AUTOMOBILES AND TOURISM AS INDICATORS OF DEVELOPMENT IN SPAIN, 1918–1939

Abstract The development of motor vehicles and their mass production and consumption during the first decades of the twentieth century had significant economic and social effects. The developed Atlantic countries, world leaders in vehicle production, were the protagonists of the success of the car. However, the globalization brought about by the second industrial revolution drew in other countries on the periphery, thanks to transport technologies, telecommunications, and the media. Thus, the consumption patterns and lifestyles of the ‘centres’ and the ‘peripheries’ tended to become more uniform, especially among the urban population. This included an interest in travelling and leisure activities in general. The link between the use of motor vehicles and new tourism practices in Spain between 1918 and 1939 provides an excellent viewpoint from which both to analyse the country's economic and social transformation during this period and to relativize the degree of backwardness observed in Spain in other studies. In this respect, we provide evidence which shows that, despite being a country of the so-called European periphery, Spain had similar patterns of consumption of durable consumer goods, such as the motor vehicle, as other, more advanced countries. There is therefore room to reconsider what has been termed ‘Spanish backwardness’.

and services), or the sociological changes and the associated cultural dimension.  Overall, the study of the history of tourist transport enables us to incorporate new elements into the analysis of the long-term evolution of societies, their economies, and their distribution and consumption patterns.  Mom argues that the analysis of road-traffic motorization in the early twentieth century makes it possible to talk about an Atlantic mobility culture as part of the Western modernization of society.  This was a continuous process rather than a revolutionary change and can be better seen from the perspective of user behaviour as a starting point than from the quantitative and technological development of their vehicles. Thus, the development of the motor vehicle should be studied as an inseparable part of the system, as it became the 'backbone of a consumption-driven society': that is, as a vehicle of modernity. Consequently, the speed and the geographical extension of the propagation of the automobile in the developed countries of the north Atlantic during the interwar years is an indicator of the success or failure of the middle classes in establishing themselves as the crucial social power.
Gijs Mom's approach connects with the foundations of the development economy from the s to the s. In particular, for some defenders of the consumer society, such as George Katona and Walt Rostow, mass consumption and the consumer society are a consequence of the degree of development reached by certain societies.  Thus, among other aspects, this path of development leads to mass consumption of durable goods and services by increasingly broad segments of society. According to Rostow's analysis, this stage was reached by countries such as the United States, Canada, and the UK before the Second World War.  Its zenith was attained in the United States with the  For Mom, the 'toy-to-tool myth', which explains the success of the car based on its (seemingly new) utilitarian properties, was in fact a marketing tool of proponents of the car, a way to sell the car as a 'necessity' at the societal level, and an alibi for indulging in the fun of driving: Mom, Atlantic automobilism, p. .  In other words, the cultural ingredient must go further and act as an accompaniment, and not as a substitute, in any history of tourism or transport, along the lines also argued by John Walton, 'Transport, travel, tourism and mobility: a cultural turn?', Journal of Transport History,  (), pp. -.  Mom, Atlantic automobilism, pp. -.  Walt W. Rostow, Las etapas del crecimiento económico. Un manifiesto no-comunista (Mexico, ; orig. edn ); George Katona, The mass consumption society (New York, NY, ). From a critical perspective, authors such as John Galbraith consider the most appropriate term to be 'affluent society' or 'society of abundance'. The affluent society, according to Galbraith, would be a superfluous society, encouraging appearances and inciting ineffable and antisocial desires: see John K. Galbraith, The affluent society (New York, NY, , orig. edn ). In a more recent work, Jeremy Rifkin presents a critical reflection on the theories of mass consumption and concludes that the phenomenon of mass consumption did not occur spontaneously but rather was driven by production linked to consumption and creating the introduction of the cheap mass production of automobiles, which had a revolutionary impact, both socially and economically. One of the effects that should be highlighted was the conversion of the United States into the leading country in outbound tourism in the s and s, along with the UK, while Canada became one of the world leaders in inbound tourism.  In particular, in some of the Canadian provinces (such as British Columbia), the incorporation of tourism into their development became a real political commitment. Hence, tourism became a key element in the country's particular path of national construction.  Mom notes that most of the studies available on the history of automobilism as part of the economic development of countries have focused on the developed countries of the north Atlantic.  He adds that new research on the countries of the southern European periphery, of 'later motorization', would greatly enrich this approach. This is precisely the aim of this article, focusing on the case of Spain, a country with a slower pace of industrialization than the north Atlantic leaders.  Nevertheless, before the Spanish Civil War (-), the country had already created a sufficiently solid base for tourism, in terms of both supply and demand.  Consequently, the link between the use of motor vehicles and new tourism practices in Spain between  and  provides an excellent viewpoint from which both to analyse the country's economic and social transformation during this period and to relativize the degree of backwardness observed in Spain in other studies. In this respect, it should be remembered that, from the beginning of the twentieth century, tourism became a key activity in the production structure of this country.
