The King received this Friday at La Zarzuela the president of the Center for Sociological Research (CIS), José Félix Tezanos, and eleven of his predecessors on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the demoscopic body, dependent on the Government, which was founded in 1963 under the name of Institute of Public Opinion and remodeled, with name change included, in 1977, after the first democratic elections.
In addition to Tezanos, appointed by Pedro Sánchez in 2018 and the current directors, the former presidents Rafael Ansón (1973-1974), Juan Díez Nicolás (1976-1979), Rafael López Pintor (1979-1983), Rosa Conde (1987-1988), Joaquín Arango (1991-1996), Pilar del Castillo (1996-2000), Ricardo Montoro (2000-2004), Fernando Vallespín (2004-2008), Ramón Ramós (2010-2012), Félix Requena (2012-2016) and Cristóbal Torres (2016-2018). The King has spoken with them about the role that the CIS plays in the preparation of demographic studies, surveys and other reports to find out the opinion and evolution of Spanish society.
The body’s studies, in the last stage, have not been without controversy and, on occasions, the opposition has protested the biased use of the results of the surveys and has repeatedly asked the government for the resignation of Tezanos. The estimate of the vote, almost always in favor of the government party, is one of the points of friction, as are the methods for conducting the surveys and the way in which they are prepared, which in demoscopic language is known as “cooking” the data to obtain a predetermined result.
Parties such as Unidas Podemos and ERC have also protested the fact that, since 2015, during the government of Mariano Rajoy and shortly after the proclamation of Felipe VI, the CIS does not carry out studies, nor does it include in the surveys, the opinion of the Spaniards on the monarchy. Prior to the abdication of Juan Carlos I, the CIS also did not make public the studies carried out that revealed a sharp drop in the appreciation of the Crown. In June 2021, Tezanos justified his refusal to accept this request by assuring that “it is not in the CIS’s mind to raise problems that do not exist”, alluding to the fact that the Crown hardly represents a concern for the Spanish.
On the occasion of its 60th anniversary, the CIS has opened, at its headquarters in Madrid, an exhibition that includes a sample of its work in its six decades of history, from the first commissions during the Franco regime, which curiously addressed questions for to know the social concerns and political ideas, to the current barometers that are carried out monthly.
In the sample you can see survey card punching and sorting machines, manufactured by the IBM company and widely used in the 70s, as well as a multitude of survey forms from the last sixty years and rudimentary calculators from the time.
Among the curiosities of the sample, a study, carried out in 1967, asked the Spaniards what they believed the world would be like in the year 2000. A majority of citizens believed that there would be greater technical progress, better transport, a higher standard of living and more free time, but also fewer jobs, more unemployment and more social problems. In the last thirty years alone, the CIS has carried out more than three million interviews with citizens from all over Spain, and has edited nearly 900 publications.
