Social Representations and Memory: The Psychosocial impact of the Spanish “Law of Memory”, related to the Spanish Civil War

Abstract

Based on the interrelationship between Social Representations Theory (SRT) and Collective Memory Studies, this work analyzes the effects of the salience of the Spanish Law of Historical Memory on beliefs about the Spanish Civil War (SCW), functions and expectancies of remembering, and reparatory behaviours, guilt and shame—collective and personal—as well as their anchoring in ideological positioning. Results confirm the positive psychosocial role of making salient the Law of Memory: it reinforces the agreement with the preventive functions of collective memory, truth commissions, and positive emotional climate, collective guilt, shame and reparatory behaviours—mainly among those on the left. Also, collective guilt and shame play a mediating role between the salience of the Law and reparatory actions. Finally, knowledge about the SCW is not influenced by salience of the law, suggesting that some central aspects of social representations of a negative past are widely shared and consensual.