Starting from this context, this article aims to show that Spain joined the consumption of automobiles from the very start of the industry. It did so, however, more as a consumer than as a producer of vehicles, unlike Italy.  After the First  For the ranking in -, see League of Nations, Bulletin Mensuel de Statistique,  (), p. .  As explained by, among others, Michael Dawson, Selling British Columbia: tourism and consumer culture, - (Vancouver, ). On the important role that tourism played in fostering a shared sense of American identity in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, see also Marguerite S. Shaffer, See America first: tourism and national identity, - (Washington, DC, ).  Mom, Atlantic automobilism, p. .  The recent social historiography defends the thesis that a reformulation of the so-called 'Spanish backwardness' is necessary. The point is that different nation-states have taken different forms and developed in different ways for particular reasons, and it is this that requires analysis. See Mónica Burguera and Chistopher Schmidt-Nowara, 'Backwardness and its discontents', Social History,  (), pp. -.
 Spain was ahead of Italy in terms of consumption per inhabitant during the s and s: see Margarita Vilar and Rafael Vallejo, 'El automóvil y el turismo en España, -', in Carlos Barciela and G. Luigi Fontana, eds., La industria del automóvil de España e Italia en perspectiva histórica (Alicante, ), pp. -. In , vehicles produced World War, Spain experienced the spread of mass consumer society practices related to motor vehicles: car dealership chains, purchases on credit and in instalments, advertising campaigns, and so forth. The appearance and spread of motor vehicles substantially changed mobility patterns, the scale of markets, criteria for the location of factories, and relations between producers and consumers. Furthermore, it modified the distribution of the population and homes within the country, from the rural world to urban centres, and also undoubtedly revolutionized travel habits and the tourism industry. Motor vehicles, private and collective, became a prime means of tourist mobility during the period under analysis, and had similar economic and social effects (although to a different extent) as in other leading countries. One of these was to socially extend tourism, making it more popular.
In this article, we provide evidence which shows that, despite Spain being a country of the so-called European periphery, the motor vehicle played a significant role in the 'Western modernization' of its society in line with the thesis defended by Mom. Spain was not as different as is often presumed. There is therefore, in this aspect too, room to reconsider what has been termed 'Spanish backwardness'.

I
The industrial diffusion of the motor vehicle had some significant macroeconomic effects before  (on regional and national income, employment, exports, and productivity gains). Simultaneously, there was a whole range of microeconomic impacts, ranging from those on families to the creation of hundreds of goods and services companies for the growing fleet of vehicles in both developed and developing countries. Motor vehicles introduced economic and social changes and were influenced in turn by those changes.  They were present in many facets of life in developed countries, from industrial structures to daily life, including transport infrastructure, urban planning, architecture, factories, press and radio advertising, and, not least, travel and tourism.  They became essential for lifestyles and for the dominant model of developmentso much so, that a General Motors magazine published in Spain in  commented: internally in Spain barely accounted for  per cent of consumption, while Italy almost exclusively consumed nationally produced vehicles ( per cent of the total): see Marcel Ehrmann, L'automobile de turisme en France (Bordeaux, ), pp. -.  The mass use of motor vehicles also has negative aspects, related to their impact on accidents, pollution, the geographical distribution of the population, and the use of public land. An interesting reflection on the benefits and costs of the use of motor vehicles can be found in Peter Freund and George Martin, The ecology of the automobile (Montreal, ).  André Trimbach, Le tourisme international (Paris, ), p. .
If we imagined for a moment the contemporary world without automobiles, wouldn't we experience one of the strangest sensations? How long could we get by without them? Imagine what disruption our current lifestyle would experience. The automobile is no longer only an instrument of luxury and pleasure, it is inherent to our current life and the most powerful aid to our existence.  Ahead of the UK and Germany, France led world production and exports of the new means of transport when the twentieth century began. However, the factor endowment, the size of its market, and innovations in the organization of production, distribution, and sales phases soon enabled the United States and its automobile industry to reach an unassailable position. By , the US already manufactured  per cent of the vehicles that were developed by the six leading producer countries. In , when US production exceeded . million cars, nearly ten times more than in , that world share rose to  per cent. Before the crisis of , the automotive industry belonged to North America, as Canada had climbed to second place in the international ranking ( Table ).
