Many multiethnic polities suffer from a deficit of citizens' support for their political communities. Hence, their governments may think of political decentralisation as a solution. This article analyses the effects of that policy on citizens' identification with their political communities in Spain: on identification with the Basque Country, Catalonia or Galicia (its most conspicuous 'nationalities') once they have become 'autonomous communities', and on identification with the overall Spanish political community. To study the processes of transformation of such attitudes, nation-building theories are interpreted from the political socialisation approach and applied to the autonomous institutions. It is also suggested that the state strictu senso, by contrast, may be developing an alternative method of forging identification with its own political community. Survey time-series evidence shows that although those autonomous communities are engaged successfully in a local but standard nation-building, the whole political system may be fostering its own diffuse support by recognising and institutionalising cultural diversity and self-government.

The 1978 Spanish Constitution enshrined the recognition of linguistic, cultural, and some degree of 'national' pluralism in the country and outlined procedural mechanisms for the creation of regional 'autonomies', which has given rise to a de facto asymmetrical federal state. This article begins by analyzing the compromise over issues of national identity embedded in the Constitution and the process by which this was forged. It highlights the articulation among political forces of contending conceptions of national identity and different projects for reorganising the territorial structure within and/or against the Spanish state. It also describes the social bases of support for the respective projects. Next, the article examines recent challenges to the parameters of the constitutional compromise. It shows that citizens' support for the basic parameters of the 1978 compromise remains high and has even become stronger. It emphasises that the preferences of the general public stand in sharp contrast with the preferences of influential sections of the Basque and Catalan regional political establishment, and it concludes that current challenges to the constitutional compromise are driven by political elites.

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