Electoral and parliamentary arenas play a crucial role in the configuration and dynamics of modern polities. This book explores the practices of citizenship and unveils the fabric of representation in the Iberian countries, during a significant period of liberal politics, that is, from its apogee to its collapse (from the 1870s to the 1920s). Part One examines the evolution of electoral norms and behaviour, as well as the recruitment profile of MPs. Portugal and Spain share fundamental features, such as the extensive clientelistic mobilisation of voters, the dissemination of fraud and corruption, the supremacy of governmental parties and the prevalence of the politics of notables. Part Two focuses on Parliament, questioning constitutional models, internal procedures, legislative action and political activity, as well as coetaneous perceptions and images of the institution and its actors as portrayed in novels, newspaper chronicles, cartoons and photographic reports. This collection of essays offers a detailed and cogent analysis, as well as a vivid picture, of the politics of representation in Portuguese and Spanish liberalism, revealing significant similarities and differences through cross-country comparisons.

This book is a new short history of Spain during a crucial period, the reign of Alfonso XIII (19021931). Traditionally, this has been seen as a time that epitomized the worst features of old Spain': a backward country, poor and chronically unequal, with a government dominated by a tiny oligarchy ruling over a corrupt system an anomaly in Western Europe. However, this study, in line with the most recent historiography, offers a new insight into the period as one that was actually characterized by extensive modernization in Spanish society and politics. Spain experienced, albeit in an unbalanced way, many of the changes already in progress in other European countries, such as urbanization, industrialization, mass migration, the rise in literacy, secularization, and the emergence of mass politics. It then suffered profound conflicts associated with these changes, and a political dynamic of reform and reaction, revolution and counter-revolution. The book is divided into four main sections, dealing, chronologically, with the beginnings of the regenerationist era, the climax of the liberal monarchy, conflicts during the crisis of liberalism, and the military dictatorship of Primo de Rivera. Primarily a political history, it also touches on social, cultural and economic issues, and offers a comparative European perspective. Last but not least, there is a special interest in the problems of nation-building, a central theme of the period, and the competition between different versions of Spanish nationalism and regional nationalist movements above all, Catalanism and Basque nationalism. Overall, the Spanish situation is presented here not as a unique case but as a variation within the difficulties that were encountered all across continental Europe in achieving the transition from classical liberalism to mass democracy.

The history of twentieth-century Spanish nationalism is a complex one, placing a set of famously distinctive regional identities against a backdrop of religious conflict, separatist tensions, and the autocratic rule of Francisco Franco. And despite the undeniably political character of that story, cultural history can also provide essential insights into the subject. Metaphors of Spain brings together leading historians to examine Spanish nationalism through its diverse and complementary cultural artifacts, from "formal" representations such as the flag to music, bullfighting, and other more diffuse examples. Together they describe not a Spanish national "essence," but a nationalism that is constantly evolving and accommodates multiple interpretations.

This book is a new short history of Spain during a crucial period, the reign of Alfonso XIII (1902-1931). Traditionally, this has been seen as a time that epitomised the worst features of 'old Spain': a backward country, poor and chronically unequal, with a government dominated by a tiny oligarchy ruling over a corrupt system -- an anomaly in Western Europe. However, this study, in line with the most recent historiography, offers a new insight into the period as one that was actually characterised by extensive modernisation in Spanish society and politics. Spain experienced, albeit in an unbalanced way, many of the changes already in progress in other European countries, such as urbanisation, industrialisation, mass migration, the rise in literacy, secularisation, and the emergence of mass politics. It then suffered profound conflicts associated with these changes, and a political dynamic of reform and reaction, revolution and counter-revolution. The book is divided into four main sections, dealing, chronologically, with the beginnings of the regenerationist era, the climax of the liberal monarchy, conflicts during the crisis of liberalism, and the military dictatorship of Primo de Rivera. Primarily a political history, it also touches on social, cultural and economic issues, and offers a comparative European perspective. Last but not least, there is a special interest in the problems of nation-building, a central theme of the period, and the competition between different versions of Spanish nationalism and regional nationalist movements -- above all, Catalanism and Basque nationalism. Overall, the Spanish situation is presented here not as a unique case but as a variation within the difficulties that were encountered all across continental Europe in achieving the transition from classical liberalism to mass democracy.

The history of twentieth-century Spanish nationalism is a complex one, placing a set of famously distinctive regional identities against a backdrop of religious conflict, separatist tensions, and the autocratic rule of Francisco Franco. And despite the undeniably political character of that story, cultural history can also provide essential insights into the subject. Metaphors of Spain brings together leading historians to examine Spanish nationalism through its diverse and complementary cultural artifacts, from "formal" representations such as the flag to music, bullfighting, and other more diffuse examples. Together they describe not a Spanish national "essence," but a nationalism that is constantly evolving and accommodates multiple interpretations.