An interview with Juan Carlos Monedero From TRIBUNE, 29 September 2019
tribunemag.co.uk/2019/09/spains-divided-left

After April's general election it looked like Spain would have its first left-wing coalition government since the 1930s. Instead, the country heads to new elections with the Left more divided than ever.

Spain will head to the polls for the fourth time in four years on November 10 after Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist Party (PSOE) turned its back on a left-wing coalition with radical Unidas Podemos.

Running on a platform of left-wing cooperation in last April’s general election, the PSOE secured a six-point victory over its nearest rivals. Yet unwilling to govern against the country’s economic elites or ruffle feathers among the European powers, Sánchez, the current acting Prime Minister, preferred fresh elections to seeking a deal with Unidas Podemos. 

As the election was called last week, Sánchez claimed “96 percent of Spaniards” would have felt anxious with Podemos Ministers in the cabinet, adding: “today I could be head of a [permanent] government but I would not be able to sleep at night.”

PSOE’s electoral strategy is now to position itself as the party of stability and moderation as Spain heads into an uncertain autumn. The verdict in the trial of Catalan independence leaders is expected in October and the economy has begun to slow amidst growing fears of a recession internationally. 

In initial polling conducted since the election was called, PSOE looks set to be the largest party again with the Celeste-Tel poll for El Diario having the Socialists half a point up from its April result on 29.4 percent.  

For his part, Unidas Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias criticized Sánchez for having not understood the new multi-party reality of Spanish politics. He also insisted the acting PM had “made a historic error” by walking away from coalition talks in July. The two sides had seemed close to an agreement before Sánchez lost an initial vote on forming a government before the Summer recess. 

Podemos now face a complicated campaign after its former deputy leader Íñigo Errejón announced on Wednesday he would head a new electoral platform, Más País, which threatens to split the left vote further.

Positioning itself as a more moderate option closer to a party like the German Greens, Errejón maintains his platform can act as antidote against the wave of expected abstention in the repeat elections.

To analyse Spain’s ongoing governability crisis and the growing division on the Spanish left, Eoghan Gilmartin sat down to talk to Juan Carlos Monedero, co-founder of Podemos and Professor of Political Science at Madrid’s Complutense University. 

EG
In July it looked like Spain would have its first left-wing coalition since the Second Republic in the 1930s. What went wrong?

JCM
A parliamentary majority in the Spanish congress requires the support of 176 MPs. In April’s election the PSOE won 123 seats, Unidas Podemos 42. With the backing of the Basque Nationalist Party and the Catalan Republican Left, we seemed to have a working majority. On election night there was a feeling that this was going to happen – that a coalition was in the air. 

Sánchez had stated during the campaign in an interview with El País that he would have no problem with Unidas Podemos members in his government. But the PSOE had never wanted a left-wing coalition – to govern with us would mean having to confront the economic powers and the European Central Bank.

If the PSOE had been serious about a coalition, it would have sat down straight after the elections and begun to negotiate in earnest. Instead they spent months delaying and insisting on discussing formulas that would have allowed them to govern alone as a minority administration.

Then a week before the vote on Sanchez’s premiership in July, the Socialists tried to detonate the talks by placing a veto on Pablo Iglesias’ presence in cabinet. In a major television interview, Sánchez claimed this was the only sticking-point holding back a coalition deal. 

This is something unprecedented – that you would insist the leader of your potential coalition partner cannot have a cabinet seat. When Iglesias then agreed to the veto, the PSOE was left wrong-footed. Sánchez had never expected him to accept it but only hoped to use it as tactic to frame him and Unidas Podemos as the ones holding back talks.

The Socialists then had no choice but to sit down to negotiate the details of a coalition with us. We had already accepted the PSOE’s veto on so-called ministries of state [foreign affairs, defence, interior and justice] as well as on the Treasury. Instead we concentrated on Ministries where we would be able to administer social policies in line with our electoral program – looking to secure areas such as Labour, the Environment, Housing, etc.

The difficulty was that these negotiations did not begin until 48 hours before the vote. How are you meant to reach a comprehensive coalition deal in that period? During the negotiations the PSOE kept stalling over the Ministries. They never made any written offers to us but orally they would suggest various positions but never together as a comprehensive package. 

