Editing Spanish Revolution of 1936 (section)

== History ==
[[File: Milicianas CNT-FAI.png | thumb|300px | Anarchist [[Milicianas in the Spanish Civil War|milicianas]] during the revolution in 1936.]]

On 17 July 1936, the [[Spanish Coup of July 1936]] began. On 18 July, the ongoing military uprising led to a collapse of the republican state (four governments succeeded each other in a single day) and to the coercive structures of the state being dissolved or paralyzed in the places where the [[Spanish military conspiracy of 1936|coup plotters]] did not seize power. By then, the [[National Labor Confederation|CNT]] had approximately 1,577,000 members and the [[General Union of Workers (Spain)|UGT]] had 1,447,000 members. On 19 July, the uprising reached Catalonia, where the workers took up arms, stormed the barracks, erected barricades, and eventually defeated the military.

=== First phase of the revolution (July–September 1936): ''The summer of anarchy'' ===
The CNT and UGT unions called a [[general strike]] from 19 to 23 July, in response to both the military uprising and the apparent apathy of the state towards it. Despite the fact that there were specific records in previous days of the distribution of weapons among civilian sectors, it was during the General Strike when groups of trade unionists, linked to the convening unions and smaller groups, assaulted many of the weapons depots of the state forces, independently of whether they were in revolt against the government or not.

Already in these first weeks, two groups were established within the [[anarcho-syndicalist]] revolutionary sectors: the radical group, fundamentally linked to the [[Iberian Anarchist Federation]] (FAI) and through it to the CNT, which understood the phenomenon in which it participated as a traditional revolution; and the [[libertarian possibilism|possibilist]] group, made up of members of a more moderate sector of the CNT, which expressed the convenience of participating in a broader front, later called the Popular Antifascist Front (FPA), the result of adding the unions to the electoral coalition [[Popular Front (Spain)|Popular Front]].

[[File: CNT Emblem.svg | thumb | Emblem of the [[National Confederation of Labor|CNT]].]]

At the same time, administrative structures were formed outside the state, most of a local or regional character, but exceeding such limits in specific cases; some of the most important were:
* [[Central Committee of Antifascist Militias of Catalonia]]
* [[Popular Executive Committee of Valencia]]
* [[Regional Defense Council of Aragon]]
* [[Malaga Public Health Committee]]
* [[Gijón War Committee]]
* [[Popular Committee of Sama de Langreo]]
* [[Santander Defense Council]]
* [[Madrid Defense Council]]
* Council of the [[Cerdanya]]
* Antifascist Committee of [[Ibiza]]

In a few days, the fronts of the [[Spanish Civil War]] were established, one of the main fronts, in the context of the revolution, being that of [[Aragon front|Aragon]]. On 24 July 1936, the first voluntary militia left [[Barcelona]] in the direction of [[Aragon]]. It was the [[Durruti Column]], of around 3,000 people, mostly workers coordinated by [[Buenaventura Durruti]], who first implemented [[Anarcho-communism|libertarian communism]] in the municipalities through which they passed. In addition, other popular military structures were formed, such as the [[Iron Column]] and the [[Red and Black Column]], the latter also departing for Aragon. All this movement gave rise to an extraordinary concentration of anarchists in parts not taken by the rebel military. The arrival, on the one hand, of the thousands of anarchist militiamen from [[Catalonia]] and [[Valencian Community|Valencia]], and the existence, on the other, of a large rural [[Aragonese people|Aragonese]] popular base allowed for the progressive development of the largest collectivist experiment of the revolution.

