«Escuelas de democracia»: el tajo y la parroquia como espacios cotidianos de conflictividad durante el franquismo final en el campo altoandaluz

Inhabitants of the rural world in Spain have generally been attributed higher levels of political apathy and acquiescence towards the Francoist dictatorship (1939-1975); but they did not always, nor did most of them, remain passive. The objective of this article is to demystify and reassess the role of the rural world in democratization processes of the 1960s and 1970s in Spain, a period of deterioration in the relationship between the state and the civil society. By looking at episodes of conflict in two of the most dynamic spheres of rural life at that time, the workplace and the Church, we argue that rural society engaged in a democratic learning process through the articulation of protest. The research relies on diverse sources such as letters from people in several eastern Andalusian towns in the provinces of Jaén, Málaga, Granada and Almería along with records from the clandestine Communist Party radio station La Pirenaica, which are available in the AHPCE. We also include the activity reports of clergy from Andalusian dioceses, generated by the Ministry of Information and Tourism, and the annual reports of Civil Governors, both of which are conserved in the state archives (AGA).