A New Era for Women: How Gender Roles Changed During the Spanish Civil WarBy: Isabel Cassidy-SotoAn Introduction to the Civil War:The conflict that erupted in the 1930s and 1940s in Spain it can be defined as a struggle between the two ideologies of Spanish society; traditionalists who wanted to remain faithful to conservative Catholic values ​​and republicans who sought to embrace the wave of progressive modernism that had already swept much of the Western world. Spain was once the most powerful empire in the world, but due to conflicting political beliefs, a broken and ever-changing political system, and a destroyed economy, by the late 1800s it had collapsed into a divided country where the chaos. Thousands of people lived in complete poverty and misery, working jobs that could not support their growing families. Infant mortality skyrocketed as the economy collapsed. As the economy lurched from one crisis to another, the population began to protest against the government's draconian censorship, forcing militaristic dictator Miguel Primo de Rivera to resign. His resignation led to the country's first real step towards democracy, the Second Spanish Republic. During the municipal elections, new radically ideological political parties began to emerge, both far left and right. Right-wing parties were supported by royalists, the upper classes, conservatives and the Catholic church. However, among these parties was the small, but rapidly growing, fascist Falanx party created by Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, son of the former dictator and a man who would have a startling influence on the lives of thousands of people, even long after his death. The Falange attempted to restore Spain to its former glory under the rule of a power... middle of paper... during the civil war and its aftermath. The law forced people to recognize and talk about what their country had been through and how society could be repaired. Relatives of those exiled by Franco's regime were granted citizenship, public statues of Franco were removed, and mass graves from the civil war were discovered, along with plans to exhume and rebury the corpses. This cultural phenomenon really shows us that for now democracy and freedom reign in Spain. Under the rule of socialist President Zapatero, women actually held more positions of power within Congress than men. Today, women are very involved politically and in the business world, as countless laws have been passed ensuring equality in the workplace. Companies cannot be run only by men and at least 40% of municipal or national candidates representing a political party must be women.