Then at a certain point they made a final offer which lacked any real substance. It consisted of the position of deputy Prime Minister but without a clear policy portfolio or budget, the Ministry of Health (which is a policy area run predominately at a regional level as each autonomous community has its own health system), and then two new ministries – which had previously been sub-cabinet positions.

Unidas Podemos rejected the offer but expected the negotiations to continue through the night until right before the vote on a new government. Instead the PSOE walked away. After losing the vote in July, in which we abstained, Sánchez still had until the third week of September before new elections were called. Yet when he came back from holiday, he claimed his offer of a coalition was now “past its sell by date” and again insisted on PSOE governing alone. 

EG
In May The New York Times described Pedro Sánchez as “the unlikely standard-bearer” for European Social Democracy. Yet this is a man who has been the Spanish Prime Minister for nearly a year and half without ever really governing. In that time he has not passed a budget or any major piece of legislation. Now he has chosen further elections instead of governing with Unidas Podemos. What is his endgame here? 

JCM
Sánchez is someone without a coherent ideology. He has no project for the future of this country. Instead his only objective is to govern and to reduce the obstacles that would obstruct him in office. In opposition or during an election campaign, he knows a left-wing discourse will win him votes but when it comes to forming a government, he is not going to confront the economic powers or Brussels unless he is forced to. 

Much of the media explain the failure to reach a coalition agreement in terms of poor personal relationships and a lack of trust between Iglesias and Sánchez. But politics is not simply a question of personal dramas between major protagonists. It is also a question of interests and power relations Ultimately, the PSOE preferred fresh elections because the CEOE [The Spanish Employers’ Association] and the major banks were against Podemos’ presence in government. 

In terms of where he goes from here, Sánchez won April’s election in large part because of the fear of a breakthrough for the extreme-right Vox party. His pitch was: ‘vote for me so as to stop the Right’. In recent weeks, however, he has called on the two major right-wing parties Ciudadanos and the Partido Popular, to facilitate a PSOE government through a “technical abstention” – as if forming a government was technical matter and not a political one. 

The ground is now being prepared for an investiture along these lines after November’s election. With a new economic recession looking probable in the coming months, this is the elites’ clear preference.

In Europe there has been a move towards different types of grand coalitions as a means to manage neoliberalism’s crisis from above. The case of Germany is obvious but also Emmanuel Macron in France represents another type of expression of this. And so I think even if the PSOE and Unidas Podemos win an absolute majority in November, we will most probably see the Socialists governing with the Right in some form. In particular the pressure on Ciudadanos’ leader Albert Rivera has increased and I think that after November’s elections it will be practically impossible for him to refuse to facilitate a PSOE government.

EG
The responsibility for fresh elections in November lies primarily with Sánchez and the PSOE. Yet there have also been critical voices within Unidas Podemos, such as those of Teresa Rodríguez or Ramón Espinar, who believed the party was not in a position to secure a substantial coalition agreement from the PSOE – that any deal reached would leave it in a subordinated position. Would Podemos have been better off facilitating a minority PSOE government – via a programmatic pact – and then mounting a strict opposition from parliament? 

JCM
No, I don’t think so. Unidas Podemos spent nearly a year supporting Sánchez’s minority government from the opposition benches before April’s elections. We reached various agreements with his administration on rent controls, repealing right-wing labour reforms and on a progressive budget but he did not keep his side of the bargain. The PSOE is great at making promises but the only guarantee that such measures will be pushed through is a coalition with our presence in it.    

You also have to remember in 2015 the Left won an unprecedented six million votes – between Podemos and Izquierda Unida – but we were also blocked from entering government then. Sánchez later admitted in a television interview he had been explicitly threatened by business and media leaders over a possible deal with us at that time. 

This experience created disillusionment and a sense that voting for the Left is not useful. Our voters needed positive news – to be able to feel that their vote counted again and that casting it could serve to form a government. A transformative political force cannot simply be geared to protest but has to hold out the promise that you can change things electorally. We founded Podemos with a clear will to govern and as means to construct alternatives – not simply to be an oppositional force. 

This not to deny there are risks here. The institutional logic of governing could end up smothering our transformative spirit. In this respect it is essential that pursuing office is combined with reinforcing our extra-parliamentary structures.

