The Spanish Anarchists: The Heroic Years 1868-1936 by Murray Bookchin

The Spanish Anarchists: The Heroic Years 1868-1936 Reviews

• 
  Miquixote

  So, what's all the hubaloo about anarchism in Spain anyhow? Well, probably the best stop to find out the details is here: The best history of anarchism up until 1936 in Spain that I know of.
  
  Why is anarchism in Spain at all relevant? Well, according to Noam Chomsky, the Catalan part of Spain could have been the most progressive society (albeit very briefly) in world history when the anarchists had popular control of government there.
  
  A must read of history that is ignored by most mainstream historians who brush off the history of anarchism at their own peril. Whether one is anarchist or not, it is impossible to realistically understand modern Spanish (or world) history without understanding the importance of the role of anarchism.
  
  
• 
  James

  Bookchin argued, in one of the earlier histories of the Spanish Revolution, that it took nearly 3 generations of struggle, organization building, and conflict to lead up to the strong revolutionary change that characterized the Revolution and Civil War. The book is therefore the story of building the revolutionary organizations that led to the founding and development of the anarchosyndicalist union in the CNT and specifically anarchist activist organization in the FAI. Bookchin notes that Anarchism and similar socialist movements took root in Spain very early on as a result of the extreme measures of the Spanish ruling classes, along with the heavy village communal traditions. He frames Spanish Anarchists having developed through periods of building unions, before drifting towards terrorism as a response to repression, such as assassinating politicians and military officials. By the 20th century, it had been generally accepted that multiple tactics should be embraced, including direct action, propaganda, general strikes, and dogged union organizing. The founding of the CNT in 1911, enabled a larger union movement to arise in Aragon, Catalonia, southern Spain, and beyond. By the 1920s-30s, several right-wing military coups led to repression of leftist movement but rapid growth of the CNT and the creation of the more secretive FAI. All of this built towards the eventual showdown in 1936, when again a right-wing general in Franco attempted to nullify an election, but this time, the people of the country stood up and said no, ushering in the Revolution in Barcelona and the countryside in the shadow of the Republican cause that began the Civil War.
  
  Key Themes and Concepts
  -Anarchism in Spain came from utter poverty and rigid class societies, which lead to Spanish Anarchists carrying a disdain for pleasures of the flesh, a responsibility of all to work, and duty towards revolution. Spanish revolutionaries also carried an inherent distrust of authority.
  -Tensions between the Anarchists of the rural peasantry and the urban unionists led to different traditions which eventually worked together in alliance, but still led to heavy debates, such as national organization versus local, communes versus dividing the land into individual plots, libertarian communism versus Bakunin’s collectivism, and more.
  -Spanish Anarchists believed in a general transformation of lifestyles, embracing utter equality and devotion to building a different society and embracing a multitude of tactics to get there.
• 
  Steven Peterson

  The first point to mention: One's understanding of what happened in Spain is almost certainly indicated by the answer to one question. Was this the Spanish Civil War or the Spanish Revolution? The essence of Bookchin's book (and it is not original to him) is that there was a revolution within the Civil War. While there is considerable recognition of the Civil War, there is much less discussion and consideration of the revolution within that civil war.
  
  One immediate problem in understanding the dynamics in Spain is the crazy quilt set of actors. Key groups run the gamut from Fascists (Francisco Franco as a leader) to monarchists to liberals/moderates to Marxists (Trotskyites, represented by the organization POUM, versus Stalinists, organized as the UGT [with members called Ugetistas:]) and anarchists (syndicalists, members of the union CNT, whose members were called Cenetistas, and straight out anarchists, members in the organization FAI, with individual members referred to as Faistas). Yikes! One needs a scorecard to keep them straight!
  
  This book does not focus on the Civil War and Revolution so much as on the background to those events. Bookchin goes back to the anarchist Mikhail Bakunin's influence on Spanish radicals. Much of this book is the run up to the Civil War and the revolution embedded within that Civil War--the Republic versus the Fascists represented the Civil War. The anarchists trying to implement libertarian societies was the revolution.
  
