Tradition and change in Southern Europe urbanization
1.
INTRODUCTION
The literature on the history of cities in Spain has followed a rather irregular
progression1, even though it has been witness to a remarkable productive output from the 1990s
onwards2. Case studies are still dominant, but several articles analysing Spanish urban
development on a global scale have been published in recent years3.
This paper aims to provide a preliminary analysis of the economic behavior of Spanish
cities during the inter-war period. The method combines the particular and the general aspects
as it attempts to characterize the progress followed by Spanish cities as a whole, in search of
those common elements that would lead us to draw some general conclusions. The first step is
to comprehend the development of the Spanish urban system during the first third of the
twentieth century. The second step is to identify the most salient features of the economy of
the cities during this period, as well to understand the sources of their main transformations.
The sources for this account have been twofold. On the one hand, the current literature
on Spanish cities, which – although as a collection incorporating a wide-ranging set of
methodologies – constitutes a qualitative starting point. On the other hand, there is
information contained in the population censuses, which allow us to construct a classification
of economic activities that facilitate defining the major factors of the economic base of
Spanish cities.
The initial hypothesis starts from the assumption that Spanish cities underwent a
particularly dynamic behavior during this period. This stage has recently been identified by
Spanish historiography, and was the threshold of other stage of intense urban growth, which
started during the late 1950s, once the depressing effects of the Civil War and post-war
autarky began to fade.
1
The objective is to ascertain which were the differences in terms of pace of growth of
the different groups of cities that composed the national urban hierarchy. The conclusion is
that the majority of cities underwent an outstanding growth, but with significant differences
among them. The cities that benefited most were the largest ones, as a result of the rural-urban
immigration processes, whilst the small cities fell behind, losing the course of
industrialization, to which some of the former cities caught up. In the middle, medium-sized
cities remained, which despite their development, mostly continued performing as commercial
and service cities.
2.
THE INTER-WAR PERIOD WITNESSED A DYNAMIZATION OF SPANISH
URBAN TRENDS
There is an emerging consensus that the first third of the twentieth century witnessed a
significant growth in the Spanish economy, despite its deficiencies, limitations, slowness, etc.
It probably was so insufficient in its development to permit a comparison with Western
industrialized economies. But, as many scholars have stated, significant growth did occur, all
in all.
The growing urban historical, geographical, economic, and sociological research of the
last two decades has shown the unique and specific characteristics of this period. In most
Spanish cities, the transition between a critical late nineteenth century and the attempts to
modernize the economic, political and social structures were taking place. Throughout the
country the symptoms of the crisis of the so-called Restoration society (1875-1914) blew up
repeatedly, following very similar patterns. And World War I mostly acted as a take out factor
of new processes, which marked the fate of towns and cities, although with extremely
different fortunes4.
Spanish historiography has traditionally presented a pessimistic view of the cities of
the Restoration period. Nevertheless, recent empirical evidence suggests that this is not an
2
accurate assessment5. Despite there being some insufficiencies in the global analysis of
contemporary Spanish urban development, the synthesis of research materials and results
indicate that this period marked the future evolution of our cities6.
Spanish urbanization displays, in general, a chronological delay in relation to
developed countries. The main reason for this appears to be the later industrialization process,
which deferred urbanization until the first third of the twentieth century and even further7.
However, urban population grew robustly in relative terms during this period (although this
could be considered slow growth when compared to Western Europe)8, marking a breaking
point in Spanish contemporary urbanization9. Around 1936 Spain was already a moderately
urbanized country10.
Depending on the aptitude of the cities to respond to changes that were taking place
during these years and on their former structures and rhythms, they were able to take
advantage or not of the new opportunities offered by economic development. Recent research
suggests the maintenance of important differences among the large and the small and mediumsized cities11, a distance that rose during the first two thirds of the century12.
World War I induced several transformations that set into motion the definitive
consolidation of the urban hold. The cities that benefited most were those above 100,000
inhabitants, which brought about a rising urbanization of the country. At the economic, social,
or planning levels, Spanish cities carried out remarkable changes from the 1920s onwards.
This decade constitutes a key explanatory stage to comprehend the development that took
place in the cities before the leap of the 1950s13. However, a new opportunity for expansion
came about with the growth of service activities, which reinforced the tertiary specialization of
the cities. From this decade onwards, the tertiary specialization of these capitals was reinforced;
but some other cities also set off a parallel and incipient industrialization of their economic
base14.
3
Several groups of behaviors can be distinguished. On the one hand, the sample of
cities that during the nineteenth or during this period decidedly got into a path of
modernization. Industrialization has traditionally been considered to be the most important
factor in Spanish urbanization. Although city and industrialization are not so clearly
associated nowadays15, because industrial activities do not seem to play such a determinant
role in Spanish urbanization as a whole16, the cities that underwent a more rapid growth were
those in which industrialization bore a heavy imprint. In general, they did not liberate
themselves completely from the presence of tertiary activities; but cities such as Bilbao or
Barcelona, and later on, some others such as Saragossa, Madrid, and even Valencia, Seville,
Gijón, etc. found the main focal point for urban growth in industrial development17.
On the other hand, we have the medium-sized cities, which have a strategic importance
in urban systems, as they act as ribbon for the impulses of economic growth. Examples of this
type of behavior were cities such as La Coruña, Oviedo, San Sebastián, Albacete, León, etc.,
in which the commercial sector played a crucial role18. During the first third of the century,
cities with a population between 30,000 and 50,000 inhabitants formed the group of medium
cities. In 1900 they scarcely represented three per cent of the national population, but in 1930
had multiplied by 2.3, their aggregate population, and by 2, their relative participation, up to
6.45 per cent.