EG
In most polling done in the initial aftermath of November’s elections being called, Podemos’ numbers were up a little on its result in April’s general election. It also looked as if the party was on course to regain third position from Ciudadanos. What is the significance then of Podemos’ former deputy leader Íñigo Errejón deciding to run a rival candidacy against you? 

JCM
Towards the end of the 1980’s there was a moment in which the Communist backed Izquierda Unida had the opportunity to enter government. Two things occurred then to block this from happening that are very similar to what is going on right now. First the establishment fomented a split within Izquierda Unida, with a new breakaway party emerging called Nueva Izquierda – which was later incorporated into the PSOE. Second the then Socialist leader Felipe González chose to reach a pact with the Catalan right – Jordi Pujol’s Covergencia – rather than with the radical left. 

We are witnessing similar manoeuvres right now. You can only understand the constant positive media coverage that Errejón’s candidacy is receiving as part of a pact aimed at ending Podemos and replacing it with a much more innocuous force. Suddenly he is not being asked about comments he made about Venezuela since leaving Podemos or receiving the type of attention we get over campaign financing. Errejón’s candidacy is part of a strategy whose only objective is to destroy us.

Many of his team are very young and have only ever worked in politics. Their first jobs were in Podemos. They approach politics like it’s a start-up – all you need is a garage and a smart group of professionals to start a party. But their decision to split from Podemos and run separately in the Madrid local and regional elections last May ended with the Left losing the City Hall and failing to remove the Partido Popular from the regional government.

EG
If part of what secured the PSOE victory in April was the fear amongst progressive voters of a right-wing government backed by the extremist Vox party, is there now a renewed threat of a government of the Right in these repeat elections – particularly as abstention is expected to be high? 

JCM
I don’t see a right-wing majority as very likely. It is much more probable a PSOE/Ciudadanos government or even some form of pact between PSOE and the PP that would allow Sánchez to govern. It looks like the PP will regain ground but at the expense of the other two right-wing parties, Vox and Ciudadanos. 

Vox in particular is losing momentum. Unlike the extreme-right elsewhere in Europe, it is a party that does not have a populist appeal. It positions itself in favour of the European Union’s neo-liberalism as well as free trade and the international system of finance. It is too old-fashioned, too Francoist, to connect with the anger of disoriented middle-class voters in the way Donald Trump does. Trump addresses these people and their concerns, Vox does not.    

EG
How should Unidas Podemos approach November’s election campaign?

JCM
Podemos cannot renounce the possibility of recuperating the six million votes that opted for an alternative to the injustices of neoliberalism in 2015. The importance of Podemos is not the party in itself but the political space it aims to represent – the six/seven million people who voted to challenge the system. We have to approach the elections believing this constituency still exists and fight for these votes.

With a new economic recession on the horizon, the potential for fresh mobilizations against the system – like the 15M or Indignados movement in 2011 – remains very much alive. 

About the Author
Juan Carlos Monedero is a co-founder of Spanish radical left party Podemos and a Professor of Political Science at Complutense University in Madrid.

Is it possible for  Britain and Spain soon be governed for the many,  not the few, anytime soon? 

This week it dawned on me, a little late perhaps, that neither the country where I live and am a resident, Spain, nor the country where I was born and am still a citizen of, Great Britain, have governments with working majorities.
Nor does it seem very likely to change in the immediate future although both will have elections pretty soon. Both countries appear to be divided straight down the middle and those divisions seem to be hardening, rather than a compromise being sort. 
From my left point of view, there are parties, and there are politicians, in Spain and Britain who see the plight of the people who have endured nearly forty years of neoliberal policies. They see the shocking number of children living in poverty in both countries, while the rich, as in almost every country, continue to become ever wealthier. 
Because I live in Spain, I am more conscious of the barriers here which inhibit so many possibilities for people to work wither alone or in small businesses. The fees for being self-employed,  “autónomo”  are outrageous. Most people must pay more than 250 euros each month in fees, regardless of how much they earn in that month. Small businesses are forced to pay large fees for each legal employee. No wonder that the black economy equals about a quarter of Spain's gross domestic product.
But there is a party that addresses these and many other issues, it is called Podemos and is led by Pablo Iglesias, economics academic from the Computense University in Madrid. In each election manifesto, there have been clear simple ideas to bring a more logical economic system to Spain. The situation is complicated in Spain by the existence of the autonomous communities, a bit like the devolved governments of Wales and Scotland. 

