The Spanish Civil War and the Social Change in the First Period of Postwar Spain

Abstract

When Postwar Spain is discussed (1939-1950), it is observed that important changes surfaced in the social aspect. The comfortable lives of black marketeers and contrabandists became incentives for the ones that were on the edge of dying of hunger. The extraordinary period of Spanish social ambiance that can be defined with greed and misery, and the rising crime rates in this era, are both social events that need to be examined. In addition to the ones that committed crimes to survive, there also appeared many disaster opportunists. In the mentioned period, the rise in the civil and gang crimes, and various methods of forgery, robbery and contrabandism were observed. In an ambience of shortages and legal pressures, the wounds of the war took time to heal. As a result, Spain's Postwar example demonstrates us that the society can be damaged morally in parallel with the damaged social and economic balances. General Franco who was supported by many citizens and believed to normalize the administrative instability and economic problems of the prewar, was not a solution for all these. In the first period of the postwar, living conditions of the Spanish citizens grew even worse.