Within this context, the case of Spain allows us to observe a key element: in order to experience these incipient processes, it was not necessary to be a leading country in motor vehicle production. What is more, Spain was a very long way behind the main world automobile producers. It only produced  vehicles in , a figure that placed this country in fifteenth position in the world ranking.  During this period, the production capacity of the main Spanish factories, such as the Hispano-Suiza one located in Barcelona, was constantly underutilized. Thus, instead of gearing itself towards mass production, the industry continued to opt exclusively for a luxury good, at a time when other trends could already be seen in the leading countries. The size of the domestic market, quite modest in the Spanish case, was one of the underlying causes. Another was the existence of a variety of small companies, which moreover produced several models; this obviously prevented the large-scale production that would lower prices. In , the automobile entrepreneur André Citroën was of the opinion that businessmen in a country would only be in a position to produce cars with 'sales prices that can compete with foreigners' when that country reached the threshold of an annual consumption of , vehicles, and, even then, with difficulty. According to Citroën, Spain and Sweden were among the countries where 'they could manufacture cars, find materials, recruit personnel and train the (technical) personnel' for this, but as the former 'does not have more than , cars and the latter ,, there is no doubt that the production of , cars mentioned above, apportioned   among several industrialists and various models, would be difficult to achieve'.  Importance in terms of production was reflected almost directly in the ranking of consumers, although with some exceptions such as Spain, which was a notable consumer but a rather insignificant producer ( Table ). In , the United States and Canada, followed by the United Kingdom, led the world ranking of vehicles per capita. The figures for  and  show that their motorization was already extraordinary, and it further accelerated over the course of the s and 's: in the United States there was one car for every  people in  and one for every  in . Canada experienced a similar progression, since in  there was one car for every  people but by  this had risen to one car for every  people.  Vehicle use was now democratized in these countries. While in France the 'vulgarisation de ce nouveau mode de transport' was taking place in the interwar period, the case in the UK was that 'the middle classes take to the road': in , there was one private car for every  people in France and one for every  in the United Kingdom, ratios that had reached one vehicle per  and  inhabitants, respectively, by . As M. L. Monginet observed in , 'the prodigious development of the automobile industry in all countries of the world has only taken approximately a dozen years. Formerly, luxury vehicles were reserved for a few privileged rich; nowadays, the automobile is available to all social classes.'  Despite the relative backwardness of the Spanish automotive industry in this period, the country had already joined the process of mass consumption of this item, at levels similar to other countries that were more advanced in terms of per capita income ( Table ). This growing domestic demand was mainly met with imported vehicles, to the extent that, in , for example, the consumption of vehicles of national production did not even reach  per cent of total consumption.  Spain, therefore, was a consumer but not a producer of vehicles during the first decades of the twentieth century. Patterns of consumption were similar to those described for the leading countries. The advance was most spectacular after the First World War, when a kind of euphoria of consumption and use of motor cars can be observed, which can partly be explained by the extraordinary profits generated in the short and medium term by Spain's neutrality in this war. During the s and s, Spain was among the top ten countries when ranked by the number of vehicles per , inhabitants.


There were several reasons for the popularization of the motor car in the leading producer countries up to . The productivity gain derived from large-scale production was, of course, one of them, along with the introduction of assembly lines and the spread of mass distribution techniques, which, as Alfred D. Chandler explained, were not available for all industries and were not equally important in all of them.  Assembly-line production quickly increased productivity in factories and reduced prices, which facilitated the social diffusion of cars. A Ford Model T cost $ in ; only eight years later, in , this had dropped to $. As prices continued to fall in the following years, there was an explosion in demand stimulated by marketing techniques such as consumer credits, instalment sales, and the creation of a notable second-hand market. Competition between companies led them to adopt progressive changes in their strategic models, and wage levels also contributed to this explosion. In the s and particularly the s, spurred by the international crisis, companies tended to manufacture smaller carsknown in the UK as 'baby' carswhich were accessible to more people. In the US, the relationship between a worker's wage and the price of a car was more advantageous than in other countries. According to Citroën, the price of a car in  was equivalent to  days' work in the US, while in France it corresponded to - days.   After the First World War, European companies were aware of these differences. Taking into account US multinational expansion (which included the installation of assembly factories and the absorption of local companies), they chose to manufacture competitive models by reducing their prices. Each country responded differently. In France, from , Citroën launched the first European vehicle aimed at the mass market, the Type A Torpedo, which was followed by, among others, the C (), the Citroën Rosalie (), and the CV (). The UK made a start in this race with the small Austin  (-), followed by its rival, the Morris Minor (), restyled in  and the first car to cost as little as £. This and other models such as the Austin  Tourer, which sold for £-£ and had female drivers among its target customers, made vehicles available to thousands of families. During the s, the number of private cars in the UK doubled from one to two million on the eve of the Second World War, and licences for private vehicles, including motorcycles, rose from . million in  to . million in .  We can see similar processes in Germany and Italy. In the former, Opel launched the / PS Laubfrosch model in  and the P- in -, while BMW began producing vehicles in  with the BMW-Dixi, and DKW made its debut in  with the Typ P. These initiatives were the basis for mass motorization in Germany, which was considered strategic to the Third Reich's economic recovery before . Such mass consumption was also pursued in Italy, culminating in  when Fiat marketed its famous Topolino model. This commitment to creating a mass consumption society in Germany and Italy led to great progress being made, with the relatively low ratios of . and . cars per , people, respectively, in , rising considerably to . and . cars per , people in , in line with the figures observed for the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.  In a somewhat more modest position, Spain also experienced this extraordinary motorization. According to official figures, in  there were . cars per , people, a ratio that rose to . in  (Table ). These data show that the relative position of Spain was better than that of other countries in the European periphery such as Italy.
