From Governmental Vigilance to Diffuse Control

Surveillance and Accountability since the Spanish Transition

Abstract

Considering the inertia of past institutions and practices, this paper questions how the accountability of surveillance has been affected in terms of its quality and mechanisms. To verify this, the first part depicts the background related to intelligence institutions since the Spanish democratic transition in the late 70s. The second part is focused on digital personal data flows in a de-concentrated surveillance assemblage since the 90s. On each part, the accountability mechanisms are analyzed through a historical and political methodology based on the theory of legacy constraints. Structured bibliography related to checks and balances and the analysis of legal measures regarding the protection of privacy are the sources for this study. The conclusion alludes to a posteriori mechanisms of answerability and to uncoordinated efforts of accountability since the first period. It also stresses the importance of answerability promoted by the citizenship to complement and reinforce enforcement dimensions which are affected by the secrecy of surveillance.