During this first phase most of the Spanish economy was brought under the control of workers organized by the unions; mainly in [[anarchism|anarchist]] areas such as Catalonia. This phenomenon extended to 75% of the total [[industrial sector]], but in the areas of [[PSOE|socialist]] influence, the rate wasn't so high. The factories were organized by workers' committees, the agricultural areas became [[Collective farming|collectivized]] and functioned as [[libertarian]] [[Intentional community|communes]]. Even places such as [[hotels]], [[hairdressers]], means of transport, and [[restaurants]] were collectivized and managed by their own workers.{{sfn|Andreassi|1996|p=86}}

The British author [[George Orwell]], best known for his [[anti-authoritarian]] works ''[[Animal Farm]]'' and ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]'', was a soldier in the [[Lenin Division]] of the CNT-allied {{lang|es|[[POUM|Partido Obrero Unificación Marxista]]}} (POUM; Workers' Party of Marxist Unification). Orwell meticulously documented his first-hand observations of the civil war, and expressed admiration for the social revolution in his book ''[[Homage to Catalonia]]''.{{sfn|Orwell|1938|pp=4–6}}

{{blockquote|I had dropped more or less by chance into the only community of any size in Western Europe where political consciousness and disbelief in capitalism were more normal than their opposites. Up here in Aragon one was among tens of thousands of people, mainly though not entirely of working-class origin, all living at the same level and mingling on terms of equality. In theory it was perfect equality, and even in practice it was not far from it. There is a sense in which it would be true to say that one was experiencing a foretaste of Socialism, by which I mean that the prevailing mental atmosphere was that of Socialism. Many of the normal motives of civilized life – snobbishness, money-grubbing, fear of the boss, etc. – had simply ceased to exist. The ordinary class-division of society had disappeared to an extent that is almost unthinkable in the money-tainted air of England; there was no one there except the peasants and ourselves, and no one owned anyone else as his master.|George Orwell{{sfn|Orwell|1938|p=51}}}}

The communes were operated according to the basic principle of "[[From each according to their ability, to each according to their need]]." In some places, money was eliminated, replaced by vouchers. Under this system, the cost of goods was often little more than a quarter of the previous cost. During the revolution, 70% of rural areas were expropriated in Catalonia, about 70% in Eastern Aragon, 91% in the republican sector of [[Extremadura]], 58% in [[Castilla-La Mancha]], 53% in republican [[Andalusia]], 25% in [[Madrid]], 24% in [[Murcia]],{{sfn|González Martínez|1999|p=93}} and 13% in the [[Valencian Community]]. 54% of the expropriated area of republican Spain was collectivized, according to IRA data.{{sfn|Payne|1970|pp=241–267}} The [[Provinces of Spain|provinces]] where rural communes became most important were those of [[Ciudad Real]] – where 1,002,615 hectares (98.9% of cultivated lands) were collectivized in 1938 – and [[Province of Jaén (Spain)|Jaén]] – where 685,000 hectares (76.3% of cultivated lands) were collectivized, leaving the rest of the republican provinces far behind.{{sfn|Garrido González|2006|p=6}} Many communes held out until the end of the war. Anarchist communes produced at a more efficient rate than before being collectivized,{{sfn|Sewell|2007|p=141}} with productivity increasing by 20%.{{sfn|Kelsey|1991}} The newly liberated zones worked on entirely libertarian principles; decisions were made through councils of ordinary citizens without any bureaucracy.

In Aragon, where libertarian communism was proclaimed as the columns of libertarian militias passed, approximately 450 rural communes were formed, practically all of them in the hands of the CNT, with around 20 led by the UGT.

In the Valencian area, 353 communes were established, 264 led by the CNT, 69 by the UGT and 20 with mixed CNT-UGT leadership. One of its main developments was the [[Unified Levantine Council for Agricultural Export]] ({{langx|ca|Consell Llevantí Unificat d'Exportació Agrícola}}, CLUEA) and the total socialization of the industries and services of the city of [[Alcoy]].{{sfn|Quilis Tauriz|1992|pp=83–85}}

In Catalan industry, the CNT workers' unions took over numerous textile factories, organized the trams and buses in Barcelona, established collective enterprises in fishing, in the footwear industry, and even in small retail stores and public shows. In a few days, 70% of industrial and commercial companies in Catalonia – in which, by itself, two-thirds of the industry of Spain was concentrated – had become the property of the workers.