As well as other durable consumer goods that were arriving in stores (refrigerators, electric irons and cookers, vacuum cleaners, etc.), thousands of families in the most developed economies started buying cars in the s and s (in fact, these were already millions in the United States, France, Canada, and the United Kingdom). Thus, a significant part of the family income was absorbed by the cost of purchasing and maintaining motor vehicles.  The change in the patterns of consumption of durable goods in Spain was less intense than in the more developed countries, but the trends were similar. In , for example, the company Puig y Cía. de Barcelona offered 'Totally automatic electric refrigeration units, of the Frigidaire brand, suitable for domestic and commercial use'. This market expanded in the s with brands such as Baker, Remington, Electrolux, and Norge, which sold 'refrigeration chambers, electric washing machines, air conditioners, electric cookers'.  At the same time, 'two-year' hire-purchase agreements appeared for radio sets made by Bremer-Tully, Philips, Telefunken, Clarion, Crosley, and Punto Azul, among others.  The data available on the pattern of consumption of Spanish families, although statistically fragile, show that the country underwent a certain modernization between  and : the weight of 'foodstuffs' fell by  per cent, while the following items all increased: 'clothing and footwear', 'housing and household expenditure' (which included durable consumer goods), and 'other expenses' (including leisure). The real per capita consumption of Spaniards in  was  per cent greater than in .  Just as, from the s, there was an 'irruption of modernity' in the Spanish urban fabric, 'mass society' emerged and the most visible expression of this 'great transformation experienced by urban society' was the combination of electricity, the telephone, the cinematograph, the press, the radio, advertising, sport, fashion, the motor car, and tourism.  Although only  per cent of the population lived in municipalities of more than , inhabitants in , the large cities of more than , inhabitants became increasingly prominent and led the way in establishing the dynamics of Spanish society between the First World War and the Spanish Civil War. This sociological mutationin which the urban middle classes participated, even though their power and influence were far lower than those of their counterparts in the leading countriesran parallel to the convergence of per capita income with developed Europe during the interwar period. The spread of motor vehicles was, as seen above, extraordinarily dynamic and required both provisions on transport policy and adaptation processes in terms of infrastructures and rules. It was necessary to regulate the registration of vehicles, codify traffic regulations, and adapt existing roads to a new means of transport which was faster and more invasive. The car, while providing a solution to some previous problems, generated others of a new nature. Organic pollution caused by horses in big cities, which disappeared as these animals were superseded by cars, was replaced by new types of contamination such as noise pollution, road congestion, and petrol fumes, which added new harmful emissions to the atmosphere on top of those coming from factories and domestic coal consumption.  A new 'disease' also broke out with the car: traffic accidents, which escalated to become a serious twentieth-century epidemic. There were numerous consequences of the diffusion of motor vehicles and these tended to be very similar in all countries where the new means of transport proliferated rapidly, without excessive time lags, in line with a more integrated market and world. It seems clear that the motor vehicle was one of the signs of globalization during the second industrial revolution.
During the interwar period, the motor vehicle, with its invasive capacity, made changes to the existing road system inevitable. It was imperative to widen old roads, modify their camber and the radius of curvature, modernize or strengthen road surfaces, prepare crossings and crossroads, and, in general, extend the boundaries of road networks. Likewise, it was necessary to rethink territorial and urban planning, which was being instigated at this time, in line with the new type of roads necessary to accommodate the new 'mechanical speeds' and the dizzying modification of travel times and accessibility.  During the nineteenth century, the road network became subordinated to the railway network all over the world. However, before the Second World War, the tables had turned in favour of motor vehicles with roads taking precedence over railways. This led to what contemporaries, in Spain and more widely in Europe, called the 'railway problem'.  As the s progressed and regular and discretionary road transport lines expanded at the same rate as, or even at a greater pace than, private vehicles, competition became a problem. This gave rise to policies to help rail transport, in line with demands from powerful railway operators who fought defensively in  every country. However, their attempts were futile because motor vehicles finally won the race. Coaches, buses, and private cars were more flexible and became cheaper, finally replacing rail travel, at least for short-and medium-distance trips. In Spain, the use of motor vehicles, both for the commercial transport of goods and for travellers, became more indispensable than in other countries, due to the low density of railway networks and their comparative shortcomings (slowness, comfort, interconnection, etc.).  Generally speaking, both in Spain and in other countries, the car generated collective enthusiasm and, as remarked on the occasion of the great  Paris Motor Show, it was perceived as an 'index of liberation': Nowadays, everything invites us to leave our homes: the cinematographer shows us all the corners of the world; all the nations, converted into giant hotels, invite us over through their tourist attraction organizations. Wherever we look, we find posters exhorting: 'Visit this place', 'Don't miss that place'. And these stimulating offers are linked to the private vehicle that can take us to all these locations for pleasure or art. Gone are the days of railways, with their lack of privacy, schedules and fixed itineraries. Now is the time for the private car, waiting for us at the door, always ready to take us as a family to wherever our fancy takes us … The automobile offers us the mobility that we so eagerly want, and makes us free, or at least lengthens the chain that ties us to the slavery of daily tasks. This is the real reason why the masses are fascinated with the car: it is an index of liberation.  This account mentions three phenomena where the car was already involved: the emergence of tourism as an international economic phenomenon; the promotion of tourism consumption through 'insinuating calls'; and the vehicle as an instrument for satisfying the new wants and desires that the emerging massconsumption society was generating. Vehicle companies' advertisements and the specialized press both placed the emphasis on the car-freedom equation.  A phenomenon of transnational mobility such as tourism required infrastructures that were articulated at an international level (international circuits), as well as an improvement of national road networks and a proper hierarchical organization in order to facilitate the movement of goods and travellers, given the fact that tourist mobility was a progressive factor from  onwards.  In , Spain approved the National Tourism Circuit, a plan to develop an improved road network in response to 'the great national interest in promoting tourism', carried out by a special body called the Patronato  Luis Marañón, 'Política de transportes', Revista Nacional de Economía, - (), pp. -.  'El XXIII Salón Francés del Automóvil. Celebrado en París del  al  de Octubre de ', Kinos. Automovilismo, Aeronáutica-Turismo,  (Nov. ), p. .  The All British Standard Car Review, which devoted considerable space to women and cars, and which was 'published monthly by the Standard Motor Co., Ltd., Coventry, for the interest, assistance and entertainment of motorists and, especially, "Standard" car owners' (vol. , no. , Mar.-Apr. ), is just one example.
