From the Municipio Libre to the 1936 communalist revolution. A history of a libertarian political project in Spain

While both municipalism and communalism have recently attracted growing interest and a number of studies, the rich history of these concepts in Spain remains relatively underexplored. This article aims to re-evaluate the role of communal self-government in republican and later anarchist federalist political projects, and to highlight the existence of a specifically communalist tradition in Spain. From the first utopian formulations of municipalism in nineteenth-century republican and libertarian circles, to the anarchists of the CNT theorizing of “libertarian communism” in the twentieth century, and through the new communal democracy of assemblies that emerged during the 1936 Social Revolution, the Spanish communalist political project envisioned the joint abolition of the nation-state and capitalism in favor of egalitarian, collective control over public affairs. Returning to the sources of libertarian theory and practice surrounding the Municipio Libre (free municipality) can thus help to question contemporary proposals of communalism. The controversies that animated the federalist movements in Spain for more than a century remain a valuable resource for thinking through contemporary issues such as the creation of specifically communal popular assemblies, the self-management of public services, and the integration of economic and political democracy. Our contribution aims to show that, alongside the Paris Commune, the unfulfilled history of the Municipio Libre in Spain can also serve as a source of inspiration for the communalist utopias of today and tomorrow.