‘La EspaÒa Ultramarina’: Colonialism and Nation-Building in Nineteenth-Century Spain

Abstract

This article seeks to introduce colonialism into recent debates over the construction of Spanish nationalism in the nineteenth century. First, it reappraises the importance of the major colonies that Spain maintained in the aftermath of the Spanish American revolutions: Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines. It shows that Cuba figured significantly in the political economy of Spanish liberalism between two moments of decolonization. Moreover, Spanish politicians and business leaders considered the colonies to be integral parts of the `national market', defending the core institutions of the colonial economy vigorously. Second, this article turns to the intersection between colonial and national historiographies in liberal Spain. Building on a deep early-modern intellectual and institutional inheritance, Spanish patriots in the nineteenth century wrote colonial history as a vital chapter of Spain's national history. Thus, `La Espala ultramarina' occupied a prominent role in the political economy of Spanish liberalism and the political imagination of Spanish nationalism.