Agrarian Reform and Industrialization in 19th-Century Spain
Changes in the Operating System and Land Ownership in 19th-Century Spain
The Sale of Church and Municipal Property and its Consequences
The liberal agrarian reform in Spain was part of the process of replacing the *ancien régime* with a capitalist society. During this process, jurisdictional domains were abolished, the privileges of the Mesta were eliminated, and private ownership was consolidated.
The confiscation (seizure of church property and municipalities) played an important role, eliminating shared ownership. The causes of this were the government deficit, the lack of agricultural efficiency, and the consolidation of liberal support.
- Confiscation of Church Property (Mendizábal, 1836): To finance the war against the Carlists, church property was seized and sold. In 1841, Espartero regulated the seizure of secular property.
- General Confiscation (Pascual Madoz, 1855): Sale of assets of the state and municipalities.
Objectives:
- To raise money for finances.
- To consolidate a middle class that supported liberalism.
- To encourage economic development through investments, public works, and the *ferrocarril* (railway).
Implications of the resulting secularization:
- It strengthened capitalist private ownership of land.
- Buyers who did not cultivate the land were interested in obtaining profitability.
- Financial problems were reduced.
- Agricultural production and trade surpluses were encouraged.
- The liberal regime was consolidated.
Although it failed to meet all expectations, it did expand production.
The Slow Growth of Agricultural Production
The agricultural sector had limited development due to:
- Poor quality of arable land.
- Adverse weather conditions.
- The agrarian reform model that was applied.
The consequences of the land reform model were:
- Mediocre performance (little progress in agriculture).
- Poverty of the population and the land.
- Low stimulus for industrialization.
- Increased agricultural production and trade surpluses.
- Increase in cultivated area and food production, leading to population growth.
- Poor agricultural yields, except in the east.
- Stagnant product available per capita, which slowed the expansion of other economic sectors.
Thus, the state of agricultural backwardness was consolidated.
Causes:
- The property structure was unfavorable to promoting technical improvements (*minifundismo* and *latifundismo*).
- The confiscation process was unable to solve the problem.
The Beginnings of Industrialization
Causes of the Slow Process of Industrialization
- Geographical position far from the continental European industrial center, increasing transport costs.
- Conflicts in the early 20th century, including wars with Britain, France, and the Carlist War, until 1939.
- Periodic economic crises of subsistence (during the reign of Elizabeth II), which held back economic development and caused a return to the beginning.
- The low purchasing power of the Spanish population, leading to little demand, higher costs, and preventing the development of industry.
- Railway concessions policy: Most of the lines were built by foreigners, who also imported the necessary products, thereby harming the Spanish steel industry.
- Low quality and scarcity of coal.
- Scarcity of capital: The loss of the colonies meant that metals were no longer obtained there, and industry no longer had that market. Capital was invested in land acquisition, absorbing resources.
The communications network was poor. To build the railway, an internal market was needed. Economic policy was indecisive and sometimes inaccurate, wavering between free trade and protectionism (railways were an error).
The Industrial Sectors
The Catalan Textile Industry
The development of cotton manufacturing began in the last third of the 18th century. Production was intended for the domestic and colonial markets. Its expansion was hampered by the War of Independence, but it thrived again afterward.
From the 1830s, the pace of expansion was high. Spinning was quickly mechanized due to the scarcity of labor and the abundance of repatriated colonial capital.
The mechanization of looms was limited. Even so, it significantly reduced costs and selling prices, stimulating increased demand.