An Anatomy of Exile, Return and De-Exile. the Writing and Life Trajectory of the Former Spanish Anarchist Minister Juan López Sánchez
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When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given e.g. AUTHOR (year of submission) "Full thesis title", University of Southampton, name of the University School or Department, PhD Thesis, pagination http://eprints.soton.ac.uk UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON © Faculty of Humanities (Modern Languages) An Anatomy of Exile, Return and De-exile The Writing and Life Trajectory of the former Spanish Anarchist Minister Juan López Sánchez Thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy By Pedro García-Guirao © September 2014 2 UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON ABSTRACT FACULTY OF HUMANITIES (Modern Languages) Doctor of Philosophy AN ANATOMY OF EXILE, RETURN AND DE-EXILE. THE WRITING AND LIFE TRAJECTORY OF THE FORMER SPANISH ANARCHIST MINISTER JUAN LÓPEZ SÁNCHEZ By Pedro García-Guirao This thesis explores the scantly studied Spanish anarchist exile that followed the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) and lasted until Francisco Franco’s death and, arguably, beyond. So far, Spanish anarchist exile has occupied a marginal research space under the wider label of “Republican exile”. Within this marginalized exile, I have chosen to address a specific issue: the voluntary return of former anarchist exiles to a dictatorship. The research is built around the controversial case study of a former anarchist Minister, Juan López Sánchez. The thesis tries to discover how, after a period of exile consisting of a short stay in Toulouse, followed by almost 15 years in England and 14 in Mexico, this former Minister constructed a discourse that justified his return to Spain at the age of 66, and the reasons why he collaborated with the Francoist Sindicato Vertical [Vertical Union]. The research attempts to extrapolate from the problems affecting a specific person (Juan López Sánchez) in a particular historical moment (1939-1975) to gain a broader understanding of the experience of returning Spanish exiles and refugees. The theorizing thus goes to a certain extent from the general to the particular. Methodologically, the study is developed based on an interdisciplinary vision. It draws on qualitative methodology to analyse the intellectual output of Juan López Sánchez and his contribution to newspaper publications in exile, which will help us understand the experience of exile and broader human dimension of the former Minister. At the heart of this data lies a corpus of 630 letters that the Minister sent and received between 1939 and 1971. Through the study of this correspondence, which has hitherto remained unexamined, Juan López Sánchez held a rich 3 and insightful dialogue with 73 leading republican figures inside and outside of Spain, providing invaluable insights into the exile and return from both a personal and political perspective. The findings of the thesis hope to contribute to the historiographical, theoretical, cultural and humanistic gaps surrounding the work and memory not only of Juan López Sánchez, but also of many other intellectuals who attempted to reintegrate into Spanish society during the Franco regime, a subject which has so far been generally rejected as a field of study by the academic establishment. 4 Contents Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………......2 Contents …………………………………………………………………………………….....4 Nomenclature ………...…………………………………………………………………….....8 Declaration of Authorship …………………………………………………………………….9 Acknowledgments…………....................................................................................................10 A note on citing Juan López Sánchez’ Archive.......................................................................11 INTRODUCTION..................................................................................................................12 0.1. THESIS AIMS AND OBJECTIVES.............................................................................12 0.2. RESEARCH QUESTIONS............................................................................................14 0.3. THESIS OUTLINE........................................................................................................15 CHAPTER 1 JUAN LÓPEZ SÁNCHEZ IN AN ANARCHIST CONTEXT..........................................19 1. PRE-EXILE………………………………………………………………….………………19 A terminological and historical clarification: the conceptual history of ‘anarchism’, ‘anarcho-syndicalism’ and ‘possibilistic anarchism’……………………………………..20 Murcia: The Birth………………………………………………………………………….23 Barcelona: The First Emigration……………………………………………………….…24 The Way to Prison…………………………………………………………………………25 Adopting Syndicalism and Forgetting Anarchism…………………………………………28 5 “Power Tends to Corrupt, and Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely”……………………30 2. EXILE………………………………………………………………………………………31 3. RETURN AND DE-EXILE……………………………………………………………………..39 CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK: EXILE, RETURN AND DE-EXILE........................44 1. EXILE…………………………………………………………………………………….…44 1.1. EXILE AND ITS FETISHES...................................................................................................44 1.2. CIVIL REPUBLICAN VIRTUES IN EXILE.............................................................................51 2. RETURN…………………………………………………………………………………….53 2.1. THE TABOO OF RETURNING..............................................................................................53 2.2. RETURN AS A MORALLY INCONVENIENT DECISION...........................................................54 The return from legal perspectives: The Francoist Laws..................................................58 3. DE-EXILE...............................................................................................................................63 Etymological approach.....................................................................................................64 De-exile according to Mario Benedetti.............................................................................64 CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY: ANALYSING JUAN LÓPEZ SÁNCHEZ’ ARCHIVE...................73 3.1 THEORETICAL MODELS TO APPROACH THE PAST FROM THE PRESENT...............................74 Qualitative inductive model..................................................................................................74 Reconstruction of the past....................................................................................................75 Psychohistory.......................................................................................................................76 Issues of self-reflexivity... ....................................................................................................77 3.2 “ARCHIVO DE JUAN LÓPEZ SÁNCHEZ (LÍDER ANARQUISTA Y MINISTRO REPUBLICANO)”.........................................................................................................................79 6 Gatekeeping archives…………...........................................................................................82 Correspondence analysis……………………….....................................................................83 CHAPTER 4 EXILE AS A SYMPTOM OF THE “GERMEN OF WAR”.............................................91 Juan López Sánchez and Republican virtues as demagogy.................................................93 CHAPTER 5 PRAGMATISM AS A WAY OF SURVIVING IN EXILE..............................................100 The impossible reinstatement of the Republic....................................................................101 Facing new realities and circumstances............................................................................104 The Spanish circumstances and the mysticism of the Civil War........................................108 CHAPTER 6 THE PATRIOTIC IMPERATIVE TO RETURN............................................................120 Return to make up for lost time..........................................................................................120 Problems of identity...........................................................................................................123 Juan López Sánchez: a Spanish man who loves his homeland..........................................134 CHAPTER 7 DE-EXILE AND COLLABORATION WITH THE “ENEMY”.....................................141 De-exile: a category for interpreting Juan López Sánchez’ correspondence and attitude towards exile.........................................................................................................142 Negotiations while in exile..................................................................................................145 Putting returnees into quarantine.......................................................................................153 Integration into the Francoist apparatus............................................................................159 7 CHAPTER 8 THE PSYCHOSOMATIC ELEMENTS OF EXILE, RETURN AND DE- EXILE...................................................................................................................................164