The Genesis of the Labor Movement in Spain: 1860-1874
Genesis of the Labor Movement in Spain
The 1860 census data reveals the workforce composition:
Day laborers were the most numerous, concentrated in the lands south of the Tagus. Factory workers and miners accounted for only 2.5% of the workforce. These figures highlight the importance of Catalonia and Andalusia in the origins of the worker and peasant movements.
Living Conditions of the Working Class
The working class faced especially harsh conditions: days exceeding 12 hours, job insecurity, lack of hygiene, etc. The living conditions of agricultural laborers were even worse: starvation wages, women’s and children’s work, seasonal unemployment, and absolute lack of land ownership. Some opted for emigration, others for banditry. The Civil Guard was created in 1844 precisely to combat such practices and ensure property and order in rural areas.
Early Manifestations of Worker and Peasant Movements
The worker movement was confined almost exclusively to Catalonia, the area where industrialization had gained some importance during this period. There were isolated cases of strikes, the most important event being the burning of the factory El Vapor in Barcelona.
In 1840, the first workers’ association was founded in Barcelona, authorized to establish mutual associations and cooperatives. The partners traded to protect those who remained unemployed, but also acted as a resistance, cost-effectively helping striking workers. Its life was short and eventful, and employers sought its dissolution to suppress the strikes. It was considered illegal until 1868.
As for peasant agitation, it occurred mostly in Andalusia, an area of large estates and agricultural laborers, and almost always followed the same pattern: hunger pushed them to the illegal occupation of land. It was suppressed due to poor organization.
The Labor Movement and the First International
The Sexenio Democrático, with its recognized rights and freedoms, was a crucial stage for the development of the Spanish worker movement, coinciding with the numerical growth of the working class due to progressive industrialization. This working class, mostly concentrated in Catalonia, was becoming aware of the need to join forces and integrate into the international labor movement to organize and attack the capitalist system together.
International Workers’ Association (AIT)
The AIT was founded with the intention of coordinating and combining the efforts of all workers in the world. The inaugural manifesto and statutes were drawn up by Marx. However, along with Marxist thought, other ideological positions appeared in the International, most notably the anarchist current led by Bakunin. However, the Hague Congress confirmed the split in the international labor movement. Marx secured approval at this Congress for the need to form political parties of the working class and the expulsion of Bakunin from the AIT. Bakunin, in turn, met in Saint-Imier with his supporters, proclaiming themselves the legitimate successors of the AIT.
Evolution of the Worker Movement in Spain
After the Glorious Revolution in Spain, a law recognizing freedom of association was passed. This law allowed labor organizations to develop. Paul Lafargue, sent by Marx, intended to drive the Spanish internationalist movement towards Marxism. He succeeded with a small group that was later expelled. Thus began the split in the Spanish labor movement between socialists and anarchists. The anarchist current consolidated its dominance in the Spanish labor movement. The support for the cantonal insurgency and its failure resulted in the suppression of the Federation. After the coup of Pavia, the Serrano dictatorship decreed the illegality of the AIT and the labor unions, which were extinguished or went underground.
Marxism
Marxism is a systematic theory ranging from the philosophical to the economic, developed by Karl Marx and Engels. They concluded that the engine of humanity is a class struggle that ends up producing the transition from one mode of production to another. In this approach, the working class, in its struggle against the bourgeoisie, would be responsible for ending the capitalist mode of production and transitioning to socialism, in which the means of production would not be exploitative but owned by the state. However, this requires that the working class be endowed with a strong organization allowing it to seize power.