The West and the Decline of Habsburg Spain

The following article contains seven excerpts from the chapter 'Spain under Philip III' in the book 'Europe in Crisis: 1598-1648' by Geoffrey Parker. A brief analysis follows each excerpt in which Isaac Piano examines the parallels between the crises of early 17th century Spain and current crises of the West.

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Summary

Single Sentence: The decline of Spain in the 17th century due to political disarray, economic hardship, and depopulation serves as a mirror to the West’s current predicament, where similar challenges threaten societal cohesion and state vitality, and little is done to substantially counteract them.

Paragraph: The West faces challenges that find parallels in Spain during the fall of the Spanish Empire. Using 17th century Spain as an example, this article highlights the detrimental effects of political turmoil, economic pressures, and demographic shifts on societal stability and national strength. Parallels include the critical importance of population for a state’s prosperity, the adverse impact of high taxation and cost of living on family formation, and the consequences of a shrinking working-age population on a nation’s ability to sustain itself. Despite recognition of these issues, there is a noted lack of effective action to reverse the trends, mirroring the inaction observed during Spain’s decline.

[Start of Excerpts]

Excerpt 1

Philip II passed on to his son an inheritance that was larger than the one he had received from Charles V in 1555-6, for although the North Netherlands continued the rebellion they had begun in the 1570s, the extensive Portuguese seaborne empire was now securely in Habsburg hands. The overseas possessions of Castille (Mexico, Peru, the Caribbean islands and the Philippines) were complemented by those of Portugal (Brazil in America, Angola and Moçambique in Africa, and a chain of factories and fortresses stretching around the northern shores of the Indian Ocean and into the Pacific). The Atlantic islands and many North African ports were also firmly under Iberian control; and Spanish preponderance was assured in the South Netherlands, in Franche-Comté (to the east of France) and in Lombardy, southern Italy and Sicily. However, weakness underlay almost every part of this impressive structure. In Spain itself an outbreak of bubonic plague in 1598-1602, following a run of poor harvests and high food prices, appears to have reduced the population of Castille by about ten per cent: some 600,000 people died.

Analysis

At the death of Philip II, Spain was the most powerful empire on earth. As described in the excerpt above, it controlled vast areas of Europe and the Americas, and stretched across parts of Africa and the Pacific. However, by 1598, Spain had suffered a series of humiliating defeats and was involved in costly wars. The Spanish Armada had been defeated in 1588 and Spain had been involved in the 80 Years War in the Netherlands since 1568. In combination with the plague of 1598-1602, these events were to prove devastating to Spanish prestige and morale. There are clear comparisons between the decline of Spain and the modern-day decline of the Western Liberal Order. Between 2001 and 2021, the USA and her allies were involved in a costly war which ended in effective defeat. Covertly since 2014 and openly since 2022, the West is involved in a major war in Ukraine with no end in sight. The West, along with much of the developed world, is plagued by the crisis of ageing populations which serves the same end as the bubonic plague: the reduction of the working population.

Excerpt 2

The loss of urban population seriously weakened both the demand for, and the production of, industrial goods, and was coupled with a drift away from the countryside of serious dimensions. As early as 1591, one of Philip II's ministers warned his master: "The population is failing, and in such a way that many reliable people who have come from various parts of this kingdom are saying that it is a marvel to meet anyone in the smaller villages. In this way agriculture will very soon fail. It is to be feared that everything here will collapse..." The heavy mortality, disruption and discomfiture caused by the plague and famine, coming as it did after a decade of political and military reverses (from the defeat of the Spanish Armada to the peace of Vervins), gave rise to pessimism and disillusion among Spain's ruling elite.

Analysis

Similarly to the situation in Spain, pessimism and disillusion has gripped the West's own ruling elite and has permeated down to the general population. Loneliness, depression, and fear of war have become major discussion points in the media. The 'cost of living' crisis has grievously impacted the hopes of a generation and the economic damage caused by COVID-19 lock-downs has caused a serious decline in the young adult population's ability to financially support children and buy houses. All of this comes on the back of military (and cultural) defeats in Afghanistan, Mali, and Niger. However, we are not on the edge of a famine as sixteenth-century Spain was. Logistics experts have spoken of food shortages over the next few years but we are not facing a famine in the near future. We are simply at the beginning of this process.

Excerpt 3

The obsession with Spain's malaise and with finding remedies for it arose from the patent failure of the Madrid government to suggest solutions of its own. Philip III ruled by delegation: most of the decisions sent out in his name were in fact made by the fourteen advisory councils sitting in the royal palace at Madrid. Even in the field of foreign affairs, the king endorsed virtually without comment nine-tenths of the recommendations made to him by the relevant council (the council of state).

