Russia-in-Spain · ‘GET READY, WORKERS OF SPAIN!’ : THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION AND ITS INFLUENCE ON THE NATURE OF POST-WORLD WAR I SOCIAL CONFLICT IN SPAIN

‘GET READY, WORKERS OF SPAIN!’ : THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION AND ITS INFLUENCE ON THE NATURE OF POST-WORLD WAR I SOCIAL CONFLICT IN SPAIN

The Russia-in-Spain project objectives are to enhance our understanding of the effects of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and its aftermath – including the Russian Civil War – in the causation and course of post-World War I political and revolutionary upheavals in Spain between 1917 and 1923. This was one of the bitterest and most violent social conflicts in post-war Europe and culminated in the dictatorship of General Miguel Primo de Rivera, which lasted until 1930. Dr Matthews’ goal was to analyze the history of the transnational transmission of information and ideas in order to understand the links between reported events from Russia and the militancy of Spanish organized labour and peasantry, which was particularly concentrated in Catalonia and Andalusia respectively, and the Spanish counterrevolutionary reaction to the perceived threat. The proposed research aimed to expand on the current historiographical interest in studying social movements from the perspective of low-ranking participants and elucidate on Spanish workers and peasants’ motivations, methods and external influences in engaging in social protest between 1917 and 1923, as well as those of the reactionary groups that opposed them. As a researcher at University College Dublin (UCD), Dr Matthews has performed targeted and in-depth research, consulting both secondary literature and Spanish collections of primary sources. On these research trips, he has gathered ample primary sources for the project’s first publications (see below), as well as significantly advanced the process of completing his second monograph on this topic. In parallel to the main project outputs, Dr Matthews has also worked towards improving his skills as an academic through targeted training. This includes presenting project results at major conferences and at universities as a guest speaker, including at a workshop organized within the parameters of the project organized by Dr Matthews and held at UCD; teaching large (150+) undergraduate lecture classes; writing grant applications to host the abovementioned workshop at UCD; and, finally, history outreach activities in both written and presentation formats (at the Instituto Cervantes in Dublin and an article in a Spanish-language popular history magazine). The project has resulted, so far, in one completed article submitted to a top-tier, peer-reviewed journal in the field and one completed chapter in an edited book published by a leading Spanish academic press. The article examines Spain in the period 1917-1923 in order to develop recent efforts to frame European counterrevolutionary mobilization after the 1917 October Revolution in Russia in a transnational and comparative way. It proposes to add nuance to a Europe-wide appraisal of anti-Bolshevik policies by including a prominent First World War neutral, while at the same time place domestic Spanish policies into greater international context. In doing so, it sheds light on the form and intensity of Spanish reactionary policies and concludes that fantastical images of the left in general and Russian Bolsheviks in particular fuelled the considerable post-war political and social violence, and were grafted comfortably onto pre-existing counterrevolutionary fears of the under classes. The chapter, meanwhile, reconsiders the role of Spain’s neutrality in the First World War as a potential motor for social conflict. Precisely because Spain did not have to form a government of unity – like the French Union Sacrée or German Burgfrieden – to mount a war effort, it meant that Spanish Socialists had a free hand to further their political aims during the conflict, which included a failed attempt at a general strike in August 1917. The chapter argues that this type of industrial action primed the bourgeoisie for a tougher stance than belligerent countries once news of the Russian Revolution broke in the West and contributed to the cycle of violence and repression that caused some 800 deaths in the period. Dr Matthews is also completing a monograph based on his research to date (provisionally entitled The Long Reach of Bolshevism: Hope and Fear in Restoration Spain). He has completed approximately two thirds of the necessary archival research and will publish further results from this funded project within the next two years. In addition, the results of this research have been presented at top-level conferences and workshops within the European Union, including at the Complutense University of Madrid and the University of Modena, which hosted the annual meeting of the US-based Association of Spanish and Portuguese Studies. This has been essential for Dr Matthews to receive structured feedback on the project’s progress and his results so far.

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