Francoism: Ideology, Power, and International Relations
The Army’s Role in Franco’s New State
The army was the main bastion of the new state. With a long and spirited traditionalist, totalitarian ideology of the moment, with rare exceptions, it assumed command of its Generalissimo while filling the highest spheres of administration.
The Falange and National Syndicalism
In the 1940s, Franco brought the Falange newer elements of its ideology and its external image. Illiberal, undemocratic, and anti-Marxist, the Falange led to a totalitarian system called National Syndicalism. The basis of this system was inspired by theories of fascism on the Italian corporate organization of the state, a state controlled by a single party and a union that would overcome the conflict between social classes, promoting feelings of national solidarity.
The Falange was made in the memory of their leader, José Antonio Primo de Rivera, executed during the war. Franco was gradually transformed into a myth.
When the war erupted, the Falange had 60,000 militants [Old Shirts]. During the 1940s, it came to have 600,000 members and exercised its indoctrination and captured images via parallel organizations serving specific social sectors.
As far as trade union organization, the Spanish Association [SBI], or vertical union, was created, a union of inter-fiction and unique.
The Falange took nearly a third of senior members of the Franco regime in the early forties. Its influence was very real in political debate. In 1945, the Falangist sector had a predominance.
The rest of the institutional rules of the new fascist state were only in appearance, as it ultimately was due to the legislative power of Franco himself. On the other hand, he did not hesitate to suppress the “revolutionary” intentions of the unionist Falangist sectors linked to the new state that sought to provide a certain service to the social egalitarianism of the working classes.
The presence of the Spanish Falange in public life began to be heavily criticized by traditionalist monarchists and the military from 1942 until it triggered an open conflict at the shrine of the Virgin of Begoña, Bilbao, in which two hand grenades thrown by Falangists caused hundreds of injuries among Carlist Basques. This opportunity was exploited by Franco to relieve Serrano Suñer.
National Catholicism and the Catholic Church
The Catholic Church would not hesitate to support the revolt on July 18, 1936, which ended up being blessed as crusaders and martyrs who died for God and Spain. Having won the war, Franco established a relationship between political power and the Church more characteristic of a theocratic state of the old regime than of a modern state, as highlighted by their efforts to control the church hierarchy through the right of presentation of bishops to the Vatican.
He gave the Church total ideological pre-eminence. The state was declared confessional and abolished secular laws of the Republic, which disappeared with the possibility of civil marriage, divorce, and abortion, which were considered non-Christian.
It gave the clergy control while teaching was to facilitate the introduction of a wide network of schools directed by religious orders. Participation in Catholic rituals and liturgies was almost mandatory to be considered under the regime.
National Catholicism defended the Catholic religion and morality in their traditional versions, as something separate from Spain itself.
This ultraconservative Catholicism sought to legitimize its historical mystique and inquisitorial atmosphere of the empire and church of the Counter-Reformation. In its name, it was hard to justify the repression that was launched against the ideologies that were seen as its antithesis: Freemasonry and Communism.
Franco condemned all enlightened European secular tradition, as he considered the Spanish beyond the genuine spirit. Communist materialism became the bank of the diatribes of the regime.
Authoritarian Institutionalization of the State
In the early Franco era, the system’s new authoritarian state was defined institutionally. Franco always talked about democracy with the derogatory term of party politics. He therefore considered deleting the “red separatist” parties (Republican, Socialist, Communist, and Nationalist) and the same right (or Catholic monarchists). He banned the media conglomerate called it the political party, which had also been classified as the National Movement.
Franco’s version was running a series of Fundamental Laws, which were defining the principles of the anti-democratic regime and the autocratic nature of the exercise of power. During the Civil War, the Labor Charter was issued, and four other important laws were enacted.
The Constitutive Act of the Cortes (1942) also defined a chamber elected by indirect suffrage by Franco and corporations. Its function was to ratify the bills submitted by the dictator. They were called the “resonating power”. This pseudo-democratic system is called organic democracy, as opposed to classical liberal democracy.
In 1945, he promulgated the Charter of the Spanish, a declaration of rights and duties of the Spaniards that made no guarantee of democracy.
The National Referendum Act (1945) also tried to give some appearance of democracy by recognizing the right of Spaniards to vote.
The Law of Succession to the Head of State (1946), which was enacted before the offensive launched by monarchist forces, led by Juan de Borbón.
Opportunistic Adaptation to the International Situation
The outbreak of the Second World War conditioned the international politics of Spain and the same definition of the new political regime in its first decade of life. This opportunistic adaptation to international developments helped strengthen Franco in power.
Franco and World War II (1939-1945)
In 1939, peninsular Franco maintained excellent relations with the Axis powers. Despite the parallels and ties when war broke out in September 1939, the government of Franco declared itself neutral.
However, collaboration with the fascist powers was constant. Franco adopted a policy of non-belligerence with which he kept open the possibility of intervening in favor of Germany. Although Hitler rejected the requests made by Franco, Serrano Suñer continued to facilitate the work of Nazi spies against the British Navy.
The time of maximum collaboration occurred in 1941 when it was decided to send a corps of volunteers to the Soviet front, which was named the Blue Division. As the evolution of the war changed direction and the loss of Nazi Germany became more evident, some military quarters were excessively compromising adherence to the interests of Hitler. He retired from the front in 1943.