Popular Front (Spain)

After the defeat of the October uprising of the left forces (see Second Spanish Republic ), the rapprochement of socialists, communists and left liberals began in order to take political revenge on the right and prevent the threat of fascism. In January 1935, consultations began between individual socialist and liberal politicians on the creation of a left-democratic bloc. On June 2, 1935, KPI leader Jose Diaz , guided by the decisions of the VII Congress of the Comintern, publicly advocated the creation of a Popular Front with socialists. Indalescio Prieto , who, after the arrest of Largo Caballero, became the leader of the ISRP, supported the idea of ​​a bloc from communists to left-wing liberals. On November 14, leader of the left-wing liberals, Manuel Asagna, proposed a bloc to the ISRP executive committee. On December 20, the creation of the Popular Front was supported by liberals - the Left Republican Party, the Republican Union and the National Republican Party ^[1] .

The Spanish Popular Front was formed on January 15, 1936, after Spanish President Niseto Alcalá Zamora dissolved the Cortes and scheduled new parliamentary elections on February 16 this year. The Popular Front brought together moderate Republicans (parties of the Left Republicans (Izquierda Republicana) and the Republican Union (Unión Republicana) , socialists from the Socialist Workers Party of Spain ( Partido Socialista Obrero Español-PSOE ) and the General Workers Union ( Unión General de Trabajadores-UGT ), Communists of Spain the Communist party and the left Communists of the Joint United Marxist Workers' party (Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista-POUM ). These Popular front party were supported as the party of the left Republicans of Catalonia (Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya-ERC) and the anarchists of the National Confederation of Workers and the Federation of Anarchists of Iberia (Confederación Nacional del Trabajo-CNT and the Federación Anarquista Ibérica-FAI). In this case, the anarchists argued for the first time participate in the election of his supporters.

The participants in the Spanish Popular Front concentrated primarily on protecting the national interests of the republic from reactionary forces and advocated a series of events that should strengthen the foundations of the republican system. The Popular Front (NF) advocated the adoption of a “national reconstruction” business plan, which should be framed by “a law or a system of laws that would establish the basis for protecting industry”, including tariffs, tax breaks, market regulation, and “other types of government assistance.” Structures of economic and technical research had to be created for the needs of the state and entrepreneurs, to facilitate and optimize regulation. The expansion of public works, the construction of housing, cooperative and communal facilities, ports, railways, irrigation facilities, irrigation installations, and a change in land use were envisaged. The NF also advocated for progressive taxation, the elimination of government measures of 1933-1935, including the law that returned estates seized from the nobility. In the agricultural sector, the NF advocated the continuation of the agrarian reform of 1932, the implementation of land reclamation, the introduction of progressive agricultural technology. Social legislation 1932-1933 had to be restored in its entirety. Moreover, "a fixed minimum wage was established, and its understatement was subject to criminal prosecution and the court as a matter of public prosecution." It was supposed to deal with unemployment with the help of statistics, public works, the creation of state employment structures, labor exchanges and social insurance. The program provided for the creation of a primary education system and to ensure "equality of opportunity in secondary and higher education based on the criterion of ability" ^[2] . At the same time, under the pressure of liberals, the Popular Front refused to carry out such widely supported actions of the masses as the nationalization of large land property and the introduction of state unemployment insurance.

In the February 16, 1936 election, the Popular Front managed to bypass the National Front coalition of right-wing forces with a minimum advantage of 150,000 votes. Despite the fact that numerous irregularities in voting and vote counting were reported locally - which was commonplace in later countries in various countries - the vast majority of observers and analysts who observed the elections in Spain and the political situation in that country unequivocally recognized victory of the Popular Front. As a result, the Popular Front received 263 seats out of 473 in the Cortes. The parties of the Center gained only 500 thousand votes, which did not affect the overall picture after the election. The new parliamentary majority created a special committee to check complaints of violations as a result of voting, but this committee worked only in the districts where the right-wing deputies or deputies of the parties of the Center won. This and the fact that the official election results were never published, allowed the opponents of the Popular Front to doubt the legality of his rule.