[[File:Lucía Sánchez Saornil & Emma Goldman.jpg|thumb|[[Lucía Sánchez Saornil]] and [[Emma Goldman]].]]

Alongside the economic revolution, there was a spirit of cultural and moral revolution: the libertarian athenaeums became meeting places and authentic cultural centers of theoretical education, in which were organized literacy classes, talks on health, excursions to the countryside, public access libraries, theatrical performances, political gatherings, sewing workshops, etc. Numerous rationalist schools were founded, which expanded the existing offers of athenaeums and union centers and in which the educational postulates of [[Francesc Ferrer i Guardia]], [[Ricardo Mella]], [[Leo Tolstoy]], and [[Maria Montessori]] were carried out. Similarly, in the social field, some traditions were considered as types of oppression, and bourgeois morality was also seen as dehumanizing and individualistic. Anarchist principles defended the conscious freedom of the individual and the natural duty of solidarity among human beings as an innate tool for the progress of societies. Thus, for example, during the revolution, women achieved the [[Abortion-rights movements|right to abortion]] in Catalonia, the idea of consensual [[free love]] became popular, and there was a rise in [[naturism]].

However, the social effects of the revolution were less drastic than the economic ones; while there were some social changes in larger urban areas (Barcelona emphasised a "proletarian style" and Catalonia set up inexpensive abortion facilities), the attitudes of the lower classes remained fairly conservative and there was comparatively little emulation of Russian-style "revolutionary morality".{{sfn|Payne|1973|loc=Vol. 2 Ch. 26}}

Public order also varied substantially, getting by without the classic forces of public order (the [[National Police Corps|police]], [[Civil Guard (Spain)|Civil Guard]], [[Judiciary of Spain|courts]], and the [[Spanish Army|army]]), which were supplanted by the [[Control Patrols]] made up of volunteers, the [[Confederal militias|popular militias]], and the [[neighborhood assemblies]] that were intended to resolve problems that arose. The doors of many prisons were opened, freeing the prisoners, among whom there were many politicians but also common criminals, some prisons being demolished.

The [[anti-fascist]] [[Carlo Rosselli]], who before Mussolini's accession to power was professor of economics in the [[University of Genoa]], put his judgment in the following words:

{{quotation|In three months Catalonia has been able to set up a new social order on the ruins of an ancient system. This is chiefly due to the Anarchists, who have revealed a quite remarkable sense of proportion, realistic understanding, and organising ability&nbsp;... all the revolutionary forces of Catalonia have united in a program of Syndicalist-Socialist character: socialisation of large industry; recognition of the small proprietor, workers' control&nbsp;... [[Anarcho-Syndicalism]], hitherto so despised, has revealed itself as a great constructive force&nbsp;... I am not an Anarchist, but I regard it as my duty to express here my opinion of the Anarchists of Catalonia, who have all too often been represented to the world as a destructive, if not criminal, element. I was with them at the front, in the trenches, and I have learnt to admire them. The Catalan Anarchists belong to the advance guard of the coming revolution. A new world was born with them, and it is a joy to serve that world.|Carlo Rosselli{{sfn|Rocker|2004|pp=66–67}}}}

But despite the [[de facto]] decomposition of state power, on 2 August the government took one of its first measures to regain control against the revolution, with the creation of the ''Volunteer Battalions'', the embryo of the [[Spanish Republican Army]]. Overwhelmed by the revolutionary phenomenon, it also promulgated some symbolic decrees:

* 18 July: Decree declaring the military who participated in the coup to be unemployed.
* 25 July: Decree declaring government employees who sympathize with the coup plotters to be unemployed.
* 25 July: Decree of intervention in industry.
* 3 August: Decree of seizure of the railways.
* 3 August: Decree of intervention in the sale prices of food and clothing.
* 8 August: Decree of seizure of rustic properties.
* 13 August: Decree of closure of religious institutions.
* 19 August ([[Revolutionary Catalonia|Catalonia]]): Decree of socialization and unionization of the economy.
* 23 August: Decree of the creation of the People's Courts.

