Introduction

Although this book is a social history, politics is at its heart. Political events set the chronology, from 1808 and the Napoleonic invasion which began the final disintegration of the Old Regime, to 1982 and the overwhelming electoral victory of the Socialist Party which confirmed the triumph of democracy following the death of Francisco Franco in 1975. Politics also determines the internal organization, with the Spanish Civil War as the dividing line between a long section on Spain from 1800 to 1936 and a shorter one on the period since 1939.