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Spain 's fifty Province s (''provincias'') are grouped into seventeen ''' Autonomous communities''' (''comunidades autónomas''), in addition to two Africa n Autonomous Cities (''ciudades autónomas'') ( Ceuta and Melilla ). FORMATION AND POWERS ''The Constitution is based on the indissoluble unity of the Spanish Nation, the common and indivisible homeland of all Spaniards; it recognizes and guarantees the right to self-government of the Nationalities and regions of which it is composed and the solidarity among them all (Article II of the Spanish Constitution)'' Centralism , Nationalism and Separatism played an important role in the Spanish Transition . For fear that separatism would lead to instability and a dictatorial backlash, a compromise was struck among the moderate political parties taking part in the drafting of the Spanish Constitution Of 1978 . The aim was to appease separatist forces and so disarm the extreme right. A highly Decentralized state was established, compared both with the previous Francoist regime and with most modern territorial arrangements in Western European nations. The autonomous communities have wide legislative and executive autonomy, with their own Parliament s and regional governments. The distribution of powers is different for every community, as laid out in the "autonomy statute" (''estatuto de autonomía''). There is a '' or the BESCAM in Madrid ). The Constitution recognizes in its Article 2 the right of "regions and nationalities" to self government. The initial intent was not that every part of Spain should become an autonomous community, but that only the so-called ''historic nationalities'' would be granted this right. However, while the Constitution was still being drafted, there was a popular outcry in Andalusia for its own right to autonomy, with over a million and a half people demonstrating in the streets of Andalusia on 4 December 1977 . This led to the inclusion of two provisions in the finished constitution of 1978 : ''Article 143'', which established the possibility for all regions to become autonomous communities, even though they would initially have only limited powers (this was dubbed at the time ''café para todos'', "coffee for everybody", by critics of the decentralization on one side, and supporters of the more asymmetric original scheme); and ''Article 151'', which set instead the rules for creating autonomous communities with an immediate larger amount of powers. The first regions to make use of the possibility of becoming autonomous communities were the historic nationalities, which had previously enjoyed autonomy during the , Catalonia and Galicia . Nevertheless, all of the other parts of Spain followed their lead. A separate statute of , to be voted in referendum in September 1936. However the start of the Civil War in July and the assassination of Infante by Franco's rebels in August of the same year put an end to the autonomist project for Andalusia. In spite of this, Andalusia was never recognised as a "historic nationality" in the 1978 constitution. This caused a great deal of indignation at the time and fired the fuse of a popular campaign which would lead to a successful referendum vote on 28 February 1980 that required a Supermajority . Andalusia would still have to wait two more years, after more political turmoil and broken promises, to join the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia on earning its right to a higher degree of autonomous government.http://www.el-mundo.es/especiales/2005/06/espana/estatutos_autonomia/estatutos/andalucia.html elmundo.es ''Especial "La España de las Autonomías"'' Since then, there has been a tendency for "slow-track" communities (those that accessed autonomy via article 143) to aspire to the range of functions of their elders (Andalusia, Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia). Even in communities without a strong nationalist or Regionalist tradition, the local branches of national parties fight for more power and budgets. Current points of disagreement are tax collection and representation at institutions of the European Union . LIST OF THE COMMUNITIES AND PROVINCES See also: Language footnotes 1 Not an official language but is protected and regulated, and spoken by a local minority. PLAZAS DE SOBERANíA There are five "places of sovereignty" ('' Plazas De Soberanía '') near Morocco , under direct Spanish administration:
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