But although I have the feeling that while Pedro Sanchez, the leader of PSOE would like to enter into a coalition with Podemos, the old guard of PSOE, represented perfectly by Filipe Gonzales, a former president, is against any moves that would alienate big money in Spain and so there is a total stalemate. The press in Spain is totally hostile to Podemos.
 In Britain the press to is against radical change. I cried I watched the proceedings from the Labour party conference in Brighton, on a  live.stream. 
My tears were of thanks for the inspiration I receive from the people speaking in this enormous conference hall.  There were young people, many of them women, many of them first-time speakers, nervous yet fired with their desire to make life better for everyone. They were speaking to the conference motions designed to restore Britain to the civilised, caring country it once was.

A young woman from Cornwall called on delegates to vote for the motion to restore social housing in the form of council houses to Britain. She spoke of her plight, she has a severely ill child, and she is forced to pay an outrageous rent in Cornwall so she can live near her child’s support team. She received a standing ovation.
This conference was all about making life better for ordinary people: restoring workers’ rights, returning education to the public sector, a green new deal to bring Britain to a carbon-free future by 2030. 
Listening to these people and watching the faces of the delegates in the hall I thought about the TV coverage of this party conference and the reporting in the newspaper, most of which are owned by five right-wing men, billionaires to a man, and all living outside Britain, every one a tax avoider.  The media talk had been all about splits within the Labour party. 
Do the reporters for the TV, radio and newspapers ever watch the conference debates I wonder? I suspect not.
My faith in the future was fully restored last Tuesday.
But can that faith last? Is it based on realistic possibilities? There are so many factors in play and in the end big money talks so loudly. 




​.

As yet another election looms, and pressure is mounting to inject more pluralism into the country’s creaky old model
Carlos Delclós, The Guardian, 26 September 2019
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/26/spain-democratic-election

In November, Spain will hold its fourth general election in four years. Only five months have passed since the last election, which had a turnout of more than 75% – the highest in 15 years. In an increasingly conservative Europe, it was a rare election result that lifted progressive spirits: Pedro Sánchez’s victorious Socialist Workers’ party looked as if it would almost certainly have to form a coalition government with Unidas Podemos, the newer, more leftwing party led by Pablo Iglesias. But since the election in April, the two have failed to reach an agreement. In the end, Sánchez preferred to risk another election rather than rely on a party that would put pressure on him from the left.​

he negotiations have been a sad spectacle, not least because the voters’ message in April had seemed so clear. On the night of the socialists’ victory, hundreds of ecstatic supporters outside the party’s headquarters chanted anti-fascist slogans and urged party leaders not to side with Ciudadanos, a rightwing technocratic party. They wanted a leftwing coalition, and it looked like a done deal: throughout the electoral campaign, Sánchez had claimed he would have no problem governing in coalition with Unidas Podemos.

But just a few days after the socialists’ triumph, they announced that they would attempt to govern alone, presumably with outside support from Unidas Podemos and the nationalist parties of the Basque country and Catalonia. As negotiations dragged on, however, Sánchez increasingly reached out to his party’s traditional sparring partners in the conservative People’s party, as well as Ciudadanos. But with both parties competing to lead the opposition against Sánchez, efforts to govern with their support were always doomed.

Meanwhile, Unidas Podemos made it clear that the only role it was willing to accept was in a coalition government, with a number of ministries handed to its politicians. Over the summer, the negotiations between the two parties broke down. More than anything else, the talks collapsed due to strategic considerations. As Pablo Simón, a political scientist at Carlos III University in Madrid, recently put it, neither party was sufficiently scared of another election.

Three recent polls showed gains for the socialists and for the People’s party, modest losses for Unidas Podemos and declining support for both Ciudadanos and the far right. For Sánchez, that suggests a scenario in which he could further weaken Unidas Podemos and pass budgets and legislation without having to rely on support from Catalonia’s pro-independence Republican Left party.

Yet there’s something else going on: huge discontent among voters. In one poll, carried out for El País, 90% of respondents reported feeling disappointed, angry or worried about the inability to form a government. Though far from impossible, a repeat of April’s high turnout seems unlikely. And what neither the socialists nor Unidas Podemos seemed to take seriously in their negotiations is that these feelings were stronger among leftwing voters than those on the right. This could be a big problem for the socialists, as they were especially effective at mobilising voters who had abstained in previous elections, by adopting more leftwing rhetoric and emphasising the threat of a resurgent far right.

