Mujeres Libres Radical Suncatcher

Free Women

Mujeres Libres (Free Women) was an anarchist women's organisation in Spain during 1936-39.

The Revolution and Civil War saw women play a crucial and often under-recognised role in both revolutionary struggles and the fight against fascism. Their participation was marked by radical activism, challenges to traditional gender roles, and efforts to achieve social and political emancipation.

Prior to 1936, compared to other European democracies, Spain could be described as backward, misogynistic and conservative. Even within the left, trade unions, socialists, anarchists, and communists, women were expected by many of the men to remain at home or support the men.

Mujeres Libres sought emancipation through direct action, education, and organised labour. They rejected liberal feminism, seeing women’s liberation as inseparable from class struggle.

As well as organising with the workers' militias and providing military training, Mujeres Libres established schools, workshops, and literacy programs to empower working-class women. The design in the poster is taken from a graphic in the newspaper they published of the same name.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

In July 1936, Franco launched an attempted military coup against the Popular Front Government, backed mainly by the aristocracy, large landowners, industrialists, bankers, sections of the army and the Catholic Church. Franco sought to overthrow the Government and establish a Fascist dictatorship.

The coup was met with fierce resistance from organised workers, particularly members of the anarcho-syndicalist trade union: the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) and other trade unions and political parties such as the socialist Unión General de Trabajadores (UGT) and the Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista (POUM).

Across much of Spain - especially in industrial strongholds like Barcelona and the rest of Catalonia, and anarchist-dominated regions such as Aragón, Asturias and Andalusia – the working class and peasants formed armed militias, seized armouries, alongside the Cuerpo de Seguridad y Asalto (Assault Guards), and successfully halted the Fascist uprising.

Factories were seized and placed under worker control and land was confiscated and collectivised. The CNT, which had one and a half million members, played a central role in organising these efforts, helping local people to establish decentralised councils and militias to defend the Revolution.

Propaganda posters became a vital tool in the struggle – in the context of relatively low literacy levels – used by anarchist, socialist, and communist groups to rally support, educate the masses, and inspire resistance. Around 1,750 different posters were designed, printed and distributed during the conflict.

By 1 April 1939, the Republican Government was beaten by the Fascists who had superior equipment and whole armies provided by Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, and mercenaries from North Africa.

At the end of the war, half a million Republicans escaped to France where many of them were held in concentration camp conditions on beaches and either forced to return to Spain to face possible execution or join forced labour units.

Many of the Spanish veterans managed to rejoin the fight against the Nazis through the French Resistance (some ‘Maquis’ bands in southwest France were made up entirely of Spanish veterans) – and were at the head of the battle to liberate Paris as a group known as La Nueve (9th Company of the French Régiment de Marche du Tchad). The 160 men of La Nueve, who were under French command, included 146 Spaniards. They entered Paris with military vehicles bearing the names of battles of the Spanish Civil War, such as Ebro, Guadalajara, Brunete, Teruel, and Guernica.

Some anti-fascists continued to fight against Franco, underground and living in the mountains in Spain for many years after the war.

The legacy of resistance and the powerful imagery of the Spanish Revolution and Civil War endured as a testament to the power of organised labour and revolutionary ideals. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------

The CNT was founded in November 1910, with a membership of 26,000 at a conference of workers societies in Barcelona and had its first national congress the following year. A general strike was immediately called in Barcelona and the CNT was declared illegal.

By 1919 there were 700,000 members. As the CNT grew, employers became more worried and hired armed thugs (pistoleros) to intimidate or assassinate union members.

The CNT took part in revolutionary strikes and uprisings throughout the period leading up to the 1936 Revolution and Civil War, including uprisings in Catalonia, Asturias and Andalusia. By 1937 the CNT had 1.5 million members.

From the start of the attempted coup in 1936, the CNT had a decisive role in events - pushing revolutionary land and factory collectivisation, but by May 1937 the Republican Government, under the influence of the Stalinist Spanish Communist Party (PCE), was reversing its achievements, suppressing the collectives, forcing militias to join the regular army or be disbanded and arresting militants.