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autarky in Spain

A dictionary of Spanish history and culture

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With the Spanish economy in tatters at the end the Civil War, Franco’s solution was the withdrawal from the world market, the creation of import substitution industries and the promotion of state intervention to supplement the weakness of private capital. The economy was to be powered by the brutal exploitation of a tamed workforce. The system of autarky was modelled on the economies of European fascism and Nazism, which of course the regime greatly admired. This was an expression of the extreme form of nationalism of the regime, and a n explicit rejection of liberalism.

Whatever the case, the plan was an utter failure and helped to under-develop Spain for twenty years. The attempt make Spain self-sufficient in wheat production was a disaster, and rife with corruption, and its populace barely survived on imports from the Peron regime of Argentina from 1946 to the early 1950s.

Franco himself was remarkably ignorant of simple economics, and at times placed his faith in hare-brained schemes which he believed would save Spain. On one occasion, a Czech engineer and con-man managed to convince the general that with the waters of the River Jarama, certain herbs and secret powders, Spain could get all the petroleum it needed. On another, he was convinced of a plan to solve the country’s terrible hunger of the 1940s by feeding the population with dolphin sandwiches. It is unsure where Spain would get enough dolphin meat to feed 30 million people. (La Memoria Insumisa, Nicolás Sartorius y Javier Alfaya, 1999). Indeed in the background of this economic quackery some 200,000 people died of hunger in the early years of Francoism, a period known as Los Años de Hambre.

On the verge of bankruptcy, a combination of pressure from the USA, the IMF and technocrats from Opus Dei managed to “convince” the regime to adopt a free market economy in 1959 in what amounted to a mini coup d’etat which removed the old guard in charge of the economy, despite the opposition of Franco. This economic liberalisation was not, however, accompanied by political reforms and repression continued unabated, though these very reforms would lead to socio-economic changes in Spanish society which would make the regime’s continuation 16 years later untenable. This was of course precisely what Franco feared.

Paul Preston on the impact of autarky

Franco’s policy of economic selfsufficiency  or  autarky  contributed  to  the  repression  and  humiliation  of  the  defeated  and  to  capital accumulation although its rigidity also delayed eventual growth.  Considering himself to be an economist of  genius,  Franco  embraced  autarky  oblivious  to  the  fact  that  Spain  lacked  the  technological  and industrial base which had made  such a policy feasible for the Third Reich.   Autarky in Spain brought economic and social disaster – the shortages consequent upon closing Spain to the world provoked the emergence of a black market, the estraperlo, which exacerbated the differences between rich and poor.
Inevitably,  it  was  those  close  to  the  regime  who  benefited  and  the  defeated  who  suffered.   State interventionism in  every  aspect  of the  planting,  harvesting,  processing,  sale  and  distribution  of wheat was so corrupt that it made fortunes for officials while creating shortages that saw food prices  rocket. Access  to  work  and  ration  cards  meant  getting  identity  cards  and  safe  conducts  which  involved certificates of ‘good behaviour’ from local Falangist officials and parish priests.  Inevitably, the defeated suffered  materially  and  were  further  humiliated  while  the  sense  of  well  being  of  the  victors  was enhanced

Wikipedia defines autarky as:

autarky is an economy that is self-sufficient and does not take part in international trade, or severely limits trade with the outside world. Likewise it refers to an ecosystem not affected by influences from the outside, which relies entirely on its own resources. In the economic meaning, it is also referred to as a closed economy.

autarky in spain, spanish autarky, what is autarky, autarky in history, como se dice en inglés, how do you say autarky in Spanish?, autarky and Franco?

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    • Briefly

      Words and concepts in Spanish that don't exist in English
      Here are a few words and expressions in Castilian Spanish that don’t exist in English, and perhaps could be borrowed. Foreigners speakers of Spanish in Spain certainly use so of them with alarming frequency with other English speakers in Spain, as do our Spanish friends and spouses. The list does not include food terms (covered elsewhere on iberianature) and most cultural terms (architectural, historical, bullfighting terms, etc) In some cases, a simple word doesn’t exist in English (tuerto – one-eyed man) while in others the whole concept doesn’t exist (consuegros – a child’s spouse’s parents) More to come

      • compaginar: slot together” or “integrate timetables
      • consuegros – child’s spouse’s parents
      • El de la verguenza – that last tasty morsel (e.g. a biscuit) which everybody feels embarrassed about taking. I suggest from now on calling this the shameful one in English, as members of my family now do.
      • enchufe – beyond the simple dictionary definition of plug, enchufe means a connection, knowing somebody, being well connected, knowing the right people, that sort of thing when you want something done. So, if you have an enchufe, it might very well make it easier to get a job.
      • estrenar – to try out something for the first time, often in the sense of wear estrenar zapatos. A football team might also estrenar un nuevo estadio An estreno is the first night of a film.
      • gestor – a kind of financial administrator, not quite an accountant, not quite a solicitor.
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      • homologar – compare and equate standards of
      • lampiño – without a beard or with little hair. Note, also inberbe, a beardless youth.
      • lustro – five years
      • manco – one-armed man
      • mimoso – as an adjective somebody who loves to be pampered/made a fuss of. Also a noun.
      • monte – in the sense of wild land (as opposed to just hill) monte does not exist in British English but equates to the Southern African English bush and the Australian outback. Echarse al monte means to take to the hills, and by extension, los del monte, the maquis fighters.
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      • recogerse – to go indoors in the evening
      • resol – Reflected sunshine off the wall, floor, etc. that some Spaniards try to avoid in summer… as in, “We can’t sit at that table” (at a terrazza) “it’s got a parasol, but there’s a lot of resol” (Michael)
      • sobremesa – the time spent after lunch sitting round the table and talking
      • tertulia – a learned discussion, often as a regular event in a bar
      • tuerto – one-eyed man
      • zurdo – left-hander
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      Mojácar used to be a town of around 6,000 people in as far back as 1870. It maintained this number of inhabitants until round about 1900 when, slowly, numbers began to fall, speeding its descent in the 1930s. Through the various local vicissitudes of the drop in the local water-table, the end of the de-forestation, a peculiar plague of locusts in 1901, the end of the mines in the 1920s and the troubled times of the Civil War, the area in general eventually became depopulated with mass emigrations to Barcelona, Algeria, Germany and even Argentina, and Mojácar itself began its long descent into what was, by 1960, a moribund village of just 600 souls. Read complete post on Spanish Shilling

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