The first tensions also arose between the strategy of the anarchists and the policy of the [[Communist Party of Spain]] and its extension in Catalonia, the [[PSUC]]; and on 6 August members of the PSUC left the Catalan autonomous government because of anarcho-syndicalist pressures.

=== Second phase of the Revolution (September–November 1936): ''First Government of Victory'' ===
[[File: Coat of arms of the Regional Council of Defense of Aragon.svg | thumb | Coat of Arms of the [[Regional Defense Council of Aragon]].]]
Both in this stage and in the previous one, the state was usually limited to legislating in accordance with the {{lang|fr|faits accomplis}} of the revolution. However, due to the need for military measures against the rebellious military, from October–November 1936 the unions began to cede control of the columns to the state for the [[Defense of Madrid]], which was directed by a semi-independent body – the [[Madrid Defense Council]], in which all the Popular Front parties were represented, in addition to the anarchists. The beginning of all this progressively greater agreement and rapprochement between the Popular Front parties and the unions was reflected in the formation of Largo Caballero's "first Government of Victory" on 4 September.

Among the measures aimed at legitimizing the activity of the revolutionaries were:
* 17 September: Decree of seizure of convicts' estates by the People's Courts.
* 10 October: Decree creating Emergency Juries.
* 22 October (Catalonia): Decree on collectivisations and workers' control.

Despite this apparent concession to the revolutionaries, the government did not actively intervene in the development of the revolution, as its main objective was to promote and strengthen the army as the foundation stone of the centralized state. In addition to the repeated attempts at the dissolution of the popular war and defense committees, they decreed:

* 16 September: Decree taking government control of the Rearguard Vigilance Militia.
* 28 September: Decree for the voluntary transfer of heads and officers of the popular militias to the Army.
* 29 September: Decree of application of the Code of Military Justice to popular militias.

As the war dragged on, the spirit of the first days of the revolution lessened and friction between the diverse members of the Popular Front began, in part due to the policies of the Communist Party of Spain (PCE), which were established by the foreign ministry of the [[Stalinist]] [[Soviet Union]],<ref>{{cite news |first=Lluís |last=Perarnau |title=España traicionada Stalin y la Guerra Civil |language=es |trans-title=Spain betrayed Stalin and the Civil War |publisher=Fundación Federico Engels |url=http://www.fundacionfedericoengels.org/index.php/marxismo-hoy/no11-antonio-gramsci-y-la-revolucion-italiana/153-espana-traicionada-stalin-y-la-guerra-civil |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160310224825/http://www.fundacionfedericoengels.org/index.php/marxismo-hoy/no11-antonio-gramsci-y-la-revolucion-italiana/153-espana-traicionada-stalin-y-la-guerra-civil |archive-date=2016-03-10}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |first=Juan |last=Manuel Vera |title=Estalinismo y antiestalinismo en España |trans-title=Stalinism and anti-Stalinism in Spain |date=1999-11-25 |publisher=Fundación Andreu Nin |url=http://www.fundanin.org/vera1.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110929102431/http://www.fundanin.org/vera1.htm |archive-date=2011-09-29 |language=es}}</ref> the largest source of [[foreign aid]] to the republic.

The PCE defended the idea that the ongoing Civil War made it necessary to postpone the ongoing social revolution until the [[Republican faction (Spanish Civil War)|republicans]] won the war. The PCE advocated not to antagonize the middle classes, the grassroots of the republican parties, which could be harmed by the revolution and side with the enemy. In the Popular Front government, there were parties such as the [[Izquierda Republicana|Republican Left]], [[Republican Union (Spain, 1934)|Republican Union]], and the [[Republican Left of Catalonia]], supported by the votes and interests of the middle class (civil servants, liberal professionals, small merchants, and landowning peasants).

