Los grupos de interés y la regulación pública del mercado de alcoholes en España (1887–1936)

This paper analizes the performance of interest groups in the Spanish alcohol market between 1887 and 1936. The research addresses the question of the impact of these agroindustrial interest groups in the making of —protective— economic policies during the Restauration. In order to answer this question, we have reconstructed their interaction with political and administrative agencies, on the basis of both the published documents of the groups and associations, and the records of the parliamentary committees. The main conclusions are: 1. Pressure groups remained very autonomous with regards to the extremely heterogeneous interests of the sector, 2. The Parliament proved unable to establish priorities among die conflicting interests; and 3. The lawmaking process ignored the main proposals and did not produce an alcohol policy.