Print Culture and the Formation of the Anarchist Movement in Spain, 1890–1915

Abstract

This thesis examines the formation of the anarchist movement in Spain, from the collapse of the movement in the early 1890s to the consolidation of the Confederación Nacional de Trabajo (CNT) in 1915. The grassroots anarchist print culture established over these years was central to the movement's survival and expansion. Periodicals were the site in which anarchist ideology and practice came together, where abstract ideas were given meaning in relation to contexts and developments over time. The anarchist press, and the groups which produced it, also gave the movement an informal structure which it otherwise lacked. Together, the ideas and networks established by print formed the cultural foundations of the movement, prior to its mass expansion during the First World War.The first section of this thesis examines the movement's relationship with violence in 1890-1898. In these years, popular violence, terrorism and state repression had a profound impact on the ways in which anarchist practice was conceived. The anarchist press provided a forum for debates between anarchist factions over the legitimacy of violence, while at the same time it attempted to stabilise the movement in the face of the broad, heavy-handed repression of the Spanish state. It failed in this last regard, and by 1896 the movement and its press had collapsed. The second section focuses on the recovery of the movement from 1899 to 1906. In this period, the movement made its first consolidated effort to establish education as a revolutionary strategy, which became seen as the prime means to cement anarchist culture and practice in local contexts. Print was central to these developments, carrying the anarchist educational message into new areas and assisting in the establishment of centres and schools. The third, and final, section discusses the attempts to unite the movement around the organisational theory of syndicalism, from the first articulations of these ideas in Barcelona in 1907Barcelona in -1910 to the consolidation of the CNT in 1915. The spread ofand in some cases, resistance tosyndicalist ideas outside Cataluña relied on the networks of anarchist publishing which had been established over the turn of the century. Yet, by helping to create an alternative, more formal, structure within the movement, the anarchist press sowed the seeds of a decline in its own heterogeneity and significance. This was symbolised by the establishment of the syndicalist daily Solidaridad Obrera in Barcelona in 1916, and the subsequent contraction of anarchist publishing elsewhere in Spain.

Escuela Moderna, cultura emancipadora y Latinoamérica

“…En América Central es posible verificar algunas experiencias relacionadas con Ferrer o la Escuela Moderna (Prado, 2015). Así, en Panamá, no obstante que en 1903 era una república esencialmente rural, despoblada y analfabeta (Pizzurno, 2014), la llegada de trabajadores españoles a la Zona del Canal en 1907 supuso que a mitad de 1911 "se habían establecido clubes anarquistas en Río Grande, Pedro Miguel, Las Cascadas, Corozal, Culebra, Emperador, Gatún, Libertador y Gorgona" (Greene, 2014), e incluso un grupo en Las Cascadas se llamó Ferrer, el cual contribuyó al lanzamiento del periódico libertario El Único (Colón, 1911(Colón, -1912 (Yeoman, 2020). En Costa Rica, es posible nombrar el Centro de Estudios Sociales Germinal (De la Cruz, 2004), así como las investigaciones que reconstruyen el papel de las obreras destacando "su participación en la difusión de la educación racionalista" (Llaguno, 2015, p. 21).…”

The Anarchist in Uniform: The Militarisation of Anarchist Culture during the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939)

“…Prior to the war, reporting had been undertaken by local anarchist militants as one element of their praxis rather than a full-time undertaking. 111 The rapid pace of military events, together with heightened public demand for information, stimulated this new category of reportage from front-line anarchist journalists, including Aurelio Jerez Santa-María, Samuel del Pardo andmost famouslythe militant-intellectual, Mauro Bajatierra. 112 While previous correspondence writing had served to link the disparate local branches with the wider movement, war correspondents connected anarchist affiliates in the rear with a heavily mythologised vision of the frontline.…”

“…7 Print was crucial to the establishment and expansion of modern Spanish anarchism, fostering the creation of an actionable ideology and acting as a connective medium between its disparate sections. 8 During the Civil War, periodicals and newspapers continued to provide a forum for anarchist militants, of all levels, to debate and contest the direction of the movement. Consequently, while these texts do not offer a reliable reconstruction of specific events, they nonetheless provide a valuable window into the ideological divergences and commonalities within their collaborative political culture.…”

Jean Grave and French Anarchism: A Relational Approach (1870s–1914)

“…As summarized by James Yeoman, the press "played a decisive role in the cultural construction of anarchism as an identity, an ideology and a movement". 92 Grave's newspapers and the associated Publications de la Révolte and Temps Nouveaux functioned as platforms for a wide repertoire of militant activities, and as exchange fora and meeting points for the communities which they structured at least partly. The essential organizing role of anarchist papers in a national context has been stressed by Jean Maitron and Alain Droguet, who identified three key functions for the anarchist press: spreading political views, arguing for revolutionary change anda less usual role, more specific to anarchismserving as an organization, a party.…”