Parallels among Spanish port cities have been particularly evident, in particular with
respect to the cities with similar hierarchical rank. Examples of this are La Coruña, Cadiz,
Alicante, Malaga, San Sebastián, Tarragona, and even Valencia, cities with a strong
orientation towards commercial and service activities linked to the port19. And certainly the
cities of the archipelagos (Las Palmas or Santa Cruz de Tenerife)20. In these cities a solid
development of commercial functions took place, which can be placed amongst a more general
tertiarization process that was strengthening during the twentieth century. This attribute is in
4
common with other urban economies, and has been parallel to the process of tertiarization that
has taken place in the majority of Western economies, and to which Spain did not remain
unconnected21.
Finally we consider the group of small cities in which socio-economic structures did
not undergo significant changes and therefore expanded at a lower rate. These locations did
not fully transform their economic base throughout the second half of the nineteenth century,
and therefore generally failed in their attempts to join the course of industrialization22. As a
consequence, they can be labelled by the excessive predominance of tertiary functions – which
were mostly non-advanced –, with a high proportion of retail (above all that oriented to the
basic needs of the population) and bureaucratic and administrative employment23. Examples
of this are Lugo, Lleida, Teruel, Huesca, Segovia, Ciudad Real, Cuenca, Jaén and other
provincial capitals, some of which crystallized as “agro-cities” located in predominantly rural
hinterlands24. Even so, this profile must not conceal that more or less traumatically these cities
also underwent a certain transformation of their socio-economic structures.
Therefore, the process of urban concentration in Spain since the early twentieth
century has initially turned into the provincial capitals, but later on it has been relocated in a
reduced sample of large cities, although with a heterogeneous location pattern25. This process
has given rise to differences at the national level in the urbanization process and to an
unbalanced urban system, with an excessive predominance of large cities; but it also generated
considerable differences in the type of dominant cities within each region26. Although, at the
beginning, the group of medium-sized cities benefited from this concentration, later on they
gave way to the group of large cities, as a result of the change in the direction of inner
migrations – towards the largest cities –, in the second half of the twentieth century27.
3.
THE DICHOTOMY BETWEEN INDUSTRIAL AND TERTIARY CITIES
Urban growth during the first third of the twentieth century gave rise to a burgeoning
5
of urban equipment, that is, infrastructures such as diverse urban services (retail, private
services, networked services, etc.). Besides, it also permitted an increase and spread of
industries and workshops that faced the needs of an increasing urban demand. The latter can
be found in every city; but the key explaining factor in a successful consolidation of a firmly
grounded industrial sector will be the ability of these sectors to supply regional, national and,
above all, international demands, not only local ones.
The sample of industrial cities was reduced in Spain at the beginning of the twentieth
century. The most outstanding capitals were Barcelona, Bilbao, Saragossa or Valencia, to
which other non-provincial capitals should be added (Gijón, Vigo, Ferrol, etc.). Only in
Barcelona, and some years later Bilbao, industrial growth took off throughout the nineteenth
century28. The rest of the cities had to wait until the first third of the twentieth century.
In some cases, the conjuncture after Cuba’s War of Independence (1898) was the
starting point for a capital flow from the former colony to the Spanish cities, which offered a
chance to revitalize the secondary sector. Among others, World War I served as a catalyst of
primary and secondary goods exports, which facilitated a recovery of many manufacturing
sectors. Finally, urban and financial development that accompanied the arrival of the Primo de
Rivera Dictatorship (1923-30) acted as a strengthening factor of the industry of several cities
(Valencia, for example), as industrials cities had reached their take-off (more visible in the
1920s), and kept growing at least until the beginning of the slump of the 1930s.
Geographically, the map of industrial cities during the first third of the twentieth
century did not undergo significant changes (Map 2). Those capitals in which the industrial
sector was above average in the whole of Spanish capitals have been plotted. The most
remarkable cities were concentrated in the northern (Basque Country, Asturias, Santander,
Galicia) and eastern coasts (Catalonia, Valencia), apart from several points of Andalusia and
Castile and León. The majority of these cities were not truly industrial cities anyway, as the
6
working population was concentrated in craft activities, or at least in sectors in which there
was an outstanding large firm. In 1900, 24 capitals were above the average of working
population employed in the secondary sector (22.76 per cent).
In the upper quarter (12 capitals), we find some cities with a heavy load of activity in
the tertiary sector, which shows industrialization had not settled sufficiently in the country.
We must take into account that the average for all capitals reveals poor results, as the primary
sector employed 38.61 per cent of the population of these cities, in contrast to the 40.71 per
cent in the tertiary sector.
Industry was not the dominant sector in any city. Barcelona was the main exception to
this behavior, as the percentage of working population employed in industry (35.96 per cent)
virtually matched the tertiary (36.40 per cent). Besides, Castellón had an outstanding presence,
although this was due to the high weight of the agricultural sector (37.45 per cent), which
distorted the results; this fact, together with the traditionally important presence of workshops
and craft activities, transmitted a false image of an industrial city.
In 1930 the situation had experienced a notorious qualitative change, as the average of
the working population employed in primary sector decreased to 12.86 per cent, in contrast to
the 49.68 per cent of the secondary and the 57.92 per cent of the tertiary. The most significant
share of this decrease of the primary sector took place between 1910 and 1920 (38.07 to 19.85
per cent), in parallel with a significant growth of industry (20.87 to 33.95 per cent). The 1920s
witnessed the strengthening of the tendency that had been initiated during the World War in
some cities that took advantage of the conjuncture, and which later on spread during the
following years to the most dynamic cities. In the eve of Spanish Civil War, the map of
industrialization was more defined.