The anarchists and the [[POUM]]istas ([[left communists]]) disagreed with the PCE, understanding that the war and revolution were one and the same. They believed that the war was an extension of class struggle, and that the proletariat had defeated the military precisely because of this revolutionary impulse that they had been carrying for years and not because of defending a bourgeois republic. The nationalists represented precisely the class that these revolutionaries were fighting: the rich capitalists, the landowners, the Church, the Civil Guard, and the colonial army.

The militias of the parties and groups that were against the Popular Front government soon found government aid cut off, and their ability to act reduced. Consequently, republicans slowly began to reverse the recent changes made in most areas. During this period, some revolutionary structures approved new programs that subordinated them to the government, which gave rise to the dissolution or beginning of absorption, appropriation, and intervention of the revolutionary structures by the republican state government. The situation in most Republican-held areas slowly began to revert largely to its prewar conditions.

An exception was the consolidation of the collectivist process in Aragon, where thousands of libertarian militiamen from Valencia and Catalonia arrived, and where, before the start of the Civil War, there was the most important anarcho-syndicalist labor base affiliated with the CNT in all of Spain. In the final weeks of September 1936, the assembly called in [[Bujaraloz]] by the Regional Committee of the CNT of Aragon, with delegations of the towns and confederated columns, following the directives proposed on 15 September 1936, in Madrid by the National Plenary of Regional members of the CNT, proposed to all political and union sectors the formation of Regional Defense Councils confederated with a National Defense Council that would perform the functions of the central government, and agreed to the creation of the [[Regional Defense Council of Aragon]], which celebrated its first assembly on 15 October of the same year.{{sfn|Peirats|2011|p=211}}

Despite this, on 26 September the most radical and anarchist sectors of Catalonia, dominated by the possibilists, began a policy of collaboration with the state, integrating themselves into the autonomous government of the {{lang|ca|[[Generalitat de Catalunya]]}}, which was reborn in place of the [[Central Committee of Antifascist Militias of Catalonia]], which dissolved itself on 1 October. On the other hand, on 6 October the Regional Defense Council of Aragon was legalized and regulated by decree. The proposed National Defense Council was regulated, aborting its development. Faced with this apparent tolerance, on 9 October a decree by the Generalitat outlawed all local committees in Catalonia, formally replacing them with the municipal councils of the FPA. All these concessions to the institutions were considered by some as a betrayal of the classical principles of anarchism, and received harsh criticism from colleagues.{{refn|group=lower-alpha|Federica Montseny, a well-known speaker and member of the CNT, entered the government and ended up being booed by her own colleagues at one of her rallies.{{sfn|Gallego|2008|p=367}}}}

=== Third phase of the Revolution (November 1936 – January 1937): ''Second Government of Victory'' ===
On 2 November, the [[Popular Executive Committee of Valencia]] approved a new action program that subordinated it to the policy of [[Largo Caballero]]'s republican government, which included the CNT members [[Juan García Oliver]], [[Juan López Sánchez]], [[Federica Montseny]], and [[Juan Peiró]]. During this month, the Iron Column decided to briefly take Valencia, in protest at the shortage of supplies provided by the Popular Executive Committee, subsequently leading to clashes in the streets of the city between libertarian militias and communist groups, leaving more than 30 dead.

On 14 November, the [[Durruti Column]] arrived in Madrid, after giving in to the pressure of the possibilists, who demanded collaboration with the state. On 20 November, Buenaventura Durruti died under suspicious circumstances, fighting in the battle of Madrid, where he had arrived with more than a thousand militiamen from the Front of Aragon.

On 17 December, the Moscow daily ''[[Pravda]]'' published an editorial that read: "The purge of [[Trotskyists]] and [[anarcho-syndicalists]] has already begun in Catalonia; it has been carried out with the same energy as in the Soviet Union."{{sfn|Enzensberger|1972}} The Stalinists had already begun the liquidation of any anti-fascists, collectivizations, and other revolutionary structures that did not submit to the directives of Moscow.

