Democracy Without Justice in Spain: The Politics of Forgetting

Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights

by Omar Guillermo Encarnación

Spain is a notable exception to the implicit rules of late twentieth-century after the death of General Francisco Franco in 1975, the recovering nation began to consolidate democracy without enacting any of the mechanisms promoted by the international transitional justice movement. There were no political trials, no truth and reconciliation commissions, no formal attributions of blame, and no apologies. Instead, Spain's national parties negotiated the Pact of Forgetting, an agreement intended to place the bloody Spanish Civil War and the authoritarian excesses of the Franco dictatorship firmly in the past, not to be revisited even in conversation. Formalized by an amnesty law in 1977, this agreement defies the conventional wisdom that considers retribution and reconciliation vital to rebuilding a stable nation. Although not without its dark side, such as the silence imposed upon the victims of the Civil War and the dictatorship, the Pact of Forgetting allowed for the peaceful emergence of a democratic state, one with remarkable political stability and even a reputation as a trailblazer for the national rights and protections of minority groups.Omar G. Encarnacion examines the factors in Spanish political history that made the Pact of Forgetting possible, tracing the challenges and consequences of sustaining the agreement until its dramatic reversal with the 2007 Law of Historical Memory. The combined forces of a collective will to avoid revisiting the traumas of a difficult and painful past and the reliance on the reformed political institutions of the old regime to anchor the democratic transition created a climate conducive to forgetting. At the same time, the political movement to forget encouraged the embrace of a new national identity as a modern and democratic European state. Demonstrating the surprising compatibility of forgetting and democracy, Democratization Without Justice in Spain offers a crucial counterexample to the transitional justice movement. The refusal to confront and redress the past did not inhibit the rise of a successful democracy in Spain; on the contrary, by leaving the past behind, Spain chose not to repeat it.

256 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 1, 2013

Reviews

[Margie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This academic text is extremely readable and provides a clear political history of Spain after Franco's death. In particular, it examines how the transition to democracy differs from transitional justice actions that occurred in other countries and posits that the path followed by Spain was the only one that could have led to peaceful democracy and should not be dismissed as a possibility in other countries. This is and will be a perpetual debate but overall the argument was evenhanded. The trade-off for a relatively short and straightforward history is that there can be an impression that the transition was smooth and painless. The losses of the left and the political wrangling are mentioned but you'd need to read other sources for individual stories and more detailed accounts.

[Guy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although they probably had a sensible reason for doing so, I think it's a shame that Penn Press decided to market this as a book for academics and professionals in the human rights field (setting the price at $70+). They have done the same with other books in this series. Encarnaciaon's book deserves a wider readership than it will likely get. It is by far the best book I've found on the subject of democracy and transitional justice and is a must-read if you are interested in Spain's history and politics from the civil war onwards.

Encarnaciaon comes to some surprising conclusions about how to deal with a difficult past. If you are a firm believer in a one-size-fits-all approach, READ THIS BOOK. Like me, you might just change your mind.