Revolution and the State: Anarchism in the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939

by Danny Evans

This book analyses the processes of revolution and state reconstruction that took place in the Republican zone during the Spanish civil war. It focuses on the radical anarchists who sought to advance the revolutionary agenda. Their activity came into conflict with the leaders of their own organizations, who had joined the coalition government in order to reconstruct the state, following its near collapse in July 1936. This process implied participation not only in the organs of governance but also in the ideological reconstitution of the Republic as a patriarchal and national entity. Using original sources, Evans shows that the opposition to this process was both broader and more ideologically consistent than has hitherto been assumed, and that, in spite of its heterogeneity, it united around a common revolutionary programme. This resistance to state reconstruction was informed by the essential insight of anarchism: that the function and purpose of the modern state cannot be transformed from within. By situating the struggles of the radical anarchists within the contested process of state reconstruction, the book affirms the continued relevance of this insight to the study of the Spanish revolution.

Genres: History, Spanish Civil War, Spain, Politics, European History, Nonfiction

230 pages, Paperback

Published February 11, 2020

About the author

Danny Evans chose to write for a living in spite of his parents' contentions that he'd make a perfect rabbi, and the past two decades have confirmed the wisdom of his decision. Had he made the opposite choice, he would not have experienced ejection from a Major League clubhouse by a Hall of Fame manager wearing nothing but a scowl. He would have missed a Denver omelet breakfast with Tiger Woods, a terrifying stare-down with a Nazi hunter, four magazine cover stories, a rejection letter that included the word ?putz?, and a call from an associate editor declaring she loved his idea but wanted someone else to write the article.

Evans graduated from Fresno State University in 1993 with a bachelor's degree in journalism, and he spent the mind-numbing year after that as high school sports editor for a newspaper in the Mojave Desert. That was all it took for Danny to realize his dream of becoming a reporter was like dreaming of being eaten alive by the Teletubbies. He ran for his life and has spent every year since in the advertising industry, writing ad copy for (among other products) hazelnut-flavored coffee creamer and ?urinal burgers? (the little pink antiseptic discs used in high-traffic men?s rooms). While working as Senior Copywriter for a Fortune 500 HMO in late 2004, danny started a blog called Dad Gone Mad (www.dadgonemad.com), in part because he needed a distraction from the monotonous written regurgitations of Medical Necessities Your Health Insurer Won?t Cover Because Our Stakeholders Need New Yachts And Frankly We Don?t Give A Shit About Your Perforated Colon. DadGoneMad.com has won national recognition (St. Louis Post Dispatch Blog of the Day for June 12, 2007 -- need we say more?) and has lead to speaking engagements on Sirius Satellite Radio, Jumping Monkeys, and at SXSW 2007 (recordings available upon request).

Danny has been a contributing writer and consultant for Babble.com, Disney's Family.com and the now-defunct Snarkywood.com. His words have enlivened the pages of Good Housekeeping, Details (about 15 characters worth), Men?s Health (the aforementioned ?here?s $75 to make you go away?), Southwest Airlines Spirit, Orange Coast, the Los Angeles Daily News and Tall Magazine (yes, there is such a thing -- correction: was such a thing).

Danny lives in Orange County, CA with his wife Sharon and their two children.

RAGE AGAINST THE MESHUGENAH is his first book.

Reviews

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

Provides an illumination of ongoing revolutionary anarchist activities throughout the war. Focuses on the divide between the "comites superiores" of the CNT-FAI that were co-opted into the Republican State and the "radical anarchists" who opposed them in various forms.
Well-researched, but not totally satisfying narrative. It does not grapple with the two-fold dilemma that faced the CNT, with the social revolution on the one hand and the desperate need to repel the murderous and well-equipped Fascist Army on the other hand. Instead, the book casually dismisses the second half of this equation, and at times even celebrates those anarchists who abandoned the Front as a protest to militarization.
How might the CNT have allied itself with the State in the war effort without becoming a part of it or subservient to it? How could the revolution in workplace relations, sexual relations, and relations of power more broadly be pursued and amplified at the same time that no effort is spared from the battle against the Fascist threat? How could an organization of millions of members retain its direct democratic decision-making character when crises are popping off daily? In short, how can you carry out a true revolution within a modern industrialized society that is surrounded by hostile forces seeking to destroy everyone involved? The complexities of these massive strategic questions and questions of organization are not considered here. In part we can blame the CNT leadership for abandoning the revolution and subsuming themselves to the project of State reconstruction, as Danny Evans rightly criticizes. However, the questions remain.