On 23 December, the Gijón War Committee was transformed by decree into the [[Interprovincial Council of Asturias and León]], which was regulated by the republican government and was more moderate in its policies, at the same time as it officially recognized the formation of the [[National Defense Committee]]. On 8 January 1937, the Popular Executive Committee of Valencia was dissolved.

During this stage, the government definitely controlled the anarchist popular militias, dissolving them so that they were compulsorily integrated into the [[Spanish Republican Army]], which was under the command of professional officers.

=== The end of the revolution (January 1937 – May 1937) ===
On 27 February 1937, the government banned the [[Iberian Anarchist Federation|FAI]]'s newspaper {{lang|es|Nosotros}}, thus initiating the period during which most of the publications critical of the government began to suffer censorship. The next day it prohibited the police from belonging to political parties or unions, a measure adopted by the Catalan regional government on 2 March. On 12 March, the Generalitat approved an order demanding the seizure of all weapons and explosive materials from non-militarized groups. More confrontations began between the sectors of the FPA; and on 27 March the anarchist advisers of the Catalan autonomous government resigned. During the month of March, the "militarization" of the militias was completed, transforming them into a regular army subject to its disciplinary and hierarchal regimes, against which many anarchist voices rose up.

On 17 April, the day after the ministers of the [[National Labor Confederation|CNT]] returned to the Generalitat, a force of [[Carabineros]] in [[Puigcerdá]] demanded the CNT workers' patrols hand over control of customs on the border with France. Simultaneously, the [[Civil Guard]] and [[Assault Guard]] were sent to [[Figueras]], and other towns throughout the province of [[Girona]], to remove control of the workers' organizations from the police, dissolving the autonomous Council of Cerdanya. Simultaneously, in [[Barcelona]], the Assault Guard proceeded to disarm the workers in public view, in the streets.

During May 1937, confrontations between the supporters of the revolution and those opposed to it intensified. On 13 May, after the events of the [[Barcelona May Days]], the two [[Communist]] ministers, [[Jesús Hernández Tomás]] and Vicente Uribe, proposed to the government that the National Labor Confederation (CNT) and the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification ([[POUM]]) be punished, bringing into practice repression against the latter party. On 16 May, Largo Caballero resigned, which was followed by the formation of a socialist government under [[Juan Negrín]], but without support from anarchists or revolutionaries.

Fenner Brockway, Secretary of the [[Independent Labour Party|ILP]] in England who traveled to Spain after the [[Barcelona May Days|May events in Catalonia]] (1937), expressed his impressions in the following words:

{{blockquote|"I was impressed by the strength of the C.N.T. It was unnecessary to tell me that it was the largest and most vital of the working-class organisations in Spain. The large industries were clearly, in the main, in the hands of the C.N.T.--railways, road transport, shipping, engineering, textiles, electricity, building, agriculture. At Valencia the U.G.T. had a larger share of control than at Barcelona, but generally speaking the mass of manual workers belonged to the C.N.T. The U.G.T. membership was more of the type of the 'white-collar' worker...I was immensely impressed by the constructive revolutionary work which is being done by the C.N.T. Their achievement of workers' control in industry is an inspiration. One could take the example of the railways or engineering or textiles...There are still some Britishers and Americans who regard the Anarchists of Spain as impossible, undisciplined, uncontrollable. This is poles away from the truth. The Anarchists of Spain, through the [[Confederación Nacional del Trabajo|C.N.T.]], are doing one of the biggest constructive jobs ever done by the working class. At the front they are fighting [[Fascism]]. Behind the front they are actually constructing the new Workers' Society. They see that the war against Fascism and the carrying through of the [[Social Revolution]] are inseparable. Those who have seen and understand what they are doing must honour them and be grateful to them. They are resisting Fascism. They are at the same time creating the New Workers' Order which is the only alternative to Fascism. That is surely the biggest things now being done by the workers in any part of the world." And in another place: "The great solidarity that existed amongst the Anarchists was due to each individual relying on his own strength and not depending on leadership. The organisations must, to be successful, be combined with a free-thinking people; not a mass, but free individuals."|Fenner Brockway{{sfn|Rocker|2004|pp=66–67}}}}

