Subjucntives or not

Question

From "Intermediate Spanish" from Routlege:

Muchos paraguayos piensan que sin la nueva constitución de 1992, la lengua guaraní nunca hubiera llegado a ser una de las lenguas oficiales del país.

Would it act like a conditional and still require the subjunctive without the "They think" or would it be like this:

Sin la nueva constitución de 1992, la lengua guaraní nunca había llegado a ser una de las oficiales del país.

Same thing:

Book:

Es probable que, sin la constitución de 1992, la lengua guaraní hubiera perdido importancia en Paraguay.

My indicative attempt:

Sin la constitución de 1992, la lengua guaraní habia perdido importancia en Paraguay.

I'm asking because the construction seems to be like a 3ed conditional phrase (even if there's no "if"), in which case they will still need the subjunctive even without the "triggers", right?

I probably wouldn't have noticed except the fact that the sentences required past perfect and not present perfect like in English made me pay lots of attention to them.

( I know the subjunctive isn't just a matter of triggers! )

Thanks in advance for any help!

Answer 1

Would it act like a conditional and still require the subjunctive without the "They think" or would it be like this:

Sin la nueva constitución de 1992, la lengua guaraní nunca había llegado a ser una de las oficiales del país.

The conditional perfect (habría llegado) is the perfect tense here, but not the pluperfect indicative you have used (había llegado). The use of the pluperfect subjunctive (hubiera llegado) instead of the conditional perfect is one of those peculiarities of the language that you cannot extend to other tenses.

My indicative attempt:

Sin la constitución de 1992, la lengua guaraní habia perdido importancia en Paraguay.

That tense is a declaration that says that this language has actually lost importance, which is not what you are saying. Again, you can say "habría perdido".

I'm asking because the construction seems to be like a 3ed conditional phrase (even if there's no "if"), in which case they will still need the subjunctive even without the "triggers", right?

No idea what a 3rd conditional phrase is (this terminology is not in any grammar I know). These sentences basically say:

Under certain circumstances, something would / wouldn't have happened

Like in English, the logical thing to do is would be use the conditional perfect (would have happened), but as I said, against all logic, the pluperfect subjunctive can perfectly replace it.

I hope this helps.

Some people call the hypothetical "If I had had. . ." the 3rd conditional. - lorenzo9, Aug 22, 2011