A-Infos (en) Italy, FDCA, Cantiere #46 - 1936: The CNT, Money, and the Spanish Revolution - Jade Saab* (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

This article is an adapted translation of a text by Jade Saab, a 
Lebanese-Canadian researcher and activist. She examines the 
contradictions and difficulties of the money question in the Spanish 
Revolution (1936-1937) through the strategic choices of the National 
Labor Confederation (CNT). She analyzes the attempt to abolish money, 
the limitations encountered by the state's maintenance of financial 
institutions, and emphasizes the need for a more coherent revolutionary 
approach to this question. Socialists have long considered money a 
central instrument of capital. By regulating not only exchanges and 
social relations, it also reinforces the domination, alienation, and 
fragmentation of workers. Its abolition thus became a key goal for 
revolutionaries. Karl Marx warned unions against excessive focus on 
day-to-day struggles, urging them instead to focus on the abolition of 
the wage system, an idea also echoed by the American union, the 
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). Piotr Kropotkin, the main 
theoretician of anarcho-communism, clarified that this implied not a new 
currency, but an organization based on the needs and capabilities of 
each individual.

Despite this theoretical consensus, historical examples are rare. The 
Paris Commune did not abolish money, and the Russian Revolution 
maintained, and even further complicated, the wage system. Revolutionary 
theories often treat this abolition as a secondary issue, or one that 
occurred after the overthrow of the state. Here, we propose to revisit 
some significant events of the Spanish Revolution, a prime example of 
how money and financial institutions appear to have been insufficiently 
strategically designed by the CNT.

The CNT at the heart of the revolution

The Spanish Revolution must be understood as the culmination of a long 
"spiral of social conflict"[1], in which the opposing camps-the Church, 
the army, and the landowners on the one hand, the trade unions on the 
other-triggered a process of mutual radicalization, culminating in a 
final struggle for hegemony. This final phase took the form of a failed 
coup d'état, staged by General Francisco Franco in July 1936 and 
subsequently degenerated into civil war. If the coup is seen as the 
trigger for the revolution, its roots lie in a series of earlier armed 
insurrections, particularly those of January 1933 (led by the CNT) and 
August 1934 (staged by the Socialist Party and supported by the CNT).

In May 1936, the CNT synthesized its theoretical elaboration of the 
revolution and the type of society it desired in the confederal concept 
of libertarian communism .[2]The proposal summarized the organization's 
position on money and supported the paradoxical idea that, although the 
rules of production and exchange should be subject to the principle of 
"from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs", 
"producer's cards" would still be necessary, certifying "the value of 
the work done by the owner". This contradictory position was linked to 
the pluralist nature of the CNT and reflected the divergences between 
its rural and urban sections. Divergences that became concrete after the 
coup d'état.

Franco's coup d'état broke out in Spanish Morocco on 17 July 1936. 
Numerous garrisons throughout Spain joined the rebellion and some 
managed to take over cities. Others remained loyal to the Republic. In 
several cases, barracks were attacked by armed workers who redistributed 
weapons and created trade union militias. As a result, after the failure 
of the coup, the central state lost control of its coercive apparatus, a 
situation of dual power arose, with the CNT in the central position[3].

Soon after, workers seized a third of the rural territory of Republican 
Spain, equal to about two-thirds of the arable land. Organized into 
agricultural collectives[4], they also requisitioned factories and 
services in the sectors of heavy industry, energy, water and commerce. 
In Catalonia, 80% of the enterprises were controlled by workers[5]. 
These agricultural collectives were governed by revolutionary committees 
invested with legislative and executive powers[6].

In rural agricultural communities, money was replaced by ration cards 
that granted workers free access to food depending on their family 
size[7]. In urban communities, a system of producer cards was 
introduced. The distribution of goods was based on the worker's 
production. In some communities, however, wages and the monetary system 
were maintained due to opposition from non-CNT workers[8]. Wages were 
increased and numerous previously inaccessible benefits were introduced, 
such as holidays and free health care.

To facilitate the organization of work on a national scale, the CNT 
established the National Industrial Federations (FIN)[9]. Rural 
agricultural collectives initiated systems of exchange and barter with 
neighboring towns and created local and regional federations[10]. 
"Libertarian communism" seemed to be taking root.

Financial institutions were neglected

While workers at the front were rapidly reorganizing the economy along 
libertarian lines, the CNT leaders abandoned the idea of pushing the 
revolution to its most radical conclusions. Instead, they chose to join 
the central government. The CNT justified this decision by arguing that 
the state, understood as an instrument of repression in the service of 
Capital, no longer existed. This reasoning would prove to be flawed.

The CNT was given secondary ministries within what it called a 
"revolutionary government", but found itself without any real capacity 
for influence. Dominated by the Socialist Party, the central government 
was primarily interested in maintaining good relations with France, 
England and Belgium, protecting their economic interests[11]. This was 
considered necessary to guarantee supplies of weapons, which were 
dramatically insufficient in the war against Franco. But this 
orientation towards European democracies put the central government in 
direct opposition to the autonomous agricultural workers' collectives. 
To demonstrate its control over the Republican territories, the 
government launched a campaign aimed at "normalising" the agricultural 
collectives through a double process of legalisation and economic isolation.

This task was facilitated by the CNT's disinterest in financial 
institutions. The CNT's belief in the abolition of money-replaced by 
non-monetary exchanges-led it to neglect the organization of workers 
within financial institutions, and when the CNT decided to enter 
government, no effort was made to take control of it. One exception was 
a plan, drawn up by a CNT militia in Madrid but quickly abandoned, which 
involved the theft of the government's gold reserves .[12]

In the wave of expropriation of factories and lands, the banks remained 
untouched. The CNT believed they would no longer play any role in a 
post-revolutionary society. Thus, although the agricultural collectives 
federated into the FIN, they did not integrate into the networks of 
non-nationalized factories nor into those controlled by other political 
parties or collectives. Their economic sustainability was therefore not 
guaranteed. Furthermore, the central government quickly regained control 
of foreign trade.