To understand Spain’s increasingly fragmentary politics, you have to go back to the indignados movement that erupted in May 2011. At a time of austerity, massive unemployment, widespread evictions and high-profile corruption scandals, hundreds of thousands occupied public squares throughout the country. Chanting “No nos representan” (“They don’t represent us”) and demanding “real democracy now”, they often criticised the system that emerged from La Transición – the country’s transition from dictatorship to democracy in the late 1970s – as an inauthentic partitocracia (“partocracy”) designed to protect the two mainstream parties and accommodate members of the old regime.

As the establishment parties routinely ignored the indignados’ demands for more direct participation, social rights and economic democracy – many of which were supported by an overwhelming majority of citizens – new parties emerged at the local, regional and state levels to capitalise on the movement’s discourse.

The process continues. This weekend, it was announced that Más Madrid, the new party led by Íñigo Errejón, a founding member of Podemos, will run in the election. By emphasising feminism, ecosocialism and political participation, the party hopes to mobilise those disenchanted by the sad spectacle of the last few months. Yet many fear this will just divide the left further, even paving the way for a rightwing government.

Unlike the politicians who represent them, Spanish voters welcome a pluralistic form of politics. According to the El País poll, just 16% of Spaniards are in favour of a return to the de facto two-party system that emerged from La Transición. By contrast, 84% believe the parties must deal with the new multiparty system and grow accustomed to reaching agreements.

Indeed, over the last two decades, the country has become much more diverse, both in terms of its political views and its demographic composition. At the same time, a broad consensus has emerged in favour of more direct and binding political participation – through participatory budgets, citizen-initiated legislation and referenda – as well as affordable housing, universal health care, and greater transparency and accountability. But as the parliament has become somewhat more “representative” of the population’s demands, party politics has become more susceptible to blockage. The November election is only the latest evidence of the existing political institutions’ failure to deal with an electorate that is outgrowing them.

The indignados pointed this problem out eight years ago: their radical critique of representative democracy is just as relevant today. It is time for the demand at the heart of their movement, the demand for more direct participation that can bypass the impasses of party politics, to finally be taken seriously.

• Carlos Delclós is a sociologist and associate researcher at the Barcelona Centre for International Affairs (CIDOB). His views do not necessarily reflect those of CIDOB

Protesters will take to the streets of more than 250 towns and cities across Spain on Friday to declare a “feminist emergency” after a series of high-profile rape cases and a summer in which 19 women were murdered by current or former partners.

Organisers are aiming to “turn the night purple” – the colour of the feminist movement – to raise the alarm and protest against apathy, indifference and a lack of attention from politicians and the media.

So far this year, 42 women have been murdered in domestic violence attacks and 32 children left motherless. Since the government began recording such murders in 2003, 1,017 women have been killed by their current or former partners.
The demonstrations come three years after the notorious gang-rape of a woman at the running of the bulls festival in Pamplona and amid the trial of seven men accused of raping a 14-year-old girl in Catalonia.

“This has been a summer dominated by barbarity, murders, rapes, assault, paedophilia and gang attacks,” said the protests’ organisers, Feminist Emergency.

“The gender-based violence of the summer has led to the worst figures in more than a decade. We can’t let another school or parliamentary term begin as if nothing has happened. To do so would be to tolerate the intolerable … This is an emergency.”

The organisers are urging people to assemble with candles, lanterns, torches and mobile phones to let “feminism fill the night”.
The Pamplona attack – known as the “wolf pack” case after the name the rapists gave themselves – shocked Spain and provoked a fierce debate over the country’s sexual offences legislation.

There were furious protests around the country after the judges presiding over the original trial cleared the five of gang-rape and convicted them only of the lesser charge of sexual abuse.

In June, Spain’s supreme court overturned the regional court’s verdict, ruled that the men had committed rape, and raised their sentences from nine to 15 years each.

Parallels have been drawn between that case and the trial of the six men who are alleged to have raped the 14-year-old girl in the Catalan town of Manresa.