Nacional de Firmes Especiales.  Following the Spanish model, Portugal founded its Junta Autónoma de Estradas in  and drew up a highway code and road plan in , which was redefined in  in order to improve car traffic conditions and connections with Spain, and to equip itself with national roads that guaranteed communications between commercial, industrial, agricultural, and tourism centres and ports and railway stations.  On  May , Mussolini's Italy established its national road board, the Ente Nazionale per le Strade, which, like its state railways, Ferrovie dello Stato, was autonomous, and whose aim was to develop a comprehensive programme for reordering and improving Italian roads. In , the fascist regime approved a highways (major roads) plan, a pioneer initiative in Europe. France had already considered the possibility of building highways in , but its progress was very slow compared to the totalitarian regimes of Mussolini and Hitler's Germany, which had built around , km of these roads by  (Table ). Spain also participated directly in the European debate on 'special roads reserved for motor vehicles', which was inaugurated in the important fifth International Road Congress, held in Milan in , and where the delegations of Italy, the United States, France, and the UK had a prominent role.  The development of roads in those years was not only motivated by tourism, but tourism as a motivation did gain an international presence. This was due to the proliferation of requests arising from the rise of motor vehicle and other forms of tourism. A summary published in a  report from the US Department of Commerce entitled 'Promotion of tourist travel by foreign countries' clearly showed the large group of countries where tourism was a factor of great economic importance. This phenomenon was perceived in the traditional  tourism countries (Switzerland, Italy, and France) but also in others that in the early s were considered as emerging tourism countries, such as Spain.  For this reason, a substantial outlay on advertising abroad was justifiable: nineteen countries in Europe (including Spain), six in the Americas, and eight on other continents invested large amounts of money in keeping tourist offices open in the USA to attract tourists from that country.  During these years, international organizations (mainly the League of Nations), states, regional administrations, and their respective public or private tourism organizations were more active than ever before and adopted three key measures in relation to tourism and road transport.
The first was the creation of major international routes that were solely for motor vehicles (highways), linked to national road networks which connected the main traffic centres quickly and safely. In this regard, the Geneva Congress of , organized by the International Association of Recognised Automobile Clubs, should be mentioned. Four major international routes were established, mainly on the basis of a project devised by Piero Puricelli, spreading a ,-kilometre network of highways throughout Europe 'for the greatest benefit of international tourism'.  The second measure was the construction of 'purely tourist routes' within each country, in order to reach attractive regions with poor access. France was one of the pioneer countries even before the First World War. Its first route touristique was opened in  in Corniche de l'Esterel and put an isolated but charming region, which was not previously very accessible, on the map. The most important route, however, was located in the Alps and was almost finished in  (after which construction was interrupted by the Second World War). Lake routes were the main attraction in Italy, particularly Lake Garda (the Gardesana) and another through the Dolomites, specially adapted for car traffic. Spain also promoted tourist routes as a state project from . These are just a few examples. The car could reach places where trains could not, thereby expanding the geographical limits of tourism. This also stimulated the desire to visit destinations that those seeking to discover new 'sights' pointed out in road maps, tourist guides, or the pages of newspapers dedicated to tourism, which proliferated in Spain from the mid-s.  Third, the international spread of motor vehicles put the regulation of crossborder travel, and the need to simplify documents, requirements, and fees, on  Rafael Vallejo, 'Turismo en España durante el primer tercio del siglo XX: la conformación de un sistema turístico', Ayer,  (), pp. -; Rafael Vallejo, Elvira Lindoso, and Margarita Vilar, 'La dimensión económica del turismo en España: la oferta turística', in Vallejo and Larrinaga, eds., Los orígenes del turismo moderno, pp. -.  Leonard J. Lickorish and A. G. Kershaw, The travel trade (London, ), pp. -.  The four routes were the Euro-African, the Eurasian, the Trans-European, and the Baltic-Adriatic (Trimbach, Le tourisme international, pp. -).