  Topically, the book begins with the origins of the idea of anarchism in Spain. Bakunin was a critical figure here, a Russian aristocrat who, oddly enough, adopted the anarchist perspective. An emissary who did not speak Spanish brought Bakunin's ideas to Spain; given the linguistic obstacles, it is surprising indeed to see that he had an impact on the development of a Spanish anarchist movement.
  
  The book then describes the development of that movement in Spain over the past quarter century of the 1800s and the early 1900s as well. In short, anarchism did develop something of a foothold in Spain. Unfortunately, some of the advocated if this view engaged in "propaganda of the deed," terrorism, to try to advance the cause. In the process, much damage was done to that very movement.
  
  Bookchin then described the twin developments--support for anarcho-syndicalism (a perspective that argued that workers' organizations ought to structure the productive process and be the basis for organizing society) and the CNT (a union that supported syndicalism). The essence of the latter can be discerned by this quotation from Bookchin (page 162): "Obedience to the wishes of the membership was a cardinal rule. At the annual congresses, for example, many delegations arrived with mandatory instructions on how to vote on each major issue to be considered. If an action was decided upon, none of the delegations which disagreed with it or felt it was beyond the capacity of its membership was obliged to abide by the decision."
  
  The instability of government in the 1920s and 1930s is then discussed, as a lead up to the outbreak of the Civil War/Revolution. Bookchin concludes by observing that (page 302): "We must leave the details of that revolution--its astonishing achievements and its tragic subversion--to another volume."
  Obviously, Bookchin has an ideological perspective on the events in Spain over the period of time that his book covers. And that must be taken into account when reading this work. Nonetheless, overall, his scholarship is solid, and much of what he contends is found in other volumes as well (hence, triangulation occurs to some extent). For those wanting to understand the Spanish Civil War from a perspective not normally presented, this book makes a solid contribution.
  
• 
  Lori

  A fascinating history of one of the most important anarchist and syndicalist movements in history. This book offers a very important perspective that is vital in understanding the social, political, and ultimately human context that lead to the development of the Spanish Revolution, and the inextricably linked Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939; at the same time giving us a plethora of further reading that I intend to do.
  
  Bookchin does a wonderful job in explaining the dynamics, organization, and evolution of the movement. Important to note is the fact that the tendency within syndacalism to bureaucratize, as happened in France, was off-put by a constant influx of rural workers into industrialized cities (pages 60-61). Furthermore this book raises a lot of important questions, and points out many difficulties that such a movement have to answer respectively overcome when trying to grow in influence.
  
  I will briefly enumerate the points I thought were important, in the hopes that prospective readers know what to find (or not) in this book:
  - strategies by which anarchists spread their ideas (p. 69)
  - the problem of the movement losing overall militancy because of rapid growth (p. 82)
  - the evolution of the organizational structures of the movement (p. 119), and its subsequent evolution (p. 165, p 268)
  - the contradictions faced by the anarcho-syndicalist movement when they were faced with the problem of voting for a "lesser evil" in an attempt to curtail the rise of fascism (p. 259). Their mistake beautifully summed up with the phrase: "one must emphasize that it would have been preposterous to expect a "lesser evil" to behave with noble virtue." (p. 261), offering a very sobering view on how radical movements should treat electoral politics.
  - Murray Bookchin meticulously explains the tensions, and dynamics that existed between the two allied factions whose synthesis gave rise to anarcho-syndicalism: the FAI (Federación Anarquista Ibérica), and the CNT (Confederación Nacional del Trabajo). How their evolution impacted each other and ultimately an exposition of the differences in temperament, organization, and scope. All scattered throughout the book, with important emphasis on different historical contexts.
  - a constant emphasis on the state and capitalist repression faced by the movement; this is highly important as this is ultimately both the goal of the anarcho-syndicalism and what gives it shape
  - the constant antagonism between the socialist UGT (Unión General de Trabajadores), and the CNT/FAI. In it embodied the almost irreconcilable conflict between the two great branches of radical anti-capitalism
  - an account of the liberatory lifestyles, that even today would be considered to radical, adopted by people from a deeply conservative, catholic country in the late 1800, and early 1900s
  - an overview of assassination conducted by the movement, and retaliations that were ensued
  - a detailed analysis of the struggle in which the CNT/FAI were engaged in on the onset of the highly unstable Second Spanish Republic in 1931
  
