Spanish nationalism: ethnic or civic?

Abstract

In recent years, it has been a common complaint among scholars to acknowledge the lack of research on Spanish nationalism. This article addresses the gap by giving an historical overview of ‘ethnic’ and ‘civic’ Spanish nationalist discourses during the last two centuries. It is argued here that Spanish nationalism is not a unified ideology but it has, at least, two varieties. During the 19th-century, both a ‘liberal’ and a ‘conservative-traditionalist’ nationalist discourse were formulated and these competed against each other for hegemony within the Spanish market of ideas. In the 20th-century, these two discourses continued to be present and became backbones of different political regimes. However, after the emergence of the Basque and Catalan nationalist movements, Spanish nationalists unified as a counter-force to these regional sources of identity. In fact, one can see 20th-century Spanish nationalism as a dialectical struggle between the centre and the periphery.