La “Batalla del trigo”. Un proceso de coerción colectiva para consolidar la adhesión del campesinado, desarrollado por parte de FET y de las JONS en el año 1937

Resum

In this paper I analyze the propaganda campaign known as “The Wheat Battle”, developed during the Spanish Civil War —particularly at the end of 1937— and executed by the insurgents or nationalists political apparatus, the only political party FET y de las JONS. A thorough but initial list of 87 towns out of 19 Spanish provinces where these acts were celebrated is provided. It is presumed there were many more locations as well. The seeming goal of these meetings was nothing but propagating the benefits of the new wheat laws. However, there was also an implicit but definite interest in gaining full support by peasantry, in an attempt to stop the existing opposition towards main cereals totalitarian intervention. The “Wheat Campaigns” were planned and developed as a rear strategic action. As a final hypothesis I suggest that refusal to Wheat Regulations decree-law —which Falange was aimed at blocking— was instigated by agrarian and flourbakery elites, who were initially against absolute State control in terms of price, production and even transport and transportation of wheat; however, at the end these groups ended up joining the new frame and taking advantage of it during the long post-war period, typically characterized by bread rationing and black market.