The most explosive example of linkage between industry and urban growth was
probably Bilbao. The last quarter of the nineteenth century had witnessed a rapid increase in
7
iron exports29. The mercantile capitals generated in the former period (that is, during most of
the nineteenth century) in a city clearly dedicated to maritime and commercial activities,
together with the new mining activities, gave rise to enormous effects on a rising metallurgy
sector. Later on, this sector exerted positive effects on diverse linked activities, which joined
those caused by the growth of the city: merchant fleet, shipbuilding and ship repairs,
electrification, transportation infrastructures, communication networks, financial sector, etc. It
is therefore a model based in capital goods industries, which usually have a robust impact on a
city30.
In Barcelona (in Catalonia, in north-eastern Spain) commerce had a very long tradition,
it being the most significant economic activity of the city up until the nineteenth century. As in
most Spanish cities, activities such as services (administration, financial functions, culture,
etc.) also played a leading role. However, by the beginning of the twentieth century Barcelona
was the most distinguished Spanish industrial city. As opposed to the heavy industry of Bilbao
and its province, in the Catalan capital consumer goods industries were predominant, with a
noticeable presence of the textile sector. Other sectors such as urban infrastructures, above all
the companies of urban transportation, water supply, sewage disposal, etc., that is, the urban
networked services associated with the second industrial revolution, served as boomers of
urban economic activity31.
The rest of the industrial models surged and consolidated at a different rhythm and
level during the period analyzed here, supported by the modernization of Spanish society. The
cities led to an impulse to modernize the system, but they also felt the impact of the processes
of socio-economic, cultural, and technological change of the country.
Madrid, a city that had historically relied upon the tertiary sector, in late nineteenth
century underwent some initial transformations that were sped up throughout the inter-war
period. Several scholars have regarded the years after 1910 as the decisive hinge in the long-
8
term metamorphosis of the capital of the state, being the period in which the transition to
modernity converged and accelerated32.
Despite the high weight of the tertiary sector, there was a certain dual division among
two different “urban economies”, which coexisted in the urban space. On the one hand, the
economy “of the city”, and on the other, the economy “of the capital of the state”. The former
rested in the most traditional elements of the tertiary sector (retail, domestic service,
administration, hostelry, etc.), together with others derived from being the capital of the nation
(the strong demand of consumer goods, educational services, transportation, etc.)33, and those
typical of the Royal Court. Apart from these functions, typical of a provincial capital, at the
end of the nineteenth century new sets of functions were incorporated. They flourished in the
first third of the twentieth century, benefited from the increasing economic centrality of the
metropolis: head of the state transportation network (road and railway), of the postal and
telegraph services (communications), which were followed by the building of a financial
network, and the functions associated with the larger firms head offices. These events
transformed Madrid into the national decision-making centre for the most important
companies, that is, the so-called “capital of the capital”34.
The following step was the emergence of industrial functions, which underwent visible
growth in the 1920s, but which can be appreciated also from the early 1900s35. Nevertheless,
despite the growth in the number of firms and employment, there was still a duality in the
sector. In the late 1920s, Madrid was still rather a “city with industry” than an industrial city.
There were several large manufacturing establishments, but the traditional workshops and
craft industries were still predominant36.
In the early twentieth century, the economy of Saragossa still relied upon traditional
sectors such as commerce, retail or domestic service, which had a considerable weight in the
urban socio-economic structure. However, the accelerated process of immigration towards the
9
city during the first third of the century reveals a growth and a more consistent economic
diversification37. The region where Saragossa was located (Aragón) experienced an
industrialization during the inter-war period, which was robustly concentrated in this city,
allowing it to yield a diversified industrial district38. In 1923-30, a cycle of development took
place, although in 1930 it was still a service city, and the capital of an agrarian region39.
Valencia displays a very different model. In the beginning, the city had common
features with other small and medium-sized cities, which strong linkages with the rural
hinterland. Due to the historical characteristics of the site, the settlement, and the dominant
economic activity in the rural environment in which nowadays the metropolitan area of
Valencia has been shaped, this city has maintained a strong relationship with the neighbor
rural area, so-called the Huerta40. The urban pre-industrial economic activity was based on the
relationship with the Huerta, commerce (agricultural exports fundamentally) and craft
activities41. Once the administrative functions of the provincial capital were incorporated, new
functions of centrality were added, apart from those related to the urban growth and the port42.
Big industry did not appear until the first quarter of the twentieth century, particularly during
the Primo de Rivera Dictatorship, although this was a growth without industrialization43. The
consolidation of a competitive and diversified agriculture, together with the development of
commercial and tertiary functions, and the incipient industrial function transformed Valencia
into a city with a complex and diversified economy44.
Other non-capital cities display a noticeably industrial profile, although with very
heterogeneous bases and chronologies. In Ferrol (located in Galicia, in north-western Spain),
the industrial specialization dates back to the eighteenth century, thanks to the establishment
of a shipbuilding infrastructure financed by state programs, in parallel with the other
significant functions of the city, the military, both of them imposed from outside. The problem
for the city was the excessive naval specialization, and the lack of productive diversification.
10
For these reasons, the economic activity has traditionally (also during the twentieth century)
been excessively dependent on the role of the State and public enterprise45.
Vigo is one of the most remarkable cases of accelerated industrial urbanization in the
Spanish urban system46. Urban expansion got underway by the late nineteenth century.