  Besides all theoretical, and historical information there is also a healthy emphasis on important characters, that shaped the movement:
  - the story of the anarchist Fermin Salvochea from Cádiz
  - the harrowing tale of the sixty year old peasant known as "Six Fingers" who declared comuniso libertario in his village upon the forming of the Second Spanish Republic in 1931, only to have him, his family, and his fellow comrades slaughtered
  - fairly detailed accounts of the affinity group "Los Solidarios" whose members included the famous Francisco Ascaso, Buenaventurra Durruti, and García Oliver
  
  Ultimately, this book is indispensable for getting a unique, and very little talked about perspective, on the Spanish Revolution, and Spanish Civil War.
  
  Last, but not least it is important to note that we get a clear picture of the sentiment that a significant portion of the population faced, and its signature cry for a better world: "Viva la anarquía! Viva comunismo libertario!"
• 
  Aaron

  Bookchin’s “the Spanish Anarchists: The Heroic Years” covers the period from 1868 to 1936—that is, from Giuseppi Fanelli’s introduction of the anarchist “Idea” to Madrid and Barcelona, to the beginnings of the military coup of 1936. It is a history of the formative years of the Anarchist movement, rather than a history of the Spanish Civil War. I don’t have the historical background to evaluate Bookchin’s conclusions; this book served as an introduction to this subject matter for me. All I can do is muse on some of the themes that he touches on.
  
  Bookchin argues that Spanish anarchist movement which climaxed in the Spanish Civil War was the last great classical workers’ proletarian socialist movement, in the tradition that started from the June 1948 Parisian uprisings. In the prologue and final chapter, he notes that capitalism has changed greatly since the period stretching from the 1840s through 1930s: “In those years capital besieged a surprisingly preindustrial society, which could resist it with its rich neighborhood life, its towns, and villages. Today, that preindustrial society is increasingly giving way to a highly commodified market society—not merely a market economy—that has turned so much of the Western world into a giant supermarket with its subservient and suburbanized lifeways.” (p. 7) Accordingly, Bookchin argues that future Left movements will have a different character than those from the period this book treats.
  
  Bookchin emphasizes the spirit of experimentalism and deep humanism that animated the Spanish anarchist movement. He does not lionize this movement, and he does not hesitate to criticize its tactical mistakes and departures from ideals. Yet the anarchist movement, in Bookchin’s history, comes out much better than the more moderate socialists, whose authoritarian organizational forms led to their own eventual downfall. In that sense, the anarchists, often criticized for being utopians, appear more realistic than the authoritarian wing of the socialist movement.
  
  It’s interesting to compare Spain in this period to the U.S in (roughly) the same period. One of the major themes in Howard Zinn’s “A People’s History of the United States” is the great skill that American liberals have with co-opting radical movements, thus saving capitalism again and again. Zinn describes the Progressive movement in the early 20th century in this manner (as a reaction to socialist and labor activism), and the New Deal (as a reaction to U.S. labor militancy in the 1930s). Naomi Klein’s No Logo could be read as a description of how corporate America—with lifestyle branding-- has now completely co-opted the stirrings of rebellion against stultifying bourgois life in the 1950s and ‘60s. In contrast, Bookchin argues that the Spanish liberals largely abandoned the working class and peasants. This left a space for anarchism to grow in Spain.
  
  Above all, it is fascinating to read about how the “Idea” of anarchism inspired normal workers and peasants to build movements and institutions on their own, largely without the assistance of a vanguard of intellectuals, and largely without forming stultifying bureaucracies.
  
