V.

El Caudillo

During the war Franco also set about constructing a new type of authoritarian state that he intended to rule after the war’s end. This system was later called the Nuevo Estado (New State). Franco based the political, economic, and social structures of his regime on fascism and corporatist ideas. Fascism required unquestioning loyalty to the state and, in particular, to Franco as Spain’s leader. Corporatism promoted a close collaboration between employers and workers under the direction of the state. Corporatist policies aimed to regulate the economy by controlling conditions of work, wages, prices, production, and exchange.

One of his first steps towards building the Nuevo Estado was to issue the Decree of Unification in 1937. This decree gave Franco supreme authority by abolishing right-wing political parties and merging all Nationalists into one party under his own control, the Falange Española Tradicionalista de las JONS (FET). His next step was to forcibly consolidate all working-class groups in Nationalist Spain into one large organization, the Organización Sindical Española (Spanish Trade Union Organization, OSE) that was completely subordinated to the FET. This was a corporatist policy Franco believed would help create the basis for a harmonious relationship between employers and employees. Then, to give his regime moral authority and to encourage social cohesion, Franco turned to the Roman Catholic Church. The Church’s support of the Nationalists gave the Nuevo Estado legitimacy in the eyes of many Spaniards.

After the war, Franco’s most urgent task was to impose unity and order. To accomplish this, he enforced a policy of repression against all those who, in Franco's opinion, represented a potential threat to the new regime. Thousands of former Republicans were summarily shot or sent to prison while countless others suffered various forms of political and economic punishments. Franco consolidated his control by establishing his authority over the diverse factions that supported him during the war. By shrewdly taking advantage of divisions between the various factions in his administration, he managed to keep any one group from becoming too powerful.