Analysis

17^th century Spain was in political turmoil. The chief executive was not present. There was no clear strategy to solve serious issues like the multiple rebellions facing the empire. Our own political upheaval mirrors this. The US elections of 2016 and 2020 were vicious and chaotic, the upcoming 2024 election appears to be on a similar path. There are factions in both of the US main political parties who will not accept an election result other than victory. Turmoil of another type affects the United Kingdom. For example, Brexit was voted through in 2016 but only became law in 2020. The 3.5 years between demonstrated that the British government had no real strategy or plans for how to implement Brexit. The result has been a bad deal for both the EU and the UK. One gets the sense that there is no organisation, no coherence, and no clarity of thought in the UK executive as Prime Ministers come and go.

Excerpt 4

Two causes of decline were picked out as being of supreme importance: depopulation and poverty. The two phenomena, it was realized, were related and others besides the ten wise men on the committee could see it. In 1619, a shrewd friar from Toledo, Sancho de Moncada, studied the parish registers of the city for the three preceding years and noted that the number of marriages had declined by 50 per cent. He concluded that the reason for this was the poverty: "people no long get married because they have no money to buy food and set up a house together", he suggested, adding that the heavy weight of taxes kept down the standard of living.

Analysis

People of child-bearing age today are faced with a terrible choice: have a child and take a severe economic hit which will likely prevent them from buying a house, or don't have children and hope that you are able to stay afloat financially. There has been a significant decline in the numbers of marriages and births since the 1990s across the developed world. This is in conjunction with an increasing tax burden (since 2021-22 in particular) and immense growth in house prices. This is not to say definitively that the decline in marriages and births is the result of increasing taxes and poverty, but they are certainly related.

Excerpt 5

The magistrates of Burgos agreed. In 1624 they informed the king that high taxes kept the city "so depopulated that the people who live here are leaving because they can no longer make a living". The tax quota of Burgos, for example, which was shared between 2247 households in 1595, was only shared between 915 households in 1618. And the total tax burden increased in the interim. Burgos declined to 823 households in 1624, to 800 in 1638 and to 700 in 1669.

Analysis

This is a possible effect of high taxation. The UK is facing a growing problem as more of its young working population moves abroad. They are taking advantage of lower taxes, digital nomad visas, and higher standards of living elsewhere. In 2024, 4.5 million people said they were considering moving abroad from the UK, 90,000 have done so. The most common reason cited was the cost of living crisis. As in Burgos, those who remain will be faced with an ever increasing tax burden due to the declining population.

Excerpt 6

Everyone realized how serious the loss of population was for Spain. "What is a kingdom without people?" asked the Discourse of Pedro de Valencia in 1610: "they are its wealth, its strength and its reputation"; "Nothing is more necessary for keeping a kingdom strong and wealthy than an abundant population" repeated Cristóbal Suárez de Figueroa in 1617. "Without people there is no kingdom because people are the kingdom" echoed Sancho de Moncada two years later.

Analysis

A nation-state cannot exist without its people. Since the 1990s, the significant decline in population has had an increasing effect on the economic ability of most western nations. Even with the benefits of generative AI and immigration, the net loss of working population is proving to be devastating. The tax burden on the population has increased in line with the decline of numbers of available workers. Now, a significant problem many western nations face is how to pay their entitlements to their ageing populations. Approximately a fifth of the UK population (19%) are aged 65 and older, this is projected to rise to 24.3% by 2043. Entitlement payments, which include social security, healthcare, and pensions, accounted for approximately 29% of GDP in 2022. With these payments due to rise as a share of its GDP and with its working population in decline, the UK faces major difficulties in fulfilling its commitments to entitlements. The situation in Burgos at the beginning of the 17th century provides an example outcome that the UK may experience: an increasing tax burden shared between increasingly fewer people of working-age.

Excerpt 7

In time, even the government seemed convinced by the new orthodoxy: "The sole foundation of a state", Philip IV informed the Cortes (Parliament) of Castile in 1622, "is its population. and the greatest danger now facing this monarchy is its shortage of inhabitants". Yet such verbal recognition did not lead to practical action. On the contrary, certain government policies in the early seventeenth century tended directly and intentionally towards depopulation. The classic case was the decision, taken on 9 April 1609, to expel all Moriscos from Spain.

Analysis

There is little doubt that western nations are facing a significant problem in terms of their declining populations. However, little beyond talking about increasing immigration has been done. Increasingly, incentives to get married and have children have been removed; full-time childcare costs approximately £14000 per year. House prices have increased from 2.5 times the average wage in 1997 to 8.5 times the average wage in 2024. Rent has also significantly increased as a percentage of wages over this period. People do not have the means to be able to establish homes together which has had a negative effect on the number of marriages on an annual basis.

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