Industrialization took off in 1890-1925, being the key factor of the conjuncture of that
period47. This was an industrialization linked to the sea and maritime activities (which
generated many economic effects), as well as to railway connection with the central regions of
country48, which decades later became (in the years before the Civil War) the most important
market for the local consumer goods industries. The modernization of the port was parallel to
local industrialization, the upsurge in immigration to Latin America, fishing, and national and
overseas trade. As a result of this, influential private business groups were created, which
were linked to canning elaboration, shipbuilding and maritime transportation and
consignments49.
Malaga was a special case. This city had developed an industrial complex during the
nineteenth century, through the exploitation of the scale economies originated from city
exports carried out by the port50. Therefore, manufacturing and craft industries were
thoroughly joined to commerce during this century. But in the last third of this century it
suffered an important crisis, although this must not be considered as a marked reversal of the
tendency, given that the city had not properly witnessed a previous process of development.
From 1900 onwards, a disruptive change in commercial patterns took place, through the
substitution of the type of exports, from the traditional goods of the nineteenth century to other
more competitive commodities. Malaga became a redistributive centre for goods and raw
materials to the inland areas, which was partially due to a certain industrial development51.
Tertiary cities exhibit significant differences in their respective stories, both regarding
their origins and their evolution throughout the pre-industrial era. However, numerous
11
similarities can be found, regarding their dominant economic functions during the
contemporary period.
In the beginning of the twentieth century, most of these places, independently of their
position within the urban hierarchy, were commercial and service cities, based in retail,
domestic service, hostelry, construction, etc. In general, they acted as leading cities for their
rural hinterlands, in purely economic terms, but also in political and social terms as well. And
there also existed a manifest predominance of activities linked to the capital role,
complemented by the army and the clergy52, thus generating a traditional socio-professional
structure up until well advanced into the twentieth century. In cases such as San Sebastián, by
the mid nineteenth century the conversion into a financial place and business city has been
observed, due to the advantages derived from the Concierto Económico, consolidating a
strong slant towards the tertiary sector 53. From the late nineteenth century onwards, in some
cases, and the early twentieth century in others, the emergent services (water supply, sewage,
public lighting, etc.) also found their space in these cities, although with some chronological
differences in the small cities with respect to the largest ones.
According to the 1900 census figures, tertiary sector was dominant in thirty Spanish
capitals. The majority of these municipalities were located in the northern half of the country
and a large number were situated in Castile (Castilla la Nueva and Castilla la Vieja). But, in
general, the types of cities with a dominant tertiary profile were those located generally at the
back of the national urban hierarchy. With the exception of the cities with more complex
structures (Madrid, Barcelona) and the port cities (La Coruña, Cadiz, San Sebastián,
Santander), most of these cities were situated below the average of the overall population of
the capitals (Map 3).
Some cities underwent significant changes that were a sign of a timid industrialization,
which barely lasted during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This small take
12
off rewarded these cities with a more accelerated economic growth in relation to the smaller
and more backward cities. Thanks to this progress, they were finally converted into mediumsized cities. The most paradigmatic case of industrial growth in Spain during the first third of
the century was that of Seville, in which the presence of this activity steadily grew over this
period. However, the recession of the 1930s, and the charges derived from an inadequate
financing and exploitation of the 1929 World Fair, drove industry into a general and definitive
decline. After that date, Seville consolidated its traditional functions as commercial and
redistributive centre, linked to its hinterland and the international market (as boarding gate of
local mining and agricultural exports), with an enormous presence of mercantile and financial
activities. Later on, during the 1950s and 1960s several of these cities found the growth
impulse that switched them into industrial cities: Valladolid, Vitoria, León, etc.54
And yet, medium-sized cities that had attempted to leap during the most favorable
conjunctures (the Primo de Rivera Dictatorship), merely developed and consolidated their
tertiary equipment (quite prominent before the twentieth century), although this was
excessively slanted towards traditional or administrative services, instead of towards other
modern sub sectors. In these cities, the attempts of industrialization crystallized in the
establishment of workshops, and scarcely defined industrial spaces. These were cities in which
the market area was strictly restricted to local or regional markets, as such, with reduced
foreign competitiveness. Thus, many small capitals remained stagnant, deep-rooted in
provincialism55.
The big difference in terms of pace of urban growth lay in the different intensities of
rural-urban migration, more accentuated in medium-sized cities, due to the opportunities of
finding employment, which was a consequence of the diversification of their economic
structures56. The agrarian sector was a key factor, as it still determined the limits of urban
growth, in such a way that the evolution of this sector in Spain defined to a great extent the
13
process of urban development57. Thus, cities with a high agrarian component grew in those
cases in which they were capable of orientating the production of their respective hinterlands
towards international or national markets. But also in those cases in which they acted as
intermediaries in inputs or agricultural goods imports, e.g., Las Palmas, Valencia, Alicante,
Granada, Murcia, Castellón, etc.58 Yet, those located in less dynamic agrarian environments,
were not successful in their progress. They raised sometimes a semi-pathological development
of the service sector, due to the excessive “atrophy” of employment, excessively slanted
towards bureaucratic functions associated with the status of provincial capital: Huesca,
Cuenca, Teruel, Ciudad Real, Segovia, Ourense.
In 1930 the tertiary sector had undergone a substantial modernization, thanks to the
appearance and consolidation of advanced economic functions (financial sector) and the
decrease of traditional services of the Ancien Regime (domestic service), although some
traditional elements still survived, such as the high weight of retail or bureaucratic and
administrative functions. Industrialization of the largest cities made them disappear from the
top of the ranking of tertiary cities, consolidating the weight of the small and medium-sized
cities within this category.