The new government - led by Manuel Asagni , and after his election as president, Santiago Casares Quiroga - consisted only of representatives of both republican parties, but relied on the support of all participants and sympathizers of the Popular Front. This situation created a broad base for him, but also limited the possibility of interference with the unlawful actions of some paramilitary units of the allied parties. At that time, in Spain, the economic crisis exacerbated the already sharp political and social confrontation in the country, which ended in July 1936 with a military coup that escalated into a civil war .

After the outbreak of the Civil War, on July 19, 1936, a new government of the Popular Front came to power, led by Jose Hiral . A deep social revolution began in the Republic, the seizure of enterprises by collectives of workers, the formation of rural collectives on the initiative of anarcho-syndicalists and left socialists. Under these conditions, on September 4, 1936, the Government of the Popular Front was created, headed by Francisco Largo Caballero , which included not only liberals, but also other parties of the Popular Front - socialists, communists, Catalan and Basque nationalists. On November 4, representatives of the National Confederation of Labor , which was not part of the Popular Front, also entered the government. Thus, a government of the broad anti-fascist coalition was formed ^[3] .

In the spring of 1937, the contradictions between the left (anarcho-syndicalists, left wing ISRP (caballerias), POUM) and right (liberals, the right wing ISRP (priestists), Catalan and Basque nationalists, KPI and the United Socialist Party of Catalonia - OSPK) became more acute. Republicans. On May 3-6, 1937, these contradictions led to armed clashes in Barcelona. As a result, on May 13, the government of Largo Caballero fell, and on May 17, 1937 a more right-wing and pro-Soviet government of the Popular Front was formed, led by Juan Negrin, without the anarcho-syndicalists and caballeries. Negrin’s government launched repressions against the anarcho-syndicalists and the POUM, headed for curtailing the social transformations of the second half of 1936, and strengthening the public sector in the economy. According to the historian A.V. Shubin, in the conditions of the Spanish Republic of this period, the policy of "people's democracies" was developed, which was then applied in Eastern Europe in the second half of the 40s. ^[four]

Given the military defeats of the Republic, the anarcho-syndicalists chose to approach the government. On April 1, the NKT, the Federation of Anarchists of Iberia and the Federation of Libertarian Youth entered the Popular Front. NKT agreed to enter Negrin's government. Negrin chose Segundo Blanco as the Minister of Education and Health from the list proposed by the NKT (later the Minister of NKT gravitated more towards Negrin than to the Confederation).

On April 6, 1938, a new Negrin government was formed without I. Prieto and his supporters. But this time, the government was formed not by parties and coalition organizations, but by Negrin himself, who selected politicians of different colors into his team ^[5] .

In general, the Negrin regime can be characterized as a mild form of authoritarianism, not only at the government level, but also locally. As P. Tolyatti reported, “in every province there was a tendency to create a small state in the state and to subjugate the masses to local authorities by administrative measures by eliminating all forms of democracy” ^[6] .

On August 16, 1938, representatives of the nationalists Aiguade and Irujo left the government - they could not withstand Negrin's offensive on the rights of autonomies, primarily the establishment of central control over the military industry of Catalonia. Catalonia in the government began to represent the pro-communist party OSPK ^[6] .

In late 1938 - early 1939, relations between the Negrin faction and the Communists on the one hand and other organizations of the Popular Front on the other worsened. Starting a rebellion against Negrin on the night of March 6, 1939, Colonel Sigismundo Casado enlisted the support of prominent figures in the main organizations of the Popular Front, except for the Communists. Although the organizations themselves did not support the capitulators, the split of the Popular Front facilitated the actions of the Cassadists and contributed to the final defeat of the republic on April 1 ^[7] .

in Russian

• Shubin A.V. The Great Spanish Revolution. - M .: URSS, Book House " Librocom ", 2011. - 605 p. - ISBN 978-5-397-02355-9 .

in other languages

• Nieves González. Torreblanca (Madrid-Patio de Butacas). - Madrid: La Librería, 2007 .-- P. 76-78.