As governments around the world tighten migration controls, Spain has taken a strikingly different path. In January 2026, the Spanish cabinet approved a decree opening a pathway to legal residency for hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants who already live in the country. At a time when deportations, detentions and exclusion dominate migration debates elsewhere, Spain has chosen regularisation.

The measure allows migrants without legal status to apply for temporary residence permits, bringing them out of administrative invisibility. The contrast with other countries is sharp. While ICE intensifies its operations in the US and European governments – including the UK – move towards harsher immigration policies, Spain has signalled a willingness to integrate rather than exclude.

Read more: The EU’s outsourced migration control is violent, expensive and ineffective

The decree is not the result of a sudden government initiative, but of a long political and social process. Its roots lie in a “popular legislative initiative”, a mechanism enshrined in the Spanish constitution that allows citizens to bring legislative proposals to parliament with at least 500,000 supporting signatures.

In this case, more than 700,000 people backed an initiative promoted by social organisations demanding the extraordinary regularisation of migrants living in Spain without papers. According to the organisers, around 500,000 people were affected, meaning they were residing and working in Spain without access to basic rights.

In April 2024, the Congress of Deputies voted overwhelmingly to consider the proposal. A total of 310 MPs supported it, with only 33 votes against; the far-right Vox was the sole party to oppose it. Despite this broad parliamentary backing, the initiative stalled later that year and remained blocked.

The decree adopted in January 2026 explicitly revives the citizen-led proposal, but it also draws on earlier experiences in Spain. The most notable precedent dates back to 2005, when the government led by the Socialist Party’s José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero regularised more than 570,000 undocumented migrants.

This earlier process plays an........

© The Conversation