 Dean MacCannel, The tourist: a new theory of the leisure class (New York, NY, ), uses 'sight' to refer to places with tourist charm. political agendas. In this regard, movement had enormous potential. In the interwar period, international travel was largely based on two factors: the recognition of the economic importance of tourism, and its value as a factor of harmony and understanding between nations (tourism diplomacy). The League of Nations was very active in this respect. It recommended simplifying border formalities, reducing or abolishing visa fees, and issuing international driving licences and carnets de passage en douanes (customs passes) for passenger vehicles, thus stimulating tourism. In , around thirty countries authorized the American Automobile Association to issue these documents for American tourists, proof of the importance that car tourism had gained within global tourism.  Thanks to the expansion of motor vehicles in the first third of the twentieth century, and more precisely after the First World War, travel became a real industryamong other reasons because 'commercial transport' (which increased comfort, speed, and safety) was developed at this time.  Transport had traditionally absorbed much of the time and cost of a holiday or tourist trip. Now, the speed of new means of transport and the fall in prices reduced both factors, and brought territories and nations closer together. By the late s, the structure of trips and excursions had visibly changed in international travel. The importance of rail travel had diminished in favour of the car, and air travel was beginning to attract attention. American, Canadian, and Italian tourism statistics from these years reflected the relative importance of the various means of transport. Italian statistics are particularly illustrative in this regard as they show the clear progression of motor vehicle tourism: while in  over half of foreign tourists to Italy travelled by motor vehicle, just three years later that proportion had risen to more than two-thirds. Cross-border tourism between Canada and the United States was even more successful, as could be expected for two countries with a high degree of motorization. In , Canadian visitors entering the United States by road already accounted for  per cent of the total, and in the early s this figure rose to - per cent. Tourists visiting Canada were even more reliant on the car. In ,  per cent of foreign tourists already used this form of transport, and by  this figure had risen to  per cent. The car had taken control of incoming tourism in North America. It was entirely logical, given that the United States and Canada led world car production in , and occupied the top two positions in the world ranking of vehicles per , people ( and , respectively) in .  Finally, collective road transport also helped replace the forms of transport that had previously been used for certain local routes or routes of particular tourist interest. A good example can be found in the route joining Warwick and the famous spa town of Leamington Spa ( miles), where in  the electric tram replaced the horse tram that had been introduced in , and then in  the motor bus definitively replaced the tram.  A guide to Leamington Spa provided the key: the Midland Red bus company (RED Way) offered more frequent trips with greater flexibility to many of the towns and cities in this area of the Midlands, and fares were also cheaper, since passengers could buy a ticket for one day for all West Midland locations connected by the company.  This example provides a glimpse of how roads and motor vehicles won the fight against railways in the United Kingdom and throughout continental Europe.

I I I
The recent historiography on tourism in Spain makes it possible to verify how the cycles of tourism in the country during the first decades of the twentieth century were similar to those of other developed countries.  Moreover, the available figures for inbound tourism show Spain as an emerging country in international tourism: it occupied thirteenth place for foreign tourism revenue in , and had risen to eleventh by .  In the first decades of the twentieth century, tourism became a key sector in Spain both as a means to improve the country's image and because of its capacity to generate positive spillover effects in local economies and, in general, boost the country's modernization. Within this context, tourism was perceived as progress and the state had the obligation to defend it by means of an active tourism policy.  Notable among several initiatives was the creation of an institution called the Comisaría Regia del Turismo y de la Cultura Artística (-) and later the foundation of the National Tourism Board (Patronato Nacional de Turismo) in . The former concentrated on cultural activities and more folkloric aspects of the country, although there was no real connection between tourism bodies and the tourism sector itself. The latter incorporated tourism into the state's agenda of priorities and had the backing of the influential business lobby. In this respect, attention should also be drawn to the National Tourism Board's role in promoting important public works in transport and communications and encouraging the building of hotels with state aid.  All these factors were key elements in developing the sector. Overall, what was being developed during this period was a strategy of tourism policy supported by two pillars: constructing the basic traits of touristic Spain and selling this image abroad.