While prosecutors had initially argued the defendants should face charges of sexual assault rather than rape because the girl was drunk, under the influence of drugs and did not fight back, they upgraded the charges to rape on Monday.

Despite the outcry and anger provoked by such cases, Spain’s far-right Vox party has called for the repeal of domestic violence laws and attacked “psychopathic feminazis”.

On Thursday, the party boycotted the minute’s silence that Madrid city council had called to mark the murder of the latest victim of domestic violence, Adaliz Villagra.

Villagra, 31, was stabbed to death in front of her two children in the capital on Tuesday.

Vox’s decision to boycott the event and instead turn up with a sign reading: “Violence has no gender” prompted a public row between Madrid’s conservative mayor, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, and Javier Ortega Smith, Vox’s general secretary.
​
The Guardian
Sam Jones in Madrid
Fri 20 Sep 2019 

Sánchez has until next Monday to form government or election takes place on 10 November


Sam Jones in Madrid, The Guardian,Tue 17 Sep 2019
www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/17/spain-braces-for-another-election-as-deadline-looms




Spain is bracing for its fourth election in as many years as the deadline looms for the formation of a government following April’s inconclusive vote.

Although the Spanish socialist party (PSOE), led by the acting prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, won the most votes five months ago, it fell well short of a majority in the country’s 350-seat congress.
Sánchez’s efforts to form a government have been hobbled by the refusal of the centre-right Citizens party to countenance a pact with the PSOE, and by the socialists’ own firm veto on entering into a coalition with the far-left, anti-austerity party Unidas Podemos.

Spain’s King Felipe has been carrying out traditional consultations with party leaders in an effort to break the impasse, but hopes of a deal remain low. If an agreement is not reached by Monday 23 September a general election will be held on 10 November.

However, on Monday Albert Rivera, the leader of the Citizens party, softened his line. Rivera offered to help Sánchez back into office by abstaining during any forthcoming investiture debate – if the PSOE promised not to increase taxes, ruled out pardoning the 12 Catalan leaders on trial for their role in the 2017 attempt at winning independence, and rejected the support of secessionists in the Navarra region.
​But on Tuesday, the PSOE’s organisational secretary, José Luis Ábalos, signalled a possible willingness to talk after Rivera requested an urgent meeting.

Speaking to Spanish radio on Tuesday morning, he said that while the move showed that Citizens “had been part of the impasse”, the PSOE would have no problem considering the offer “if it’s genuine”.

The acting PM was due to call Rivera, Podemos’s leader, Pablo Iglesias, and Pablo Casado, the leader of the conservative People’s party (PP), on Tuesday to determine their “final decision” as Monday’s deadline moved closer.

“Pedro Sánchez is committed to establishing a legislature without the need for elections and to creating a stable government, which is what Spain needs,” said a PSOE source.

Recent polls have suggested the socialists would again finish first in a repeat poll, but would still fail to secure a majority. They predict the PP would finish second, picking up more seats than in April, while Citizens would fare very badly, losing between 19 and 23 seats.

www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/14/project-brings-silenced-spanish-women-writers-to-life

(For me "Doves of War" by Paul Preston is a book which explains the Spanish Civil War superbly well, through the lives of four women, two nationalist, two republican;  two English , two Spanish. N.D.).

An online film project aims to bring the thoughts of Spanish and Latin American female visionaries to a new generation.
By Sam Jones, the Guardian, 14 September 2019 

Eighty-six years after she was silenced at the age of 18 by four bullets that her mother fired into her sleeping body, Hildegart Rodríguez – Spanish prodigy, socialist and pioneering sexual educator – has found her voice once more.

So, too, has the trailblazing writer Carmen Laforet and, more controversially, Pilar Primo de Rivera, daughter of the 1920s Spanish dictator and crusading leader of the women’s section of the Falange movement under Franco, which was led by her brother, José Antonio.

The trio are the first influential thinkers featured in a new online project that mixes film and literature to recover and preserve the ideas, words and legacies of Spanish and Latin American women whose contributions to culture and society have been overlooked, marginalised or forgotten.

Cartasvivas (Livingletters) is the brainchild of the writer and Exeter University academic Nuria Capdevila-Argüelles and the award-winning filmmaker Paula Ortiz, who teaches at Barcelona University.

