Corporate activity by the Spanish forms a universal pattern (7)
I believe the answer is:
mandala
'pattern' is the definition.
(I know that Mandala is a type of pattern)
'corporate activity by the spanish' is the wordplay.
'corporate activity' becomes 'manda' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'by' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'the spanish' becomes 'la' ('the' in Spanish).
'manda'+'la'='MANDALA'
'forms a universal' is the link.
I am not very happy about this link. Some or all of it may be part of another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for mandala that I've seen before include "Circular design symbolising the Universe" , "pictorial symbol" , "Buddhist representation of the universe" , "Hindu circular representation of the universe" , "Buddhist and Hindu symbol of the universe" .)