• 
  Lee Humphries

  A great book that's been sitting on my shelf for a while & been meaning to read it. If you are interested in how and why a country like Spain desired a massive social revolution then this is the book for you. Chomsky often cites that the Spanish revolution was over 30 years in the making and this book demonstrates and documents the events leading up to 1936 social revolution. I've read a few books on Spain which mostly concentrate on the civil war itself this book is essential as the forerunner to one of the biggest social revolutions which was sadly crushed by fascism & Stalin.
• 
  Alex

  Bookchin's fantastic history of the Spanish anarchist movement BEFORE the Civil War. this is actually the best-written thing I've found of Bookchin's. if only he could have written this way for his theory pieces, like The Ecology of Freedom, which contains so many great ideas but written in such a jumbled mess.
  
  if you're curious about the Spanish Revolution/Civil War, this book is the necessary back-story.
• 
  David Grassé

  For all those who maintain that Anarchism could never be sucessfully actualized.
  
• 
  Carmilla Voiez

  Studying Europe's interwar period without reference to the Spanish Anarchists felt incomplete, but Bookchin came to my rescue. My introduction to Bookchin came via an audio Bookchin Reader, and I am delighted to report that his own writing (at least in this text) is far less pretentious, more concise and clearer than the Reader led me to believe.
  
  1868-1936 Spain, was a time of new ideas which spread through the regions like wildfire and created idealists in both the moderate and radical left. This book tells their stories - their mistakes and successes, and the difficulties and suppression (from government and paramilitaries and communist "comrades") they faced. A wonderful read if you have any interest in leftist politics or twentieth-century European history.
• 
  Andrew

  A must read for those who are interested in anarchism. Beautifully, methodically researched; this concise history may be dry and factual but Bookchin does not spare insights when they are warranted.
  The "Idea" is one of the most deliberately overlooked political systems in history. In Spain (and other places) it tended to work well without outside interference. Much as it has been in Rojava recently.
• 
  John

  Wonderful history of Anarchism in Spain up to the beginning of the Civil War itself. As other reviewers elsewhere have pointed out, this is book that even people pissed off at Bookchin because of his pamphlet denouncing Lifestyle Anarchism like.
• 
  Anthony

  Interesting topic. Terrible writing.
• 
  Owen

  Interesting content, but terribly written prose. It was one of those books where I would sometimes find myself re-reading the same sentence over and over to try to make sense of it.
• 
  Jonas Mustonen

  Kiinnostava historiallinen aihe ja kirjoittaja, mutta oli pakko jättää kesken koska teksti on vaikeasti lähestyttävää ja omaksuttavaa. En voi muuta toivoa kuin kansantajuisempaa materiaalia tämän aatesuunnan edustajilta. Kouluttamattoman maatyöläisen halu määritellä oma kohtalonsa on tässä kuvattu kuin vain poliittiselle teorialle elämäntyönsä omistanut ihminen voi.
• 
  Micah

  In 1868, the "Idea" (as they called it) was planted in Spain by someone on a mission from Bakunin, one Fanelli who spoke no Spanish but whose passion was enough to convince the dedicated militants who began the anarchist movement in Spain, which would become the most significant in the world and help carry out the most far-reaching revolution of modern times.
  
  Today it seems like we inhabit a different planet. The days are long gone when a union could be formed, dedicated to the overthrow of capitalism, and grow to tens of thousands of members in a few months and organize violent general strikes in major cities.
  