The arrival of the Second Republic (-) led to a restructuring of the monarchic National Tourism Board, after subjecting it to a severe political and financial audit.  One of the main strategic novelties was making it possible to spread the profits from tourism to the middle and working poorer classes, in stark contrast to the previous body, which had exhibited a more aristocratic and elitist vision. The Republican National Tourism Board also tried to improve Spain's image abroad in order to attract new visitors from other countries. Nevertheless, inadequate funding at a time of budgetary savings, a lack of internal government stability, and the difficult international context after the impact of the Great Depression hindered this task.  However, tourism is only partly the result of tourism policy. Hence, despite the limitations of tourism policies seen above, new forms of mobility during this period implied not only quantitative but also qualitative changes. The mode of travel, the tourism experience, destinations, and attractions all evolved considerably. This was not only true for individuals; the tourism industry was also transformed, as were the forms of tourism this sector promoted. Moreover, the structure of international travel was revolutionized. In Spain, from , when the country's first commercial flight took place, all the means of transport that characterize the modernity of the twentieth century were present: trains, trams, steamships, aeroplanes, and motor vehicles, both private and collective.  This combination of means of transport led to both  The large-scale road building and undertaking of numerous other important public works in Spain during the Primo de Rivera dictatorship (-) was closely related to the simultaneous experience of the Italian fascist regime. In this respect, it should not be overlooked that the Spanish dictator had a persistent tendency to seek inspiration in the Italian mirror, as explained in the work of Juan Avilés, 'Un pálido reflejo del fascismo: la dictadura de Primo de Rivera en los informes diplomáticos italianos', Pasado y Memoria Revista de Historia Contemporánea,  (), pp. -, https://doi.org/./PASADO...  Moreno, 'La política turística', pp. -.  Carmelo Pellejero, 'La política turística durante la República, -', in Vallejo and Larrinaga, eds., Los orígenes del turismo moderno, pp. -.  Javier Vidal, 'Los nuevos sistemas de transporte y el turismo: aportación del automóvil y la aviación a la movilidad en la España del primer tercio del siglo XX', in Vallejo and Larrinaga, eds., Los orígenes del turismo moderno, pp. -.  general and tourist mobility within the country being more intense and more diversified, aided by the proliferation of telephone communications.  Within this process, it should be noted that motorized road transport brought about a swift transformation in the behaviour of tourists, while it also became the backbone of a society that promoted consumption, and it was effectively a link to new lifestyles.  The advance of road mobility was very rapid. Hence, while in  there were only . motor vehicles per , inhabitants, by , just in the category of passenger vehicles, there were now . per , inhabitants. Overall, in  there were almost , motor vehicles in use, distributed as shown in Table .
In this vehicle population, private cars accounted for almost  per cent of this total and, in general, passenger transport vehicles, both private and in public service, accounted for more than three-quarters of the total. We do not have figures for the total number of people who travelled in all of these vehicles. Figures available for the main collective means of land transport in  register  million passengers: that is, thirty-eight trips per inhabitant, given a population of . million ( Table ). It can be seen that local, urban, and metropolitan forms of transport (trams and trolleybuses), moved roughly three-quarters of travellers, followed by trains and buses. Buses (including  coaches), a comparatively cheap means of transport, carried  million passengers in rather more than half the number of train passengers.  During the interwar period there were two basic forms of motor vehicle tourism in Spain. One group was based on car drivers who owned their own vehicles. The other, more numerous, group comprised the users of collective vehicles for tourism purposes, usually travelling in groups. The former grew to significant numbers, although continuing to be of a somewhat elitist nature, while the latter served as a channel to extend these practices to a wider public.
Motor vehicle tourism by private car was not restricted to national tourists. There were also foreign tourists arriving by car. Unlike in the cases of Italy, the United States, or Canada, the official statistics available in Spain for -, from the National Tourism Board, are not at all clear. They do not show the means of access of foreign tourism, as this is classified as 'they entered by crossing the border', at times via locations where there was both road and rail access. The most reliable data availablealthough not completecome from the statistics of 'Foreign vehicles that have been issued a receipt for the acquisition of an international tourist licence' to enter the country.  There were a total of , private passenger vehicles in , and , in ; we estimate that there could have been approximately , in , which was the equivalent of  per cent of all the private cars then registered in Spain. These figures include day trippers and tourists (those who are away for more than  hours), although it is not possible to clearly distinguish one from the other. A singular phenomenon of this tourism was that of 'caravans': that is, motorists who travelled in groups, following the same route, usually organized by an automobile club or tourism association, on the occasion of some international event, whether trials related to the  On the other hand, group travel by bus and coach was a key element in the social diffusion of road travel in Spain, helping this pervade increasingly broad sectors of society. This process was given a great boost by regular bus lines, which expanded and spread rapidly, occasional organized trips, and also group journeys organized systematically, on an industrial scale, by bus companies or travel agencies, as excursions, including the more elitist trips of gran turismo (grand tourism).  The coach increased the possibilities of travelling, both territorially and socially, giving rise to several facets or forms of travel: mountain and nature tourism, urban and cultural tourism, and religious tourism, both inside and outside Spain. During the interwar period, this type of travel received the name 'excursion'. In fact, there was a kind of excursion fever at this time that led to the diffusion, in the main Spanish cities, of small associations of active tourism, cyclists, hikers and ramblers, archaeological societies, and the like.
Within the road passenger transport market, two types of operators were active after the regulations passed in : those that had a licence to run regular lines of passenger transport (buses and coaches) on an exclusive basis; and 'free' transport undertakings: 'taxi drivers, buses and coaches for excursions, and lorries for goods without a fixed route'.  Within the first group, there were , lines of 'authorized public services of motor vehicles' in , covering a total distance of almost , kilometres.  For these regular bus and coach lines, tourist travel was only a fraction of their business, and difficult to quantify, but this service was fundamental to access all corners of the country. In , 'Spain certainly does not have a very large number of kilometres of railways'; however, it did have an extensive system of inter-urban road communications. Via this network, a substantial number of bus companies 'provide their services with coaches of the world's best makes, unbeatable in terms of comfort and safety, with extremely attractive timetables and  Ibid.  See Rafael Vallejo and Carlos Larrinaga, 'Travel agencies in Spain during the first third of the th century: a tourism business in the making', Business History (), https://doi.org/ ./... For the expansion of the social base of Spanish tourism in this period, see Vallejo, Vilar, and Lindoso, 'Tourism economy'.