[digger Blaque · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is not Spanish Civil War 101. It helps to have some background on that stuggle and I read Paul Preston's "The Spanish Civil War: Reaction, Revolution and Revenge" to great advantage. Danny Evan's book goes deeper and offers more insight.
Spain, 1936: A loose alliance of Socialists, Trade Union members, anarchists, Communists and Republicans (those who are a part of or support the democratically elected national government) create an egalitarian state of empowered workers, liberated women and semi-autonomous communities that works for liberty for all. However, there were fractures in the alliances from the beginning, as Anarchists and some Socialists wanted to continue a revolution to put workers in charge while others want to reconstruct a state. Author Evans goes into deep detail of the split in the community and why radicals split over the question of state reconstruction.
There is parallels to current events. Do we reconstruct a state in the US by deposing Trump and the Republicans and replacing it with Biden and the Democrats? Replace one government with another when they both support a bloated military budget and endless wars, both have sketchy records on reproductive rights, both oppose Medicare for all, both support Israel's illegal land grab in Palestine, both support bailing out rich corporations while working and poor people are left to fend for themselves in a devastated economy, both either ignore or propose mild changes for combating global climate change... I could go on. Like the Spanish libertarians (anarchists) of the 30s, I don't see much gain in supporting a government that is pro-war, pro-rich, and anti-worker. Change happens in the streets, in communities working together and on the barricades.
Evans makes no correlation between today's issues and the Spanish Civil War but tells an honest story of a time in history when people worked for fundamental change to create a just society. The comparison to today's issues are all mine.

[Cody Bolce · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a valuable book that I’d recommend for anyone who really wants to drill down on on the Spanish Civil War. It’s not a general history and you probably won’t get much out of it if you don’t have some general knowledge of the conflict (you don’t need to be an expert, I’m certainly not!). It’s pretty narrowly focused on anarchist ambivalence toward collaboration with the state in an anti-fascist coalition, which is an interesting and important part of the Spanish Civil War. Understanding this dynamic will definitely enhance your understanding of the conflict. It also has some salience for modern readers interested in anti-fascist politics.

TL;DR: not a general history, but an excellent examination of a particular part of the Spanish Civil War. You don’t need to be a expert, but some general knowledge of the conflict is probably necessary to really get the most out of this book. Certainly worth a read if you’re interested the Spanish Civil War or radical politics.

[James Monaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the most eye-opening works on anarchism I have ever read.

Already adhering to what in the book could be classified as "voluntarist" or "purist" anarchism, the most I really knew about the anarchism in the Spanish revolution came from a brief introduction via some of Chomsky's collected essays on the Vietnam war, which I read probably over a decade ago. My vague and erroneous conception of the movement was that it was mostly a series of agricultural experiments in democratic self-management.

The subject of the book is the radical debate over and consequences of the decision of anarchist leaders to take part in the reconstruction of the republican government during the course of the civil war, a decision which was ongoing. Such a decision will of course, bemuse both anarchist and non-readers alike. Isn't participation in government contrary to the whole point of anarchism? As I said, my knowledge of the Spanish civil war was practically non-existent; I personally had no idea this had even taken place. But the political import of this decision was and is vital not merely for the counter-revolutionary outcome of the war but the ongoing left-wing debate over collaboration with government institutions.

Revolution and the State is not the first time that these questions have been discussed in connection with the Spanish experience. Vernon Richards' Lessons of the Spanish Revolution (1953), which I discovered in Evan's book, covered many of the same themes long ago, and is a more useful text for anarchists looking for clarity on the polemical terrain.

Evan's book is not designed for readers who want to understand the general arc of the Spanish civil war. This knowledge is assumed. It has little to say about what civil war experiments in industrial or agricultural self-management looked like, and contains few comments on Stalinist connivances — the traditional questions of interest for anarchists. (Evidence of anti-democratic connivances of anarchist leadership within their own organizations aplenty, however). Being a specialist work of history, however, references to such discussions are conveniently and heavily footnoted below.

