Spanish and Greek Civil Wars

Paper Summary:

The Spanish Civil War developed during the 1930s as a conflict between major social and economic interests, specifically the landowning class (supported by the military) and the peasant and working class (that was ill-treated by both). The paper shows that in Greece, by contrast, the tensions were not as deep and the sides might have worked out their problems, had not a succession of outside interventions taken place. Both conflicts were protracted and highly damaging to the economies of each country and to human lives. The paper explains that both conflicts also produced a long-standing, right-wing government that repressed opposition and prevented democratic reforms for many years. The political consequences continue to some extent to this day.

From the Paper:

"The landowners benefited from easy profits from farming and had control of huge estates, a result of the sale of Church land and communal lands by the state in the nineteenth century. One result was the creation of a huge mass of landless workers living on low wages and facing a political system controlled by the landowners. The only way peasants could see change would be through land reform. Another source of instability was the economic depression of the 1930s. It was during this period, as tensions increased between workers and landowners, that there was an increase in left-wing union membership, with the Socialist Party in particular gaining members."

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