  Bookchin's history seems well-balanced and obviously sympathetic, written as it was in the '60s and '70s before he became a crotchety anarchist-hater. He makes a general division between the mountain peasant anarchists of Andalucia, given to terrorism and jacqueries, and the industrial anarcho-syndicalists headquartered in Catalunya. The shadowy FAI with its organic affinity groups based on close personal friendships is of course covered, although here perhaps Bookchin's more moderate style shows through. He's not a big fan of the dramatic "cycle of insurrections" the FAI initiated in 1932-33, when pueblos would seize or blow up the town hall, raise the black flag, abolish money, and declare libertarian communism. Bookchin also finds some excuses for the CNT's blunder in 1936, when it allowed its members to vote for the left, although he also sees that this was the road that led the syndicalist union to open collaboration with the bourgeois state. The union that refused to accumulate strike funds because drawn-out strikes reduce workers' revolutionary fury in lightning strikes, was drawn down the path to co-optation.
  
  Ultimately, Bookchin perhaps gives too much space to the CNT, as though it were a strictly anarchist organization, or as though all anarchist activities were concentrated there. He even admits this in his Preface written in the early '90s. Today I think an historian would have to look more closely into the FAI, or even other, more obscure groups. Bookchin finds the CNT's diversity of tactics impressive: "The general strike was combined with local uprisings, a steady barrage of propaganda, direct action by individuals or small groups, and dogged union organizing, each flexibly deployed to reinforce the others." This multiplicity of balanced methods was certainly key, but perhaps combining them all into one CNT with a National Committee was an error the anarchists would regret.
• 
  Javier

  I know little about the history of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Spain, to say nothing of anarchist movements in the country more specifically. Bookchin's account here certainly provided a good introduction to both of these, though I found his writing style here somewhat less exciting than in either
  Post-Scarcity Anarchism or
  The Ecology of Freedom; the radical criticality that I have found in these books--and admired Bookchin for--is certainly missing here. Overall, this is a fascinating period of history reminiscent of the mid- to late- nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries in Russia--and a social milieu featuring much more passion and resistance (in my view) than is the case in much of our current reality.
  
  The last ten pages (the Epilogue)--where Bookchin criticizes the narrow, economistic concerns of Marxism/socialism; claims the 'industrialization of the proletariat' to valorize, not negate, capitalism; and calls on those "discontent with the quality of everyday life," aware of the "meaningless of a life devoted to mindless toil," and conscious of "hierarchy and domination in all its forms" to promote social revolution--were worth five stars themselves.
• 
  Tentatively, Convenience

  I went to Barcelona in 1978 for a day. There were nervous looking teenagers standing around in uniforms w/ machine guns. Franco had been dead for 4 yrs. I left. I went to Madrid in 1984 to visit a friend. It was amazing. Very liberated. I went to Barcelona again in 2004 - pd to do so by the Center for Contemporary Culture of Barcelona to participate in a hactivist festival of sorts. I read this bk before & during being there. It was extremly useful in understanding the culture. Of course, for anarchists like myself, Republican Spain was an amazing thing, a peak in the history of anarchy. Nonetheless, the anarchists lost the civil war to the fascists. As such, I think it's important to remember that to win against fascism there must be a total revolution in human consciousness. If it boils down to a war, the fascists are more likely to 'win' because that type of winning is based almost solely on levels of brutality & that's the specialty of fascists - wch is, obviously, why anarchists oppose them.
• 
  D

  As others have mentioned, this book is the lead up to the Civil War, but contains nothing of the Spanish Revolution, only the background. The tensions between Anarchists and Socialists, as well as the other major players are looked at. As this is mostly a book on anarcho-syndicalists, the focus is on the working class, not Anarchist theory.
  
  A few things would've added to this book. Why on earth isn't there a map? Also, a glossary, especially since spanish words are introduced without translation. Also a reference list of the organizations and key individuals would've been nice. It's scholarly and well written-ish, but definitely dry. As such it took me quite long to finish, so it was quite hard to keep names and acronyms straight in my mind.
  
  For the history of the Spanish Anarchists leading up to the Civil War, I doubt this book could be beat, but I'd only really reccomend it for those looking to go in depth. I would've liked a bit more theory and information on the actual Revolution and collectives, then the 70 year narrative of the syndicalist movement.
• 
  michael

  Can we say FAI bay area?