The Political Landscape of Spain's Second Republic

The Political Model of the Second Republic

Left-Wing Parties

This category includes Republican parties, those supporting regional autonomy, and workers' parties.

Bourgeois Left-Wing Republican Parties

• Republican Action: Founded by Manuel Azaña, this party comprised leftist intellectuals. Its political ideology centered on the modernization of social and political structures. During the first two years of the Republic, it collaborated closely with the PSOE.
• Radical Socialist Party: Created by Marcelino Domingo, its ideology was very similar to Republican Action. Domingo served as Minister of Public Instruction. This party later merged with Republican Action and ORGA to form Republican Left.
• Republican Union: Founded by Diego Martínez Barrio after separating from the Radical Party, it incorporated some members of the Radical-Socialist Party.

Parties Supporting Regional Autonomy

• Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC): Created in 1931 by Francesc Macià, incorporating his Estat Català. Macià's leadership of Esquerra Republicana led him to proclaim the Catalan State. ERC grouped together Catalan conservatism. After Macià's death, Lluís Companys took over leadership. At the start of the revolution, he proclaimed the Catalan State within the Spanish Federal Republic.
• Galician Autonomous Republican Organization (ORGA): Represented the Galician autonomous sentiment. In the Constituent Assembly, it was the party that secured the largest number of MPs. ORGA was integrated into the Republican Left.
• Basque Nationalist Party (PNV): The two parties (PNV and a Carlist faction) drafted the Statute of the Basque-Navarre Country. During the biennium, the PNV adopted a more left-leaning stance, sending Largo Caballero their approval of the statute.

Workers' Parties

• Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE): The PSOE and the UGT were founded by Pablo Iglesias. At the time of the Republic's proclamation, they were the best-organized political formations in Spain. Although the PSOE was a Marxist workers' party, it established alliances with Republicans. Key leaders included Francisco Largo Caballero, Secretary-General of the UGT and a supporter of collaboration with the anarchists, who assumed the presidency of the Republic after a failed attempt; Julián Besteiro, the most prominent intellectual leader of the PSOE, with a solid Marxist education, who sought a peaceful settlement through England during the Civil War to end it; and Indalecio Prieto, a PSOE deputy who always played a leading role, and served as Minister of Public Works.
• Spanish Communist Party (PCE): It held little importance when the Republic was proclaimed, being a small organization. It was from the Popular Front alliance onward that the PCE gained a significant role in Republican Spain.