Women, feminism and intergenerational relationships in the Canary Islands’ anti-NATO movement

Abstract

The mobilisation against Spain’s membership in NATO during the first half of the 1980s involved different parties, organisations and individuals committed to pacifism and antimilitarism. This paper, which considers the case of the Canary Islands, where there was broad support for the No vote in the 1986 referendum, proposes a new approach to the history of pacifism in Spain by focusing on women and relationships between generations. Based on archival sources and oral testimonies, it analyses tensions between different ways of understanding commitment, international politics and the role of women and feminism in the pacifist movement, as well as the inheritance and exchanges, common references and mutual learning over three generations of women. Special attention is also paid to their relationships with men of different generations within the anti-NATO movement, as well as to family networks and genealogies which promoted intergenerational exchanges. Our study sheds light on generational renewal in feminism and pacifism.