A simple overflow?

Environmental Coloniality in Francoist Spain (1950-1979)

Abstract

This article analyzes the emergence of the critique of the "environmental coloniality" of Spain’s Francoist dictatorship, and how it connected to the foundation of several environmental injustice struggles in Spain. This coloniality can be observed in contemporary critiques of "internal colonialism", which arose during the 1970s. Green intellectuals, such as Mario Gaviria, went as far as to describe three types of environmental colonialism based on classic colonialism: space colonialism, energy colonialism and extractivism. In this article we argue that the Spanish case illustrates that the global colonial system implies a certain capacity for reversibility. In comparison to liberal democracies, the environmental coloniality of a fascist regime involves more violence and repression in the coloniality of power, knowledge, and being. Such reversibility, along with the old patterns of environmental coloniality, prompts historians to criticize the rhetoric of European economic miracles and high-modernity through the lens of decolonial environmental history. We can describe the concept of environmental coloniality from three perspectives. First is the conceptualization of the environment as an object of capitalist appropriation of scientific processes overseen by the State. This perspective can be described in terms of the commodification of nature. Secondly, and related to this first element, is the coercive nature of a fascist state that annuls any decision-making processes or social participation in the field of environmental management. Finally is a fascist state’s violent repression of any form of social contestation. From these three perspectives we can conclude that environmental coloniality gave rise to a cycle of struggles for the defense of land, water, and community life; these struggles can be considered decolonial, because they proposed an alternative model to the authoritarianism of the fascist state.