Causes of the antimilitarism and antibelicism of the Spanish citizens: The impact of the military service (1808-2001)

Abstract

The article defends the thesis that the opposition of a large part of the population to military service was the main cause of the anti-militarist and anti-war sentiment that characterizes the Spanish society even today. To this end, the manifestations of this rejection will be presented since the War of Independence, where the first symptoms of this phenomenon appeared. Then, we will consider the incidence of the cash redemption and substitution during the liberal period, with the wars of Santo Domingo, Cuba and the Philippines in the last thirty years of the nineteenth century and that of Morocco in the twentieth century. The article will conclude with an analysis of the impact that conscientious objection and insubmission had on the suspension of the military service in the year 2000. For writing this article, the author has used a wide range of testimonies, legislative and sociological sources, as well as the abundant literature available on the subject.