The idea of convivencia has had supporters and detractors from the time Castro first proposed it. Hussein Fancy has summarized the underlying assumptions on both sides of the debate: "The convivencia debates were never about political ideologies or partisan politics, as they are often construed, but rather," as Ryan Szpiech has argued, "about fundamental and unresolved methodological and philosophical issues. While Castro appealed to philosophical interpretivism, [Claudio] Sánchez-Albornoz appealed to scientific positivism."