Agricultural communities could no longer bypass Madrid for economic 
exchanges or the supply of materials and equipment.

The central state quickly deprived the agricultural communities of the 
necessary financial resources.

The revolutionary councils that administered these communities were 
progressively replaced by traditional municipalities dependent on Madrid.

This process of legalization and integration became a general feature of 
the revolution and also extended to the trade union militias and the 
popular courts. The interference of the central government in the 
management of finances and resources caused uncontrolled inflation in 
the Republican territories[13], a deterioration in the quality of 
weapons[14]and, finally, defeat by Franco's troops.

The lessons of this Revolution

What can we learn from the Spanish case? The CNT's decision to join the 
central government and its rejection of the transition to a moneyless 
society are both linked to a flaw in its revolutionary theory.

As developed in the "concept of confederal libertarian communism," the 
CNT ignored the fact that, during a revolution, power is polycentric: 
multiple centers of power vie simultaneously for hegemony. The 
transition of power does not simply occur from one camp to another, even 
when power is decentralized. The parallel emergence of the agricultural 
collectives and the central state dragged the CNT into a complex 
situation, in which pursuing revolutionary goals meant entering into 
direct conflict with other centers of power, formally allied against 
Franco. Once in government, the CNT's lack of a trade union presence 
within financial institutions granted the central government a decisive 
advantage in terms of economic resources over the collectives. The CNT 
thus found itself without the influence necessary to maintain the gains 
made in the early stages of the revolution.

Some authors[15]argue that the main mistake of the CNT was not to have 
carried the revolution to its conclusion. However, even a possible 
victory of the CNT would not have necessarily resulted in a society 
without money. Contempt for financial institutions would have worked 
against it anyway.

If revolutions are primarily local events, they must nevertheless take 
into account the international political dimension. Even if an anarchist 
Spain had emerged, it could not have completely done without money, 
which was necessary to function and exchange within a capitalist world. 
Moreover, in the CNT's conception of libertarian communism, forcing 
people to use money or forcing them to join agricultural collectives was 
considered unacceptable. In the post-revolutionary society envisioned by 
the CNT, individuals could remain independent of the collectivist 
system; and this is what the CNT did during the war, allowing those who 
did not want to join collectives to keep their plots of land .[16]

Is it therefore impossible to build a moneyless society immediately 
after the revolution? Should we instead adopt a gradualist approach? Not 
necessarily. In any revolutionary theory that aims to abolish the use of 
money, it becomes important to consider a post-revolutionary dual 
system: a system in which internal affairs function without money, but 
in which a monetary system is simultaneously maintained to manage 
interstate relations and exchanges with individuals outside the 
collective system. Both systems would, however, remain faithful to the 
values of the revolution, such as the abolition of exploitation.

Integrating this parallel approach into revolutionary theory means that 
pre-revolutionary organizations should not ignore financial institutions 
as a battleground-including all those institutions presumed to disappear 
in a post-revolutionary system. This may seem counterintuitive. Why 
would a revolutionary organization concern itself with institutions 
that, in theory, should no longer exist after the revolution? Because, 
on the one hand, a parallel system would imply that such institutions 
would not immediately become obsolete. On the other, since power during 
a revolution is polycentric-and sometimes competitive-organizing within 
these institutions can divert valuable resources from other centers of 
power. Developing revolutionary theories that better integrate these 
parallel systems would therefore avoid the same mistakes made by the CNT.

*) Article published in n. 371, May 2026, Alternative Libertaire edited 
by Niels Zwarteveen

[1]1 George Lawson, Anatomies of Revolution, Cambridge University Press, 
2019, p. 184.

[2]2 The full text is available in English at Theanarchistlibrary.org

[3]3 Jose Peirats, The CNT in the Spanish Revolution, Volume 1, The 
Meltzer Press, 2001, p. 131.

[4]4 Robert Alexander, The Anarchists in the Spanish Civil War, Janus 
Publishing Company Limited, 1999, p. 326.

[5]5 Ibid, p. 463.

[6]6 Ibid, p. 332   ; Stuart Christie, We, the Anarchists  !, AK Press, 
2002, p. 186  ; Hugh Thomas, «  Anarchist agrarian collectives in the 
Spanish civil war  », The Republic and the Civil War in Spain, R. Carr, 
1971, p. 240  ; Burnett Bolloten, The Spanish Civil War: Revolution and 
counterrevolution, University of North Carolina Press, 1991, p. 65-66.

[7]7 Alexander, op. cit., p. 329; Thomas, op. cit., p. 250.

[8]8 Alexander, op. cit., p. 533.

[9]9 Jose Peirats, The CNT in the Spanish Revolution, Volume 2, Christie 
Books, 2005, p. 32.

[10]10 Alexander, op. cit., p. 329.

[11]11 Bolloten, op. cit., p. 227.

[12]12 Alexander, op. cit., p. 175.

[13]13 Martín-Aceña, Pablo, Elena Martinez Ruiz et María A. Pons., «War 
and economics: Spanish civil war finances revisited», European Review of 
Economic History 16 no 2, 2012, p. 158.

[14]14 Kowalsky, Daniel. «  Operation X: Soviet Russia and the Spanish 
Civil War  », Bulletin of Spanish Studies 91 no 1-2, 2014, p. 168-169.

[15]15 See for example the work of Vernon Richard Lessons of the Spanish 
Revolution .

[16]16Alexander, op. cit., p. 372.

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