It is rather and unquestionably a specialist work of history, written primarily for fellow specialist historians, and secondly I suspect for other anarchists on the question of government collaboration. It is the latter aim which forms a kind of "ideological subtext" of Evan's discussion of pro-collaborationist anarchist individuals and groups in the civil war — and surely motivates Evan's entire enterprise and his copious reading of minutes and articles of anti-collaborationist anarchists — and I think the author successfully shows that the leaders of anarchist organizations bear substantial responsibility for counterrevolutionary shift of the civil war: they took part it in the counterrevolution. There were many moments in the book where upon reading the decisions of anarchist leadership during the war I thought to myself "What a fucking catastrophe..."

As explained in the blurb of the book, the argument developed in response to other specialist historians is that there existed throughout a coherent and clearly articulated opposition within the anarchist movement to the collaborationism of its own leadership. This point would seem unsurprising to anarchists, as that position — especially the idea that collaboration will corrupt even the most committed radical — was hammered out in the larger European (and international) anarchist movement well before.*

But the actual extent and breadth of anarchist collaboration depicted in Evan's book will surely surprise many anarchists. Classical anarchists writers too underestimated the possibility:

"One can in no way reproach the libertarians for seeking to get rid of a government only to put themselves in its place. 'Get out of the way to make room for me!' are words that they would be appalled to speak." Réclus, "Anarchy" [1894], in Anarchy, Geography, Modernity: Selected Writings of Elisée Reclus (2013), p. 122 (available on webarchive)

There are in fact plenty such "appalling" behaviours committed by avowed anarchists in Spain, copiously relayed in Revolution and State, and this would to me strongly reaffirm the corruption of power thesis. But Evan's work also points to the need strengthen core anarchist principles. As the above-quoted author continues:

"This is what we constantly repeat to our brothers — including our fraternal enemies, the state socialists — "Watch out for your leaders and representatives!” Like you they are surely motivated by the best of intentions. They fervently desire the abolition of private property and of the tyrannical state. But new relationships and conditions change them little by little. Their morality changes along with their self-interest, and, thinking themselves eternally loyal to the cause and to their constituents, they inevitably become disloyal. As repositories of power they will also make use of the instruments of power: the army, moralizers, judges, police, and informers." ibid.

There is much work still to be done within the anarchist movement. It is many ways a more profound and more tragic revendication of that thesis than even the Russian revolution,** as in the Spanish case perhaps the anarchists had multiple opportunities to carry the revolution forward. They were all squandered.

I would just like to conclude with why I found this book eye-opening from a political point of view:
1. It provides a much more nuanced picture of the relationship between Marxist and anarchist organizations that I held previously.
I was not previously aware of the range of left-wing organizations in revolutionary Spain. My general conception was that vaguely constituted Marxist and especially Stalinist organizations in some way sabotaged anarchist attempts at self-management in the countryside. This certainly occurred. But in practice, the activities of members of some Marxist organizations – notably the POUM — working alongside members of anarchist organizations, put the leadership of the latter to shame. Some Marxists were more anarchists the anarchists themselves.
2. It provides further evidence of the central anarchist contention that state collaboration suffocates the revolutionary impulse of a movement, this time with the anarchist movement itself as the tragic protagonist.



* Zoe Baker's recent history of the anarchist movement shows this conclusively (https://theanarchistlibrary.org/libra...), yet the author even excludes earlier anarchist authors from their analysis. They are also unaware that the libertarian wing of the American abolitionist movement had, certainly prior to the civil war, developed a coherent critique of collaboration in the state apparatus as a way to achieve the abolishment of slavery (c.f. Aileen Kraditor, Means and ends in American abolitionism (1970).
** Like in Spain, Russian anarchist and narodniks themselves provided a practical and theoretical alternative to the path chosen by the Bolsheviks, e.g.

". . . Nothing reveals the diametric opposition between a 'seizure of power' and a 'social revolution' better than the current disputes among the Bolsheviks themselves and popular opposition to the government of 'People’s Commissars.' This confirms Anarchism’s fundamental principle: the
action of parties is no substitute for a social revolution. The Bolsheviks—particularly Lenin and Trotsky—must either admit this truth, abandon the road to power, and follow the road to stateless communism, or fall back to conciliation (that is, reverse the revolution’s course). A seizure of
political power will inevitably strangle the revolution." Editorial in Labor’s Voice (Golos truda), a Petrograd Anarchist newspaper on November 1, 1917, quoted in Hickey (ed.), Competing Voices from the Russian Revolution (2011), p. 489.

One wonders how much of this perpective was destroyed in the repression which quickly ensued...

