Intergovernmental Relations in Trade Policy: Spanish Regions, the limits of devolved governance and EU level mobilization

While Spanish regions have varying levels of autonomy within domestic politics, they are limited in their ability to engage in trade policy. Despite that trade policy issues across Europe have become increasingly contested at the subnational level, generating increased subnational mobilization, Spain has not seen the same level of mobilization. What institutional constraints prevent autonomous communities from engaging in trade politics? How do Spanish regions promote their trade agendas and shape trade policy? Despite substantial research on the Spanish territorial model, little attention has been given to why subnational entities have limited influence in trade policy, and to how autonomous regions mobilize beyond the nation-state to advocate their interests at the European level. Our paper focuses on the subnational engagement of Spanish regions in trade policy and shows how constitutional constraints, lack of effective multilevel channels of institutional cooperation, as well as weak intergovernmental relations, have led autonomous regions to circumvent domestic constraints and to promote their trade agendas in Brussels. Bringing together the literature on the politics of trade with that of intergovernmental relations, we offer an empirical analysis of the adaption strategies of Spanish regions relating to trade policy, which has become increasingly contentious.