does the class system.

Writing in El Confidencial, political journalist Esteban Hernández describes class as "a taboo" and notes that one of Spain’s two main political parties, the centre-right Partido Popular (PP), essentially ignores class and “distances it from its framework, which appreciates the individual if he or she is Spanish, Catholic and anti-tax.”

That is to say, anyone is welcome to vote PP if they meet these characteristics. That many PP voters do come from more middle-class backgrounds is true, but less important or commented on.

Meanwhile Spain's Socialists (PSOE) might’ve traditionally voiced more working-class concerns, but now so many of its natural voter base are pensioners and property owners that connection has been complicated. The defence of the welfare state, however, which is comparatively speaking less of a class issue in Spain anyway, remains strong among the PSOE base.

“The Spanish left,” Hernández notes, “on the whole doesn’t not like to mention the middle class because it represents everything they want to distance themselves from, those people they consider conformist, consumerist and conservative and whose eagerness is to imitate the rich.” This, despite many recent leaders of the Spanish far-left — Podemos leaders Pablo Iglesias and Ione Belarra come to mind — being from solidly middle-class backgrounds and entrenched in Madrid politics.

Then there’s Vox and the Spanish far-right, which tends to have a more cultural understanding of Spain, politics, and history. Like the PP, some of this is religion and culture, with more extreme elements on the fringes, let's say, and a lot of it is based in interpretations of the past — the Civil War, transition to democracy, and so on — and nostalgic understandings of Spanish society.

That is to say, the Spanish far-right is less likely to analyse society in class terms than it is in terms of older notions of ‘real’ Spain and its internal enemies — rojos, non-Catholics, Basques and Catalans, for example — regardless of class background.

What social class are most Spaniards?

The Spanish right has long focused on individualism and entrepreneurship over collective models of society, caring less for material arguments and more for religion and nationalism.

Centre-left and far-left politics, however, in Spain and around the world, has in recent years become very focused on identity politics: diversity, minority groups and multiculturalism, which when taken to its extreme is arguably in itself a form of individualism. Often, the main proponents of overzealous identity politics, are from comfortable middle class families themselves, so class politics has lost some relevance. Perhaps it’s no surprise the language of class has fallen out of favour.

It's also about how Spaniards view themselves.

Hernández notes: "If we look at purely material elements, at prices and salaries, at the cost of subsistence and real disposable income, a good part of Spaniards are working class but almost all of them identify themselves as middle class. A small part of the population, and mostly politicised, considers itself working class."

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