Is Spain different?
Subtitle: a comparative look at the 19th and 20th centuries
By: edited by Nigel Townson
Publisher: Sussex Academic Press; Liverpool University Press; imusti
Published: 2015
Place of publication: Brighton
Language: eng
Number of pages: 189
ISBN-13: 9781845193591
Subjects: History; Spanish National characteristics; Politics and government; Social change
Description: "The slogan that launched the tourist industry in the 1960s, Spain is Different?, has come to haunt historians. Much effort and energy have been expended ever since in endeavouring to show that Spain has not been different, but normal. Still, many of the defining features of the country's past--the civil wars, the weak liberalism, the Franco dictatorship--are taken as evidence of its distinctiveness. A related problem is that few historians have actually placed Spain's trajectory over the last two centuries within a truly comparative context. This book does so by tackling a number of key themes in modern Spanish history: liberalism, nationalism, anticlericalism, the Second Republic, the Franco dictatorship and the transition to democracy. Is Spain Different? thereby offers a fresh and stimulating perspective on Spain's recent past that is not only of interest to students of Spanish and European history alike, but also sheds new light on the current political debates regarding Spain's place in the world"--From publihser's website.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Introduction: Spain : a land apart? / Nigel Townson; title: The debate over the nation / José Álvarez Junco; title: The civil wars of the 19th century : an exceptional path to modernization? / María Cruz Romeo Mateo; title: Anticlercialism and secularization : a European exception? / Nigel Townson; title: The Second Republic : a noble failure? / Edward Malefakis; title: The Spanish Civil War : a unique conflict? / Michael Seidman; title: "Spain is different"? : the Franco dictatorship / Nigel Townson; title: The transition : a global model? / Pamela Radcliff.