By searching archives and examining letters, speeches and interviews, the pair have recovered the intimate thoughts of Rodríguez, Laforet and Primo de Rivera and put them into the mouths of actors. With the help of their students, who helped produce and subtitle the short films, and the support of the Banco Santander Foundation, the first “filmic capsules” are now available online for free.
The aim, according to Capdevila-Argüelles and Ortiz, was to find a tool “to bring the legacy of the past fully into the present” and put it within easy reach of everyone.

“We didn’t come up with the words that the actors have made their own – they were already written and already there,” says Capdevila-Argüelles, who has also worked to ensure Madrid commemorates a lost generation with a series of plaques of female writers, artists, scientists and thinkers silenced under Franco.

“The project is about taking these legacies that are key to understanding our culture, our politics and our history, and putting them very much in the here and now,” said Capdevila-Argüelles.

Ortiz added: “What’s fascinated me from the beginning of all this is that, while women have obviously contributed half of all history and half of all thought, that’s not even close to being reflected in our culture or in the products of our culture.

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“It’s just not there, so we have to go looking for it in those hidden places where women’s thoughts, feelings and ideas have always been kept. Even though they didn’t have the opportunity or the right to have a public voice or presence, they still made use of the tools they had and of their private spaces, be they letters or diaries.”

And that, she adds, is where the real treasures are to be found: “the sexual and reformist work of Hildegart Rodríguez; the plans for statewide organisation you get in Pilar Primo de Rivera; and the deeply poetic and profoundly philosophical creative attitude of Carmen Laforet.”

Rodríguez was the self-described “eugenic daughter” of a mother determined to create a superhuman. In letters to her “spiritual father”, the English sexologist Havelock Ellis, Rodríguez talks of her belief in the urgent need for family planning while also mentioning her ringlets and a “mummy” who never leaves her alone.

Rodríguez was 18 when her mother killed her in 1933, apparently terrified that her preternaturally gifted child was slipping away from her. “I think if we were American, there would already be three films about her,” says Ortiz.

Laforet, who wrote Nada (Nothing) – one of the great Spanish novels of the 20th century – emerges as an author profoundly and painfully unaware of her own worth: “I remain absolutely convinced that this work of mine does not give or take an ounce of spirituality to or from the world, that it is not important to anyone; and I dedicate myself to it knowing of its many defects, enormous plot holes, and lack of moral purpose.”
Then there is Primo de Rivera. In the film, after railing at those who call her a fascist, she points to the work that the Sección Femenina did to improve infant health and the lot of women in post-civil-war Spain.

“If it weren’t for us, Spanish women would be 40 years behind European women,” she says. “If the Sección Femenina hadn’t existed, Spanish women would have had nothing, absolutely nothing, only backwardness, ignorance, submission … and dictatorship.”

Primo de Rivera, who died in 1991, is careful to point out that the section was under her command – not Franco’s – and that it was, as she puts it, her baby: “I gave birth to it, I raised it, I buried it, and no one else was ever in my position.”

She also gives short shrift to what was expected of her as a woman of her era. “I have never been beautiful,” she says, “nor liked wearing makeup or flirting with men. I do not think these necessary in order to feel like a woman. They whispered behind my back; that I looked a mess, that I had not heard of shampoo, that I always dressed as if I were a sexton’s daughter.”

Capdevila-Argüelles and Ortiz are aware of how the inclusion of Primo de Rivera could be viewed in a Spain struggling to come to terms with its past and to break with the post-Franco pact of forgetting.

She lived well into Spain’s post-Franco return to democracy, dying in 1991, and defended her actions and achievements to the end, saying: “Nowadays people say that I was authoritarian, reactionary and, first and foremost, a fascist – as if I had exterminated Jews like Hitler did. They accuse me without wanting to listen … Accusing someone is very easy and very comfortable because those that accuse are automatically free from blame.”

But Capdevila-Argüelles and Ortiz are adamant the project is not an exercise in hagiography. “These pathfinding women were visionaries, but there were also huge paradoxes because it wasn’t easy for any of them to be who they were,” says Capdevila-Argüelles. “We’re trying to show the tensions in their thoughts and in who they were.”

​Pilar Primo de Rivera with General Franco in 1939, defended her association with the dictator as it enabled her to improve the health of Spain’s women and children. Photograph: Ullstein Bild via Getty Images