Analyzing Franco's Totalitarian Regime in Spain

Max Gallo’s ‘Spain Under Franco’ is a comprehensive work that attempts to provide an overview of the living conditions and political dynamics in Franco’s Spain. Gallo makes extensive efforts to detail the brutal totalitarian nature of the state by saying that ‘the reprisals and executions which went on long after victory had been won [by Franco in the civil war] mark an undeniable retrogression for any civil society governed by traditional norms of law’.1 In addition, Gallo explains why Spain drifted towards an authoritarian form of government in the aftermath of World War Two instead of a democracy as Italy had done by arguing that ‘there was literally no social stratum capable of envisaging the replacement of Francoism by a democracy of

Western type’.2 These observations made by Gallo are extremely relevant to the research topic because they detail some of the characteristics that Francoism shared with Italian fascism, such as its ruthless political oppression and the marginalisation of civil liberties in preference for furthering the ambitions of the state. It is also useful that Gallo explains how the social structure of Spain was fundamentally different to that of Italy as it forms a strong argument as to why fascism never became dominant in Spain and it is definitely a point that I will refer to in my essay. Finally, this book is quite unique in that it provides some interesting statistics relating to economic production, mortality rates, and income per capita which helps to provide fully objective facts that can be used to make conclusions about Franco’s Spain. Much like Wiskemann’s Fascism in Italy: its Development and Influence, Gallo’s Spain Under Franco was written a long time ago and therefore does not reference archival documents that became available after Franco’s regime fell which raises natural doubts about the veracity of his account of events. The high quality nature of Gallo’s analysis and his reputation as a respected authority in his field offers a great amount of credibility to this source and I plan on referring to it extensively when constructing my essay.