=== Related subsequent events ===
On 25 May 1937, the [[Iberian Anarchist Federation|FAI]] was excluded from the People's Courts. On 8 June, the government issued a decree by which it temporarily outlawed rural communes that had not yet been dissolved. On 14 June, a new government of the Generalitat was formed, also without the anarchists and revolutionaries. On 15 June, the [[POUM]] was outlawed and its executive committee was arrested. On the 16 June the [[29th Division (Spain)|29th Division]] (formerly the POUM's [[Lenin Division]]) was dissolved.

In August 1937, criticism of the [[USSR]] was prohibited by means of a government circular. In this month, the central government also ordered the dissolution of the Aragón Defense Council, practically the last remaining body of revolutionary power, which was militarily occupied by republican army troops on 10 August. [[Joaquín Ascaso]], its president, was arrested. Likewise, the eleventh communist division attacked various committees of the Aragonese people and dissolved collective agricultural production, which soon after was reorganized. On 7 September, the government reauthorized religious worship in private, one of its many measures to reestablish the power of the government in the republican zone, while in Barcelona there were demonstrations against the dissolution of the anarcho-syndicalist publication {{lang|es|Solidaridad Obrera}}. On 16 September, political rallies were prohibited in Barcelona. On 26 September, the Asturian Council proclaimed itself the [[Sovereign Council of Asturias and León]], independent from the [[Second Spanish Republic]].

On 21 October, a demonstration by anarchist and socialist militants took place in front of the San Miguel de los Reyes prison in Valencia, threatening to break down the doors if the prisoners were not freed. On 12 November, the CNT withdrew from the FPA committees.

On 6 January 1938, the government published a decree prohibiting all new issuances of banknotes and coins by committees, municipalities, corporations, etc.; and a period of one month was given for them to be withdrawn from circulation, in an attempt to end the last remnants of the revolution.

During that year many of the large landowners returned and demanded the return of their property. Collectivization was progressively annulled despite its popular support.{{Citation needed|date=January 2025}}

[[Sam Dolgoff]] estimated that about eight million people participated directly or at least indirectly in the Spanish revolution, which he claimed "came closer to realizing the ideal of the free stateless society on a vast scale than any other revolution in history".{{sfn|Dolgoff|1974|p=5}}

{{blockquote|In Spain during almost three years, despite a civil war that took a million lives, despite the opposition of the political parties (republicans, left and right Catalan separatists, socialists, Communists, Basque and Valencian regionalists, petty bourgeoisie, etc.), this idea of libertarian communism was put into effect. Very quickly more than 60% of the land was collectively cultivated by the peasants themselves, without landlords, without bosses, and without instituting capitalist competition to spur production. In almost all the industries, factories, mills, workshops, transportation services, public services, and utilities, the rank and file workers, their revolutionary committees, and their syndicates reorganized and administered production, distribution, and public services without capitalists, high salaried managers, or the authority of the state.

The various agrarian and industrial collectives immediately instituted economic equality in accordance with the essential principle of communism, 'From each according to his ability and to each according to his needs.' They coordinated their efforts through free association in whole regions, created new wealth, increased production (especially in agriculture), built more schools, and bettered public services. They instituted not bourgeois formal democracy but genuine grass roots functional libertarian democracy, where each individual participated directly in the revolutionary reorganization of social life. They replaced the war between men, 'survival of the fittest,' by the universal practice of mutual aid, and replaced rivalry by the principle of solidarity....

This experience, in which about eight million people directly or indirectly participated, opened a new way of life to those who sought an alternative to anti-social capitalism on the one hand, and totalitarian state bogus socialism on the other.|[[Gaston Leval]]{{sfn|Dolgoff|1974|p=6}}}}