CONSEQÜÈNCIES INSTITUCIONALS DE LA LIMITACIÓ DEL DEUTE PÚBLIC A LES COMUNITATS AUTÒNOMES I ALS LÄNDER. UNA ANÀLISI COMPARADA DELS MECANISMES DE CONTROL DE L’ESTABILITAT PRESSUPOSTÀRIA A ESPANYA I ALEMANYA

Abstract

This article aims to analyze, from a comparative law perspective, the control mechanisms take in place to ensure compliance with the constitutional limitation of government debt in German and Spain. Specifically were analyzed, the German law creating the Stability Council to prevent situations of budget crisis, compared to the Spanish Law of Budgetary Stability and Financial Sustainability, with particular emphasis on the procedures, intervention measures and organs created to enforce structural deficit limits set by the European Union. This comparative analysis allows us to contrast two very different ways of dealing with the obligations stipulated by the European Union on the limitation of public debt in the composite States. In the German case, the federal law submits both levels of territorial Administration (Bund and Länder) to the control of a joint participation body (StabilitätsRat). In the Spanish case the state law submits the regional levels to strict control by the Ministry of Finance and limited the role of the Council of Fiscal and Financial Policy to merely advisory functions. This not only does not give a satisfactory response to any failure by the State Administration, but it causes imbalance between the State and the Autonomous Communities.