J. FONTANA. Cambio economico у actitudes politicas en la Espana del siglo XIX. Barcelona. 1981. 213 p.

A prominent Spanish Marxist historian, Professor at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, J. Fontana is the author of a number of works on the history of Spain in the 19th century1 . He is interested in economic history, especially in one aspect - "the study of the complex connections that exist between economic development and political events" 2 . The book under review is not just a study of one of the aspects of the history of Spain in the XIX century, but a problematic, generalizing work on the history of the country throughout the century.

This topic requires the formulation of a number of issues that are the subject of discussion in Spanish historiography .3 This is primarily the problem of the" industrial revolution "("industrialization") in Spain, the emergence of capitalist relations in the economy and the bourgeoisie as an independent class, the birth of the proletariat, its role in the country's political history, agrarian reform and its consequences, etc .

The book seems to sum up a certain stage of research, refuting the established idea of the Spanish XIX century 5. The main conclusion of the author, which has now become generally accepted in Spanish Marxist historiography, is as follows: the XIX century in the history of Spain can not be considered a period of "industrial revolution "("industrialization"), rather, it is a period of failed industrial revolution, formation of conditions and foundations for further development that will take place in the XX century.

The book rightly notes that often the study of the process of industrial development in Spain in the XIX century is reduced to the study of individual industries. Fontana made an attempt to present a complete picture of this process, paying special attention to the emergence of a large modern industry and the formation of an internal national market. A study of the Spanish economy in the second half of the eighteenth century leads Fontana to conclude that Spain did not have a national market, that the country was a collection of disparate rural areas (p.17). The situation in the country was such that the hinterlands produced grain for their own consumption, while the maritime provinces, primarily Catalonia, imported wheat, and bread prices in the maritime provinces were more stable than in the inner rural areas. The scientist sees the reason for such an imperfect structure of the Spanish market not only in low yields, bad roads and inconvenient transport, but also in the state of productive forces in Spain at the end of the XVIII century (p.30).

Fontana concludes that in a country where the rule of the seigniorial oligarchy remains in the countryside, where a feudal economy has long existed, there can be no advanced agriculture. During the same period, i.e., in the second half of the eighteenth century, the textile industry was rapidly developing in Catalonia against the background of the stagnant situation in Spanish agriculture. Fontana explains this seemingly contradictory fact. Per-

1 Fontana J. La quiebra de la monarquia absoluta 1814 - 1820. Barcelona. 1974; ejusd. La crisis del antiguo régimen. 1808 - 1833. Barcelona. 1979; ejusd. La Hacienda en la historia de Espana 1700-1931. Madrid. 1980.

2 Fontana J. Cambio economico у actitudes politicas en la Espana del siglo XIX. Barcelona. 1981, p. 8; ejusd. La quiebra de la monarquia absoluta 1814-1820, p. 9. 3 In Soviet historiography, the history of Spain in the 19th century is poorly studied (see: Maisky I. M. Spain, 1808-1917. Historical essay M. 1957; Gonzalez A. History of the Spanish sections of the International Workers ' Association, Moscow, 1964).

4 Nadal J. El fracaso de la Revolucion industrial en Espana. Barcelona. 197Б; Sanches Albornos N. Espana hace un siglo: una economia dual. Madrid. 1977; Tunon de Lara M. La Espana del sig. lo XIX. P. 1968; Vic ens Vives J. Coyuntura economica у reformismo burgues. Barcelona. 1974; Artola M. Antiquo regimen у revolucion liberal. Barcelona. 1974.

5 Historiografia espanola contemporanea. X Coloquio del Centro de Investigations Historicas de la Universidad de Pau. Madrid. 1980, p. 175.

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Initially, Catalonia's textile industry relied on its own regional market, where agriculture was placed on a commercial basis (in contrast to the situation in Castile). Then Catalan industry began to produce goods for export, actively trading with the colonies.

