Vicissitudes of academic freedom in the twentieth century (1900-1970) with special reference to non-university education

Abstract

In the legal and educational history of the Spanish twentieth century, the right to academic freedom oscillates between stages of recognition and denial depending on the political regimes and the consequent regulatory developments. Each of them reflects a certain conception of education, of the purpose of teaching and of the teaching practice in accordance with more or less traditionalist, religious or modernist visions. As outstanding examples, during this historical period we witnessed the creation of the Ministry of Public Instruction, the first recognition in a constitutional text of this freedom for all teachers, with the Constitution of the Spanish Republic of December 9, 1931, and the long period of denial and effective annulment of it during Franco’s political regime. The aim of this study is to describe and analyze the evolution of this freedom distinguishing four major periods in the advances and setbacks of educational policies in our country: the dawn of the twentieth century with the creation of the Ministry of Public Instruction, the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera, the Second Republic and the Franco regime until the approval of the General Law of Education of 1970.