The primary sector deserves a separate analysis. In 1900, the primary sector was
dominant in eighteen provincial capitals. Their location was concentrated in regions with an
accentuated predominance of the agricultural sector, although with different types of property,
organizational structures, etc. On the one hand, those regions with predominantly
smallholding types of property based on small-scale subsistence agriculture (e.g., Galicia). On
the other hand, the capitals located in dry farming environments (Castile), and those regions in
which large-scale agriculture was dominant, that is, latifundio (Andalusia). Finally, the
regions of modern agriculture, located in the east coast (Valencia, Murcia) (Map 1).
14
4.
CONCLUSIONS
It is not possible at this stage to draw definitive conclusions about what occurred in
Spanish cities, from an economic point of view, during the inter-war period. On the one hand,
it is necessary to further explore and collect alternative statistical sources, still under
development at this moment. On the other hand, this paper is still limited to providing a
descriptive view. Finally, the scope of the paper has been the provincial capitals, precisely
because of the type of information that has been presented.
Spanish society underwent a noticeable process of modernization during the first third
of the twentieth century. This endows this period with a certain unity. There are more and
more analysis that demonstrate that, although the late nineteenth century was a critical period,
the whole of the Restoration was not characterised by a depressed behavior of the urban
system in Spain.
Cities were modernized, but at different rates. Strictly in terms of growth, the standard
should have been to discover an urban structure characterized by the progress of the largest
cities. This is what happened in Spain, and does not contradict, therefore, the standard pattern
of Western urban societies. In addition, this progress occurred in many provincial capitals.
From an economic point of view, the early twentieth century cities had, in general, a
double profile. First, cities in which the primary sector was dominant (almost 38 per cent of
the working population of the whole capitals in 1900). Most of these were small cities, located
in strongly agricultural regions and environments. Besides, as the population censuses provide
information at the municipal level, the data exhibited an excessive slant towards this sector, as
the presence of cities within municipalities dedicated to agricultural activities was common
(Murcia, Lugo, Ourense, etc.). Second, tertiary cities, which had a high weight of services of
the Ancien Regime, or were the result of the administrative division of the country in
provinces (with its capitals) in 1833: traditional retail, domestic service, administrative
15
functions, bureaucracy, army, etc. Within these two groups we have found the small cities
(sometimes primary, sometimes tertiary) and some medium-sized cities. Almost 40 per cent of
the working population of the capitals worked in this sector.
In the top of the urban hierarchy the economic functions were more diversified. Some
of the cities have initiated their industrialization take-off, although their number was never
significant. The medium-sized were still dominated by the tertiary sector.
On the eve of the Civil War, some remarkable changes can be observed in practically
every Spanish capital, even the smallest ones. Although industrialization was not the only
process responsible for the urban growth of the country, an increasing presence within the
economic structure of the cities has been corroborated. The progressive de-agrarization and
the rural-urban migrations of the first third of the century relocated the Spanish working
population. The percentage of industrial working population doubled, as around 22 per cent of
the “urban” working population were employed in industry in 1900. But in 1930 it was around
40 per cent, whilst the working population employed in primary sector decreased to more than
12 per cent and tertiary also increased from 39 to 49 per cent.
The development was common to all the capitals, something that validates the
modernization of the whole urban system. However, many cities were not completely
successful, and remained underdeveloped in relation to the more dynamic regions and cities of
the country. Industrialization did not change significantly the archaic socio-economic
structures of the country, consolidating a division (which is not unusual in other developed
countries) among cities that were successful and took off during this period (Barcelona,
Madrid, Bilbao, Valencia, Seville, Saragossa, etc.) and those which underwent several
advances but without a significant transformation of their economic base.
16
1900
1910
1920
1930
Map 1. Capitals with a relative weight of the primary sector above the average of this sector in
the whole of Spanish capitals, 1900-1930
17
1900
1910
1920
1930
Map 2. Capitals with a relative weight of the secondary sector above the average of this sector
in the whole of Spanish capitals, 1900-1930
18
1900
1910
1920
1930
Map 3. Capitals with a relative weight of the tertiary sector above the average of this sector in
the whole of Spanish capitals, 1900-1930
19
Endotes
1
Fernando de Terán, “Historia urbana moderna en España. Recuento y acopio de materiales”,
in C. Sambricio (ed), La historia urbana. Ayer, no. 23 (1996): 87-107. José L. Oyón, “Spain”,
in R. Rodger (ed), European Urban History. Prospect and Retrospect (Leicester: Leicester
University Press, 1993): 37-59. Francisco Monclús, “Planning and History in Spain”,
Planning Perspective, vol. 7 (1992): 101-106. Fernando de Terán and Martín Bassols,
“Spain”, in C. Engeli and H. Matzerath (eds), Modern Urban History Research in Europe,
USA and Japan. A Handbook (Oxford: Berg Publishers, 1989).
2
Jesús Mirás, “Shifts in the economic structure of a medium-sized Spanish town during the
post-war period: La Coruña, 1939-60”, Urban History, vol. 31 (2004): 357.
3
Gregorio Núñez, “Modernización de las ciudades españolas durante la crisis política de la
Restauración”, Ciudad y Territorio. Estudios Territoriales, vol. XXXIII (2001): 252. David S.
Reher, “Ciudades, procesos de urbanización y sistemas urbanos en la Península Ibérica, 15501991”, in M. Guàrdia, F.J. Monclús and J.L. Oyón (eds), Atlas histórico de ciudades europeas
(Barcelona: Centre de Cultura Contemporània, 1994): 1-29.
