Franco’s account of the post-war famine in Spain (1939–1942 and 1946)

Abstract

Franco’s dictatorship emerged from the victory of the rebel army in the Spanish Civil War, just as the Spanish famine would. The so-called ‘years of famine’ (1939-1952) were a period of starvation for those defeated in the conflict. ‘Franco’s victory’ led to the development of an autarkic economic policy that exacerbated post-war deprivation. Alongside this, a strategy emerged determined to purge this ‘anti-Spain’, blamed for all evils, including the famine that would make its appearance by the late 1940s. The Franco regime concocted a series of myths that absolved the regime of any responsibility for the famine. Thus, accounts of the war, the ‘persistent’ drought, speculators and international isolation flooded the media, whilst Spanish society was starving. The silencing and justification of the famine left their mark on an entire generation, willing to break legal and moral barriers in order to survive.