 According to the description in Marañón, 'Política de transportes', p. . For the regulation of road transport and the concession of transport lines for vehicles with mechanical engines, see Real decreto de  de julio de  (y su Reglamento de  de diciembre de ) and Reales decretos de  de febrero y  de junio de  (y su Reglamento de  de junio de ), discussed in José María Coronado, Francisco Javier Rodríguez, and Rita Ruiz Fernández, 'El transporte regular de viajeros por carretera en España, -: ordenación legislativa y análisis del sector', Revista de Historia Industrial,  (), pp. -.
prices'.  In general, in the provinces where the density of railways was lower, the density of regular services of road passenger transport was greater.  The information on these services was summarized in a guide issued by the National Tourism Board, the first edition of which appeared in .
With regard to the second group of operators, the small business entrepreneurs with 'buses and coaches for excursions' (that is, specifically for tourism use), we do not know their number, but we do know that their advertising flourished from the mid-s. These advertisements show how road passenger transport for tourist trips in Spain 'became an authentic industry', with a diversity of products and targeting all types of people, especially the 'modest classes' in the s.  As well as this segment of tourist buses and coaches, some travel agencies, such as Thomas Cook or Marsans, and some associations involved in tourism, also acquired coaches.  In short, in Spain in the s, as in many other European countries, the roads were now a significant part of the 'vital network throughout which tourists circulate'. 

I V
The development of motor vehicles during the first decades of the twentieth century and their mass production and consumption had significant economic and social effects. The developed Atlantic countries, world leaders in vehicle production, were the protagonists of this success of the car. However, the globalization brought about by the second industrial revolution drew in other countries on the periphery through the use of transport technologies, telecommunications, and the mass media (the illustrated press, radio, and cinema). Over and beyond the degree of development, the consumption patterns and lifestyles of the 'centres' and the 'peripheries' tended to become more uniform, especially among the urban population. During the interwar period, this included an interest in travelling and leisure activities in general.
This article has shown how the expansion of the use of the motor vehicle in Spain during the period under study helped bring new habits of consumption and tourism practices to the country, similar to other countries considered to be more developed in terms of GDP per capita. Spain participated in this expansion despite not being a significant producer of automobiles, in contrast to  Patronato Nacional del Turismo, Cómo se viaja en España (Madrid, c. ), p. .  Rita Ruiz, José M. Coronado, and F. Javier Rodríguez, 'Los servicios ferroviarios y los servicios regulares de transporte de viajeros por carretera en España en los años previos a la Guerra Civil: una aproximación territorial', paper presented at the VI Congreso de Historia Ferroviaria, Vitoria, , https://docutren.com/HistoriaFerroviaria/Vitoria/pdf/. pdf.
 El Heraldo Español,  Mar. , p. ; Luz,  Apr. , p. .  One example of such associations is the Sindicato de Iniciativas in Valencia, which in  inaugurated a twenty-two-seater 'coach for excursions' with a Pullman-style interior: Revista Luz,  Jan. , p. .  Trimbach, Le tourisme international, p. . The private automobile, that is, the passenger car, which is called a turismo in Spain, and collective motor vehicles revolutionized mobility during the first third of the twentieth century, as pleasure trips became available to increasingly broad sectors of society. In this way, the foundations were laid for new forms of behaviour in an incipient tourism industry, which barely two decades later would be a key element in the country's production structure. The Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset explained this well in The revolt of the masses (La rebelión de las masas, ), which was widely disseminated in Europe in the s. He affirmed that the rebellion of the masses 'comprises all our collective habits, including our fashions both of dress and of amusement' and that 'the life of the ordinary man is today made up of the same vital repertory which before characterized only the superior minorities'. He went on to conclude that 'there is hardly a place on the continent where strictly the same does not happen', a trend that he identified as the 'frightful homogeneity of situations into which the entire West is sinking'.  This technical, cultural, and socio-economic confluence, apart from the obvious national differences, ultimately explains how some of the countries of the European periphery that had not developed an automotive industry soon joined the mass consumption of the automobile and adopted the social uses implicit therein, including tourist trips (a good indicator of the process). Spain is an excellent example from this group of countries.
Here in Spain, the development of the car set in motion 'touring', a form of car tourism that reduced the length of stays and shortened the time between the point of departure and the destination. It also fragmented the time for leisure travel into short trips, opened up a variety of new routes, and enabled trips to unknown places or to areas that were hard to reach by rail or other traditional means of transport. These activities were, of course, initially carried out by the elites. However, during the interwar period, they gradually became accessible to wider social groupings due to the spectacular progress of means of collective transport (buses and coaches). This evolution included trips organized by travel agencies, self-organized trips by regional groups travelling to their province of origin during the summer, educational trips, trips for youth groups or young people from political parties, and trips arranged by work centres or trade union organizations. These new patterns of tourist mobility, barely studied from this perspective, were part of a broader process of modernization of Spanish society, visible in the dynamism of its cities. When we take a closer look at these, we can confirm that this peripheral country, despite its relative degree of economic backwardness, was joining the mass consumption society, in which the motor vehicle would take on an increasingly important role.