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Title: The Spanish Revolution Author: Conor McLoughlin Date: Spring 1996 Language: en Topics: Workers Solidarity, Spanish Civil War, Spanish Revolution Source: Retrieved on 5th December 2021 from http://struggle.ws/ws/spain47.html Notes: Published in Workers Solidarity No. 47 — Spring 1996.
You feel that, had there been a documentary crew on the battlefields of
Spain in the thirties this is what they would have brought back
So said ‘Hot Press’ about Ken Loach’s excellent film Land and Freedom.
Yet the version of the conflict in Spain peddled by the school history
books bears no resemblance to this ‘documentary’. The revolution in
Spain is portrayed simply as a civil war fought between democracy and
fascism.
Land and Freedom goes some way towards redressing this, but even here
you have to look hard to see any evidence that there were anarchists in
Spain at the time. In fact, the Anarcho-Syndicalist Confederation
Nacional de Trabajo or CNT had almost two million members, and they had
a profound influence on the Spanish social revolution.
Anarchism had (and still has) a long tradition in Spain. This goes right
back to the middle of the last century, 1869 to be precise, when the
anarchist ideas of Michael Bakunin were first brought to Spain by the
Italian Guiseppe Fanelli. Anarchism developed rapidly in the harsh
economic conditions prevailing in Spain at the time.
1911 saw the formation of the CNT. This was an Anarcho-Syndicalist
union. They hoped to organise all workers into one big union and bring
about anarchism through a revolutionary general strike. In its day to
day activity the union put into action the anarchist principles of
direct action and direct democracy. All delegates and representatives
were subject to being mandated and recalled if they did not carry
through their mandates.
The CNT experienced rapid growth. Its strongholds were in Catalonia
(especially Barcelona) and Andalucia. It also had a large following in
the Asturias, Levant, Saragossa and Madrid. It organised militant
strikes and protests including several city wide and national strikes.
For most of its history it was subject to vicious government repression,
not only under the semi-dictatorship in power until 1931, but also under
the republican and popular front governments which followed. This
included the 1936 popular front government.
Franco’s coup began in July 1936. The government had been warned that a
military uprising was about to occur but refused to take the warnings
seriously. The Prime Minister Casares Quiroga reportedly replied to one
such warning
By which you mean you are sure that the military will rise? Very well
then, but for my part, I am going to have a lie down..
This rather pathetic attempt at humour sums up the attitude of the
government. The parties of the popular front reacted in a similarly
complacent fashion. The communist and socialist parties issued this
joint note
The moment is a difficult one. The government is sure that it possesses
sufficient means to crush this criminal attempt.
The government refused to arm the workers. Workers armed themselves. The
CNT broke out its own arms (that it had been saving for just such a
rainy day) and organised detachments to seize barracks and arsenals
before the military could link up and consolidate. Over most of northern
and central Spain they beat the fascists and the army with whatever arms
came to hand.
There is absolutely no doubt that the initial response to Franco’s coup
was due to the deep implantation of anarchist ideas among Spanish
workers. There was no waiting around for the government to act (and just
as well too). Workers beat the coup and moved to take control.
Anarchist influence was everywhere from the formation of the militias
and the expropriation and collectivisation of land to the seizures in
industry. The smashing of the military coup was like the bursting of a
dam, releasing a surging human tide of imagination and creativity.
Throughout republican Spain anarchist ideas inspired a transformation.
This transformation would take a far longer article then this to
describe and, indeed, has been the subject of several large books.
However a few examples will at least give a flavour of the times.
In the short space of a few years the small peasants and agricultural
labourers demonstrated that, far from chaos, anarchism was an efficient,
desirable and realisable method of running things. There were
unprecedented levels of voluntary collectivisation throughout the land
on the anti-fascist side. Gaston Level (in his book Collectives in the
Spanish Civil War) puts the numbers involved as high as 5–7 million
people.
Collectivisation occurred much as described in Land and Freedom. After
the major landowners had split, a village assembly was held. If a
decision to collectivise was taken all individually owned land and
machinery was brought together for the use of the entire collective.
Teams were formed to look after various areas of work and each elected
recallable delegates to a village assembly. Individuals were, however,
able to remain outside the collective and keep their own property if
they wished, though they were forbidden from hiring labourers to work
their land. Most of these people eventually joined, their reservations
disappearing in the face of the visible successes of the collectives.
To distribute the common stock of goods, rationing or a family wage was
brought in. Given the low level of production at the time it was
impossible to go straight to communist distribution (i.e. free goods for
all). But there was a major increase in living standards with more of a
say for everyone and many free services.
Industrial collectivisation was extensive especially in the anarchist
stronghold, Barcelona. As George Orwell put it in Homage to Catalonia
It was the first time that I had ever been in a town where the working
class was in the saddle.
About 3000 enterprises in the city were collectivised. The tram system
provides a shining example of just how much better we can run things
when we do struggle up into that saddle.
On July 24^(th), five days after the rising was crushed, the tram crews
got together and decided to run the whole system themselves. A committee
was elected. They quickly introduced many changes. Within another 5 days
700 trams were in service. 100 trams had been patched up and rushed into
service. The major reason for the quick repair job was the re-employment
of 657 laid off tram-men.
With the profit motive gone, safety became more important and the number
of accidents was reduced. A new automatic safety and signalling system
was introduced. Sections of track were repaired and re-laid.
The old fares had varied from 0.1 to 0.4 pesetas. A new standard fare of
0.2 pesetas was introduced. Yet more money was made (and ploughed back
in) and an extra 50 million passengers were carried. Wages were
equalised for all workers (which meant an increase for most) and there
was free medical care for all workers in the city.
Perhaps the most amazing fact is that over the two years of
collectivisation there were only 6 cases of workers caught stealing from
the workshop.
The factors involved in the defeat of the revolution would take an
article in themselves to explain, ranging from the military power of the
fascists (and their outside aid) to the betrayals by the communists and
social democrats, and this is not my purpose here. What is important is
that the social revolution did not collapse due to internal problems or
flaws in human nature. It was defeated from without. Anarchism had not
failed. Anarchists had proved that ideas which look good in the pages of
theory books look even better on the canvas of life.