Such an economic situation could not but affect the peculiarity of socio-political development, the relationship between the old aristocracy and the new bourgeoisie. The colonial market allowed Catalan industry to develop without parallel growth of the domestic national market. Thus, conflicts between the industrial bourgeoisie and the privileged classes of the old regime were excluded. There was a sort of division agreement: the Spanish market belonged to the seignorial aristocracy, and the colonial market belonged to the bourgeoisie. The government took care to preserve the monopoly of colonial trade for Catalan industry, and the bourgeoisie supported it in the country, abandoning its revolutionary mission (p. 42).

However, the subsequent economic changes led to a change in the political positions of the Spanish bourgeoisie. The loss of the colonial market as a result of the wars with England and the struggle for independence in the American colonies of Spain in the early nineteenth century, as well as the significant damage caused to Catalan industry as a result of the wars with Napoleon, confronted the bourgeoisie with the internal problems of the Spanish economy. The Catalan bourgeoisie understood before the government that economic development in the new age is a global phenomenon, that industry can only be based on the appropriate level of agriculture, and that the existing regime is the main obstacle to progress (p. 51). Thus, the conquest of democratic freedoms became the most important goal for the bourgeoisie.

Following his goal of finding connections between economic and ideological - political phenomena, Fontana connects the emergence of the industrial proletariat in Spain with the emergence of the textile industry in Catalonia at the end of the XVIII century. The most important social consequence of this process was the emergence of the proletariat, which has new, fundamentally different properties from artisans: large numbers, concentration, complete dependence on the interests of industry and, accordingly, the owners. Indeed, at first the bourgeoisie and the proletariat acted as allies: they were united in the struggle against a common enemy - the "old regime". The length of the struggle against feudalism explains the long solidarity of workers and landlords.

At a certain stage, when the bourgeoisie, having achieved its goal, ended the struggle, the proletariat found that its interests required a great change, that it was necessary to enter into a struggle with yesterday's ally. However, the period of cooperation with the bourgeoisie was not in vain for the Spanish labor movement: for a long time it was under the ideological influence of the big liberal bourgeoisie. In an effort to free itself from the influence of bourgeois Republicans, the independent labor movement - anarchism - declared itself "apolitical", thereby trying to set its organization against the political organizations of bourgeois society. In fact, it was the first specific workers ' political organization, as Fontana rightly points out.

Starting to study the economic and political crisis in Spain in the late 60s of the XIX century, the author paid special attention to the question of the causes and nature of the bourgeois revolution of 1868-1874. In his opinion, the revolution was caused not by deep economic shifts, the need to change the mode of production, but by so-called conjunctural economic factors. Therefore, according to Fontana, the subject of research should not be "the economic causes of the revolution, but the economic motives that led to the coup d'etat, namely, the interests of certain strata and groups of Spanish society" (pp. 105-106). The book contains convincing facts that show that by the end of the 60s of the XIX century, the country showed signs of an economic crisis (in railway construction, trade, etc.), and that many major political figures were closely connected with the business world.

The crisis of Spanish capitalism in the 70s of the XIX century significantly contributed to the fact that these figures realized the need for political renewal in the country. The study of a large number of appeals, proclamations, and political manifestos of various Spanish juntas of 1868 allowed the author to identify the program and goals of the revolution. He emphasizes her moderation-

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"Along with calls for the overthrow of the hated Bourbon dynasty and the expulsion of the Jesuits, the inviolability of private property was emphasized" (p.130). The restoration of 1874 is considered by Fontana not as a return to the pre-revolutionary situation, but as a continuation, the second act of the "pseudo-revolution of 1868". Both of these events are "two stages of the same process, caused by the structural crisis of Spanish capitalism, designed to overcome it and help to start a new stage of growth" (p. 141).