4
Jesús Mirás, “El impacto de la Primera Guerra Mundial en la industria de A Coruña”, Revista
de Historia Industrial, no. 29 (2005): 144.
5
6
Núñez, “Modernización de las ciudades españolas”: 252-254.
Fernando de Terán, Historia del urbanismo en España. III. Siglos XIX y XX (Madrid:
Cátedra, 1999).
7
David S. Reher, “Urbanisation and demographic behaviour in Spain, 1860-1930”, in A. van
der Woude, J. de Vries and A. Hayami (eds), Urbanisation in History. A Process of Dynamic
Interactions (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990): 282-299. Spanish urban growth evolved in
parallel – although at a slower rate – to other developed countries, in which the period
20
between World War I and the recession of the 1930s shows high rates of growth and
urbanization. This process was more accelerated in the neutral countries. Paul Bairoch, Cities
and Economic Development: From the Dawn of History to the Present (Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 1988), 302-303. From the first third of the nineteenth century (when García
situates the early urbanization in Spain), Spanish urban transition has gone through several
phases. Between 1875 and 1940 the second stage of the process took place, and within this
period, the 1920s are a key period, as in that decade a notorious take-off of some mediumsized cities took place. Luis V. García, “Prólogo”, in Carmen Delgado, Las pequeñas y
medianas capitales de provincia en el proceso de modernización del sistema urbano español
(Las Palmas: Universidad, 1995), 14-15.
8
Reher, “Urbanisation and demographic behaviour in Spain”.
9
Francisco J. Monclús, “Las ciudades españolas en la Edad Contemporánea. Procesos de
crecimiento y estrategias urbanas”, in F. García and F. Acosta (eds), Córdoba en la historia:
la construcción de la urbe (Córdoba: Ayuntamiento de Córdoba, 1999): 362.
10
José L. Oyón, “Crecimiento de las ciudades”, in F. Bonamusa and J. Serrallonga (eds), La
sociedad urbana en la España contemporánea (Barcelona: AHC, 1994): 12.
11
Leopoldo S. Díez, “Ciudad «levítica» o ciudad diferente? En torno de la historia urbana de
España”, Historia Social, no. 26 (1996): 63. Oyón, “Crecimiento de las ciudades”: 13.
12
Luis Lanaspa, Francisco Pueyo and Fernando Sanz, “The evolution of the Spanish urban
structure during the twentieth century”, Urban Studies, vol. 40 (2003): 577.
13
Jesús Mirás, “Crescita ed evoluzione del settore terziario in una citta' spagnola durante il
primo dopoguerra”, Storia Urbana, no. 109 (2005), forthcoming.
14
Delgado, Las pequeñas y medianas capitales, 213. Solà-Morales divides Spanish
21
urbanization process in the long term in a different manner, accentuating the role of the more
recent urban growth (between the 1950s and 1960s). However, the author points out that the
1920s witnessed the initial take-off of the large metropolises, besides being one of the key
periods of Spanish urban growth. He also remarks that industrialization was the most
important structural factor of urban growth. Manuel Solà-Morales, Las formas del crecimiento
urbano (Barcelona: UPC, 1974), 9-14. Industrial development and diversification, from which
the more active cities benefited (Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia, Saragossa or Bilbao)
demonstrate this behavior.
15
Monclús, “Las ciudades españolas”: 358. Reher, “Ciudades, procesos de urbanización”.
16
Luis Racionero, Sistemas de ciudades y ordenación del territorio (Madrid: Alianza, 1978).
Horacio Capel, Estudios sobre el sistema urbano (Barcelona: Universidad de Barcelona,
1974).
17
Manuel González (ed), Los orígenes de una metrópoli industrial: la Ría de Bilbao (Bilbao:
Fundación BBVA, 2001). José L. Oyón (ed), Urbanismo, ciudad, historia (II). Vida obrera en
la Barcelona de entreguerras, 1918-1936 (Barcelona: Centre de Cultura Contemporània,
1998). José Almuedo, Ciudad e Industria. Sevilla 1850-1930 (Sevilla: Diputación Provincial,
1996). Eloy Fernández and Carlos Forcadell, “Crecimiento económico, diversificación social
y expansión urbana en Zaragoza, 1900-1930”, in J.L. García (ed), Las ciudades en la
modernización de España. Los decenios interseculares (Madrid: Siglo XXI, 1992): 433-457.
José L. García, “Madrid en los decenios interseculares: la economía de una naciente capital
moderna”, in J.L. García (ed), Las ciudades en la modernización de España: 405-414. Joaquín
Sorribes, “Creixement econòmic, burgesia i creixement urbà a la València de la Restauració
(1874-1931)”, Recerques, no. 15 (1984): 99-124. Ramón M. Alvargonzález, Gijón:
22
Industrialización y crecimiento urbano (Gijón: Ayalga, 1977).
18
Jesús Mirás, “The Commercial Sector in an early-twentieth century Spanish City. La
Coruña 1914-1935”, Journal of Urban History, (2006), forthcoming. Carmen García,
Actividad comercial y espacio urbano: la organización espacial del comercio minorista en la
ciudad de Albacete (Universidad de Castilla La Mancha, 1995). Juan Trespalacios, Estudio del
sector comercial en la ciudad de Oviedo (Oviedo: Universidad de Oviedo, 1992). Félix
Luengo, Crecimiento económico y cambio social. Guipúzcoa 1917-1923 (Bilbao: Universidad
del País Vasco, 1990). Manuel J. González, Diferenciación socioeconómica en la ciudad de
León (Universidad de León, 1987).
