The Construction of Collective Memory: from Franco to Democracy

Abstract

Collective memory is neither spontaneous nor random, but the result of a series of selective practices. It establishes group identity and sets power relations between groups. The author considers the process of selection through a case study of the transformation of Franco’s regime in Spain into a democracy. Collective memory of the time is shown to be organized around an event (the Munich Coalition or contubernio) and around the democratic transition. The author traces two opposing notions, negationist (denying any importance to Munich) and the pro-democratic, and concludes that the memory of the transition is only the memory of those who won the civil war, who were also those who engineered the transition itself.