It’s Our Fault

This book begins from an uncomfortable premise: our institutions fail not only because of politicians, elites, or laws, but because they reflect our own preferences—often poorly informed, contradictory, and incoherent.

It’s Our Fault does not seek easy culprits or indulge in moral outrage, but rather understanding. With rigor and clarity, it shows how our collective decisions—as voters, citizens, and consumers—feed the very system we later criticize.

In a style that is incisive yet calm, Benito Arruñada examines the mechanisms behind Spain’s stagnation: from education and housing to territorial organization and political culture. Instead of the comfort of blaming others, he proposes a demanding but realistic alternative: a citizenry that is better informed, more responsible, and less gullible in the face of magical promises. These pages are not an invitation to resignation, but to adulthood and initiative—because if the fault is ours, so too is the solution.

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“The ancients said that when the gods favored us, they ignored our wishes, and when they wished to punish us, they granted them. Likewise, Spaniards express preferences that politicians strive to satisfy—with disappointing results. This perceptive and meticulous book analyzes why we demand from the state precisely what frustrates us, and then blame it for giving it to us.” — Fernando Savater