19
Jesús Mirás, “El puerto y la actividad económica en la ciudad de A Coruña, 1914-1935”,
Geo Crítica/Scripta Nova, no. 177 (2004). Carlos Larrínaga, “Ciudad, economía e
infraestructura urbana: San Sebastián a mediados del siglo XIX”, VI Congreso de la
Asociación de Historia Económica (Girona, 1997): 75-80. C. Gómez, La ciutat de Tarragona
a l’època de la Dictadura de Primo de Rivera: aspectes de la vida urbana (Tarragona: Cercle
d’Estudis Històrics i Socials “Guillem Oliver”, 1994). Juan Morilla, “La economía de Málaga,
1890-1930”, in J.L. García (ed), Las ciudades en la modernización de España: 323-343.
Joaquín Sorribes, “La transición urbana: Método y resultados. Valencia 1874-1931”, in J.L.
García (ed), Las ciudades en la modernización de España: 197-222. E. Fernández, El
comercio minorista en la ciudad de Alicante (Alicante: Caja de Ahorros Provincial, 1991).
Julio Pérez, “Demografía y urbanización en Cádiz: dos siglos de relaciones”, in V. Gozálvez
(coord), Los procesos de urbanización: Siglos XIX y XX (Alicante: Instituto Juan Gil-Albert,
1991): 165-174. Javier Vidal, Comerciantes y políticos. Alicante (1875-1900) (Alicante:
Instituto Juan Gil-Albert, 1987).
23
20
Eduardo Cáceres, La formación urbana de Las Palmas (Las Palmas: ETS Arquitectura,
1980).
21
Jorge Romero, “Bibliografía sobre terciarización urbana, comercio y consumo”, Revista de
Geografía, vol. XXIX (1995): 115-131. Bairoch, Cities and Economic Development.
22
González points out that the process of growth and change failed in the majority of Spanish
cities, as the dynamism observed in the nineteenth century was short-haul, and after the initial
take-off, many of them suffered a prolonged stagnation and “lethargy”. Only the largest cities
managed to escape from this scheme by the early twentieth century. Esmeralda González,
“Industrialización y desarrollo metropolitano en España”, Ería, no. 26 (1991): 200.
23
Delgado, Las pequeñas y medianas capitales, 24. Elena Estalella and Enrique Gubern,
“Estructura funcional de las ciudades españolas en 1900”, Estudios Geográficos, no. 118
(1970): 27). Monclús, “Las ciudades españolas”: 358.
24
Alejandro López, “El impacto espacial del comercio de Lugo sobre su provincia”, in R.
Domínguez (coord), La ciudad. Tamaño y crecimiento (Málaga: Universidad de Málaga,
1999): 111-121. Enric Vicedo (ed), Empreses i institucións econòmiques contemporánies a les
terres de Lleida, 1850-1990 (Lleida: Institut de Estudis Ilerdenscs, 1999). Emilio Arroyo et
al., El sistema urbano de la ciudad de Jaén (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1992). Pedro
Armas, La organización del espacio lucense (Lugo: Diputación Provincial, 1990). Franscisco
Rodríguez, Valor y usos del suelo urbano (Santiago: Universidade, 1989). Félix Pillet,
Geografía urbana de Ciudad Real (1255-1980) (Madrid: Akal, 1984). Miguel A. Troitiño,
Cuenca: Evolución y crisis de una vieja ciudad industrial (Madrid: MOPU, 1984). Manuel
García, Geografía urbana de Teruel (Teruel: CSIC, 1983). Joaquín Callizo, “Huesca, un
estudio de geografía urbana”, Geographicalia, 6 (1980): 3-62. Eduardo Martínez, Segovia.
24
Evolución de un paisaje urbano (Madrid: Colegio de Ingenieros de Caminos, Canales y
Puertos, 1976).
25
Julio Vinuesa, “Dinámica de la población urbana en España (1857-1991)”, Ciudad y
Territorio. Estudios Territoriales, no. 107/108 (1996): 195. Jacinto Rodríguez, Población y
territorio en España. Siglos XIX y XX (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1985): 26-29.
26
Salustiano del Campo and Manuel Navarro, Nuevo análisis de la población española
(Barcelona: Ariel, 1987): 114-115.
27
Fernando Mikelarena, “Estructura económica, evolución cuantitativa de la población y
balances migratorios de las capitales de provincia españolas en el período 1860-1930. Un
análisis comparativo”, in M. González and K. Zárraga (eds), Los movimientos migratorios en
la construcción de las sociedades modernas (Bilbao: Universidad del País Vasco, 1996): 87114.
28
Monclús, “Las ciudades españolas”: 358.
29
Mario Cerutti and Jesús M. Valdaliso, “Monterrey y Bilbao (1870-1914). Empresariado,
industria y desarrollo regional en la periferia”, História económica & História de empresas,
vol. VII (2004): 55.
30
31
Cerutti and Valdaliso, “Monterrey y Bilbao”: 55-56.
Carles Carreras, Geografía urbana de Barcelona. Espai mediterrani, temps europeu
(Barcelona: Oikos-Tau, 1993): 123-128, 140.
32
Francisco Sánchez, “Madrid, 1914-1923. Los problemas de una capital en los inicios del
siglo XX”, Mélanges de la Casa de Velázquez, vol. XXX (1994): 42. Santos Juliá, “De
revolución popular a revolución obrera”, Historia Social, no. 1 (1988).