[Gautam Bhatia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve had this book on my shelves for many years, and what finally made me pull it down, dust it off, and get to reading it was a brilliant anarchist walking tour of Barcelona that I went on earlier this July, when I was in the city (https://kevinflanagan.ie/portfolio/gu...).

Revolution and the State is a book about the Spanish Civil War, but from a very specific perspective: it covers the debates, disputes, dissensions, direct actions, and schisms within the anarchist movement, on the question of whether - and to what extent - the anarchists ought to have joined the republican government, as part of a broad, popular front fighting against Franco’s fascist coup attempt.

This debate split the anarchist movement into two, as one side - primarily consisting of the leaders of unions such as the CNT - argued for the necessity of a united front against Franco, even if it means participating in a project of “state reconstruction.” In a way, these anarchists argued for a division of the economic and the political spheres, where the economic could be confronted after the political (and military) victory over Franco. On the other hand, for many rank and file anarchists (especially in Barcelona), the revolution (which sought to dismantle the capitalist State) was indistinguishable from the anti-fascist fight; these anarchists warned that even if Franco was militarily defeated, a reconstructed republican State would amount to little other than a new set of oppressors replacing the previous set.

Evans skilfully takes us through these debates without ever getting bogged down in theoretical minutae, interspersing them with the actual action (primarily in Barcelona) which, for a time, saw something close to the realisation of the anarchist dream, where all manners of hierarchies (including gender hierarchies) were temporarily broken down (these are some of the book’s most inspiring sections). In the event, as we know, this would all end in tragedy, as Franco’s army would prevail, and over much bloodshed, Spain would suffer a fascist dictatorship for the next four decades; one would think that this would make the internal debates within the anarchists moot, but one of the signal achievements of this book is how it shows us that in every conceivable way, these debates matter to the world as it exists today.

[Pierce Nienhaus · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very honest, critical review of the anarchist press at the time, CNT and FAI assembly minutes and other sources, assessing the CNT superior committees’ policy of state collaboration, the bureaucratization of the CNT and the rest of autonomous radical anarchist action in the face of betrayal of their movement by the CNT leaders and their committees.
It speaks carefully about how civil war circumstances challenged anarchist and federalist practices and ultimately served to defeat their own revolutionary fervor and spirit in both the socialization campaign and the anti-fascist war effort.
Evans affords insight and draws parallels to the Russian Civil War, but the reader will mostly be left to contemplate how future movements can preclude bureaucracy, militarism, state collaboration and other betrayals for the sake of circumstances, and how to maintain adherence to the anarchist ideology.

[Doug Brunell · Rating 2 out of 5]

As much as I love the subject and think Evans proved his point, I just could not get into this book. There were so many names and acronyms floating around that it became distracting at best. For anarchist and Spanish Civil War completists only on this one.

[Kevin Doyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brilliant work that adds greatly to our knowledge of one of the most extensive and radical revolutions - the Spanish Revolution (1936-37).

[Brackets_28]

anarchy and that!!!!!

[Mason Wyss · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was, for me, pretty difficult to get through at times. It relies heavily on quotations from the anarchist press during the period and there are far too many names for me to keep track of. The text laboriously describes the knot that anarchists found themselves in when a revolutionary situation arose in which liberals and Communists sought to curb the revolution and also fascist forces were constantly approaching to destroy them all. The hardest tangle in the knot is the dilemma between state reconstruction being necessary in order to militarize nationally instead of in militias and adequately defend against the fascists on the front but that this would mean increased repression of workers in the rear.

However difficult to read, in the conclusion it comes together nicely to begin to pull at one of those strings. Evans summarizes the events and writings of the period to argue that state reconstruction doomed the revolution, regardless of what one thinks of its necessity in the moment. That state reconstruction destroyed the revolution is almost certainly true, but it remains unclear after reading the book how much this was necessarily tied to militarization and if the war was winnable by either militias or a national military given different decisions. That is not the point of the book, though. Evans wants to focus on how the perceptions, inconsistent ideologies, and bureaucratization of anarchist leaders led to state reconstruction, and therefore the revolution’s betrayal.

The facts of the matter are important, but I can understand how this book might have swelled if it tried to analyze them and how it would probably take another decade of research just to understand the military situation. All in all, it’s pretty good and worth reading because the dilemma of state reconstruction during civil war will be relevant in all future revolutions as they necessarily produce civil wars.