Industrial Revolution

WORKER’S SOCIETIES

The 1830’s were the first period of organization of the Catalan working class, which was mainly concentrated in Barcelona being the most industrial city in the region and the whole State. This was a period when the solidarity of the class, which was essential to reach necessary improvements in working and living conditions of the industrial workers, was already becoming visible.

Workers' societies were created in Barcelona at the beginning of the 1840s, after the first strikes a few years before against working conditions in the textile sector, and for the right to organise and be allowed to negotiate collectively with their bosses.


One of the objectives of the fights and re-vindications of these first years was to gain the right of association. This possibility arrived during the first period of the regency of General Espartero. So, in 1840, in Barcelona, the first working society of the State was born: the ‘Associació de Protecció Mútua de Teixidors de Cotó’ [Association of Mutual Protection of Weavers of Barcelona], better known as the ‘Societat de Teixidors’ [Society of Weavers].
Two years later, this association had spread beyond Barcelona, with sections in Olot, Vic, Igualada, Sabadell and Mataró, gathering close to 50.000 members.
These early workers' associations were usually formed around a trade. When the revolutionary political context allowed it, they organised themselves collectively and formed bodies such as the first Junta Central [Central Committee] in 1841, the Junta Central de Directors de la Classe Obrera [Central Committee of Working Class Directors] in 1855, and the Direcció Central de Societats Obreres [Central Administration of Workers' Societies] in 1868. In 1888, the state-wide Unión General de Trabajadores [General Workers Union] was created in Barcelona.
We would have to wait until 1868, with the triumph of the revolution and the start of the Democratic Sexennium, to make the reorganization of the Catalan working class a reality. A symbol of this recuperation was the creation, in 1869, of the ‘Federació de les Tres Classes de Vapor’ [Federation of the Three Vapour Classes], which gathered together spinners, weavers, mechanics and day labourers of the textile industry.
During this period the introduction of new ideologies amongst the working class also occurred. In 1869, the AIT sent a representative called Farinelli to the Spanish State, to promote his ideas. A supporter of Bakunin, more than of Marx, Farinelli promoted the basis of anarchism and his non-political views.
These were ideas that soured amongst the majority of working associations, as can be see in the working congress held in Barcelona in 1870. The assistants approved their adhesion to the AIT, proclaimed the non-political views of their movement and constituted the ‘Federació Regional Espanyola de l’AIT’ [Spanish Regional Federation of the AIT].