33
Estíbaliz Ruiz, “Madrid en 1900: La capital del sistema educativo”, Arbor, no. 666 (2001):
25
519-539. Santos Juliá, “Madrid, capital del Estado 1833-1933”, in D. Ringrose et al. (eds),
Madrid. Historia de una capital (Madrid: Alianza, 1994). García, “Madrid en los decenios”:
406. Angel Bahamonde and Luis E. Otero, “Madrid, de territorio fronterizo a región
metropolitana (II)”, in Juan P. Fusi (dir.), España. Autonomías (Madrid: Espasa Calpe, 1989),
vol. V.
34
Sánchez, “Madrid, 1914-1923”: 55-58. García, “Madrid en los decenios”: 406-407). Santos
Juliá, “En los orígenes del Gran Madrid”, in J.L. García (ed), Las ciudades en la
modernización de España: 415, 425. José M. Sanz, Madrid ¿Capital del capital?
Contribución a la Geografía Urbana y a las funciones socio-económicas de la Villa y Corte
(Madrid: Instituto de Estudios Madrileños, 1973).
35
García, “Madrid en los decenios”: 408.
36
Sánchez, “Madrid, 1914-1923”: 59-61.
37
Javier Silvestre, “Inmigraciones interiores e industrialización: El caso de la ciudad de
Zaragoza durante el primer tercio del siglo XX”, Revista de Demografía Histórica, vol. XX
(2004): 65-69.
38
Luis Germán, “Hacia una tipología del crecimiento económico moderno regional en España.
En torno al «éxito de las regiones ibéricas»: el caso de la provincia de Zaragoza”, VI Congreso
de la Asociación de Historia Económica (Girona, 1997): 11-12.
39
Fernández and Forcadell, “Crecimiento económico, diversificación social”: 442.
40
María J. Teixidor, València, la construcció d'una ciutat (València: Institució Alfons el
Magnànim/Diputaciò de València, 1982), 12. Pedro Pérez, “La dinámica histórica del Área
Metropolitana de Valencia”, Cuadernos de Geografía, no. 28 (1981): 91.
41
Joaquín Azagra, Propiedad inmueble y crecimiento urbano: Valencia, 1800-1931 (Madrid:
26
Síntesis, 1993).
42
43
Sorribes, “La transición urbana”: 197-200. Teixidor, València, la construcció, 97-104.
Manuel Sanchís, La ciudad de Valencia. Síntesis de Historia y de Geografía Urbana
(Valencia: Ajuntamente de València, 1999), 591-592. Pérez, “La dinámica histórica”: 99.
44
Teresa Carnero, “La modernización de la ciudad (1895-1935): Cambios y persistencias”, in
J.L. García (ed), Las ciudades en la modernización de España: 190.
45
Enrique Clemente, Desarrollo urbano y crisis social en Ferrol (Salamanca: COAG, 1984),
70.
46
Andrés Precedo et al., Vigo, área metropolitana (La Coruña: Caixa Galicia, 1988), 17.
47
Xosé M. Souto, Vigo. Cen anos de historia urbana (1880-1980) (Vigo: Xerais, 1990), 23.
48
Xosé M. Souto, “Xénese e evolución da paisaxe e o urbanismo en Vigo”, in Xosé Vázquez
(ed), Vigo. Economía e Sociedade (Vigo: Xerais, 2003): 70.
49
Souto, Vigo. Cen anos de historia urbana, 23.
50
Morilla, “La economía de Málaga”: 337.
51
Damián López and Antonio Santiago, “Industrialización/desindustrialización malagueña en
los siglos XIX y XX: una nueva aproximación”, Estudios Geográficos, no. 207 (1992): 310331.
52
The presence of clergy activities in many Spanish cities has led to coin the term
“ecclesiastical cities”, constituted in 1900 by Ávila, Huesca, Palencia, Toledo, Murcia,
Girona, Jaén, Granada, Tarragona, Cuenca, Segovia, Lleida or Burgos, in which the weight of
the clergy was above the national average. Estalella and Gubern, “Estructura funcional”: 24.
Díez, “Ciudad «levítica»”.
53
Larrínaga, “Ciudad, economía e infraestructura urbana”.
27
54
Pedro Andrés, El sector industrial en la ciudad de León y su entorno (León: Universidad de
León, 1994). Pedro Arriola, La producción de una ciudad-máquina del capital: VitoriaGasteiz (Bilbao: Universidad del País Vasco, 1991). Jesús García, Crecimiento y estructura
urbana de Valladolid (Barcelona: Los Libros de la Frontera, 1974).
55
56
García, La formación de una ciudad industrial, 9.
The crisis of the traditional agricultural economy of the second half of the nineteenth
century played an ambivalent role in the Spanish process of urbanization. On the one hand, the
rural exodus was responsible for the demographic growth of the cities. On the other hand, the
agrarian character of many urban hinterlands restricted urban growth, as a consequence of the
limitations of the national market. Delgado, Las pequeñas y medianas capitales, 55.
57
Delgado, Las pequeñas y medianas capitales, 53.
58
Amparo Ferrer and Amparo González, “Evolución demográfica y socioprofesional de la
ciudad de Granada (siglos XVI-XX)”, Demófilo, no. 35 (2000): 23. Carnero, “La
modernización de la ciudad”: 190. Joaquín Casariego, Las Palmas. Dependencia,
marginalidad y autoconstrucción (Madrid: IEAL, 1987), 29. Agustí Segarra, “Evolución
demográfica de Castellón de la Plana (1857-1936)”, Boletín de la Sociedad Castellonense de
Cultura, vol. LXII (1986): 151. Javier Vidal, “Burguesía y negocios: la especulación en el
sector servicios de la ciudad de Alicante a fines del siglo XIX (1880-1900)”, Anales de la
Universidad de Alicante, no. 2 (1983): 161.
28