However, it is difficult to agree with the author's assessment of the bourgeois revolution of 1868-1874 in Spain as a coup d'etat. This was the last, fifth Spanish revolution of the 19th century, which completed the revolutionary cycle of 1808-1874. In its course, the first Spanish Republic was established, and for the first time the proletariat emerged as an independent political force that seriously influenced the fate of the revolution .6
The paper emphasizes the crucial role of agriculture in the process of "modern economic development" (p. 149). This approach to the agrarian question allowed the author to identify the peculiarity of the "Spanish way" to capitalism, comparing it with the French one: "In Spain, the liquidation of the old regime took place through the alliance of the liberal bourgeoisie and the large landed aristocracy, the monarchy acting as an arbiter, and without a parallel peasant war. Moreover, the interests of the peasantry were sacrificed, and large groups of peasants took up arms against the bourgeois revolution and the agrarian reform that was being carried out at their expense, thus finding themselves on the side of the reform's enemies: the Carlist party. This explains what is inexplicable from the point of view of the French version: the landed aristocracy in Spain was on the side of the revolution, and the broad strata of the peasantry supported the reaction" (p.162).

Speaking about the ways of solving the agrarian question, Fontana, following A. Sobul, reveals the difference between the "revolution from below" (the French way, or the bourgeois-democratic revolution) and the "revolution from above" (the Prussian way, or the liberal, anti-feudal revolution), considering that Spain followed the second, more typical for European countries, path. This approach makes it possible to adapt agriculture to the requirements of the modern economy without significantly changing the position of the old privileged classes. In this connection, Fontana considers the liberal legislation (deamortization) of 1835 as mainly a financial measure, denying its revolutionary character (p .167, 183) .7 The consequences of such a solution to the agrarian question-the strengthening of large-scale land ownership in the south of the country, the low marketability of agriculture, etc. - affected the development of the Spanish economy in the XX century (pp. 191-210).

Fontana's undoubted contribution is the study of a number of characteristic features of Spain's transition from feudalism to capitalism. He admits that in Spain there was a process of changing the mode of production, but the term "social revolution" can only be applied to the French revolution (p.100). Obviously, Fontana means by" social revolution " in this case one of its ways - the bourgeois - democratic one, which was characteristic of France. The term "social revolution", or more precisely, "the era of social revolution" 8, refers to the entire long period of change from feudalism to capitalism 9 . It is difficult to agree with Fontana in assessing deamortization as a purely financial measure. The sale of church and part of state lands carried out in the course of the campaign significantly reduced the amount of land owned by the state.

6 See K. Marx and F. Engels Soch. Vol. 18, pp. 457-474. See: Gonzalez A. Uk. soch.; Temkin V. A. Francisco Pi-i-Margal as a theorist of Spanish federalism. In: Problems of Spanish History, Moscow, 1984.

7 This issue is a subject of discussion in Spanish historiography. A number of major historians (X. Vicent Vives, M. Tunyon de Lara, and others) deny the revolutionary nature of deamortization. Their opponents (M. Baldo Lacomba, S. Perez Garzon) it is claimed that " Mendizabal's financial measure had a double purpose: to win the war (meaning the first Carlist War. - A. E.) and break the relations of production that delayed the development of bourgeois relations, i.e., destroy feudalism" (Valdo Lacomba M. Crisis del antiguo regimen e industrializacion en la Espana del siglo XIX. VII Coloquio de Pau. Madrid. 1977, p. 103).

8 K. Marx and F. Engels Soch. Vol. 13, pp. 6-7.

9 Barg M. A., Chernyak E. B. On the question of the transition era from feudalism to capitalism (on the example of England). - New and recent history, 1982, N 3.

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the economic power of the church, which owned 1/3 of the land in Spain, turned these lands into bourgeois property.

Some of the contradictions contained in the book are characteristic of the current stage of development of historical science in Spain, when many pages of the country's history are being re-evaluated. In general, Fontana's work makes a valuable contribution to the study and understanding of the key problems of the history of Spain in the XIX century.

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