Printed public sphere and stateless nationalisms

This paper argues that, regardless of the curriculum they were exposed to, literate individuals gained greater access to newspapers and other printed materials, which meant increased exposure to information beyond state-sanctioned narratives. The magnitude of the printed public sphere was inherently tied to the number of readers: as literacy rates increased, so did the demand for newspapers. This growing readership encouraged the expansion of print media beyond official publications, fostering a more pluralistic public discourse and increasing its dynamism. In Deutsch’s (Reference Deutsch1966) terms, the periodical press was a facility of social communication that enlarged the channels of social communication — increasing their rate, range, and reliability.

Substate nationalist activists recognized the opportunity this communicative environment presented. Unlike statewide nationalist elites, who could rely on state-controlled institutions for dissemination, substate nationalists had limited institutional access. Publishing in newspapers, journals, and pamphlets became their most effective strategy for mass communication — a far more scalable and cost-efficient method than small-scale meetings or oral dissemination. In this line, Hroch (Reference Hroch2015) described how newspapers became central for patriotic activists seeking to diffuse national consciousness beyond elite scholarly circles to broader sections of society. Newspapers functioned as both propaganda tools and platforms for ideological articulation, enabling activists to frame national narratives, disseminate historical and linguistic claims, and build emotional attachment to the nation. By providing accessible and regular content, newspapers helped convert abstract nationalist ideas into a shared cultural experience. Movements that developed dense networks of newspapers and periodicals — often tied to cultural associations — were significantly more likely to consolidate a shared national identity and reach broader segments of the population. These effects were particularly pronounced when rising literacy rates enabled the effective dissemination of nationalist content. This pattern has been found in many case studies (Orsini Reference Orsini2009; Penslar Reference Penslar2000; Ward Reference Ward2016).

However, their ideas could only take root if they were able to resonate with a significant readership. Without a non-nationalized audience, their efforts would have been much less effective, as readers already possessed a national identity that prevented them from switching to another (Darden Reference Darden2013). Therefore, if the school system focused primarily on teaching literacy skills (reading and writing) rather than fostering a cohesive national identity through history and symbolism, then literacy ceases to be a reliable proxy for statewide national allegiance and becomes a proxy for openness to adopt minority nationalist identities.

Expectations

Building on the interaction between curricular nationalization and intra-state literacy, I formulate directional, comparative expectations:

In countries where education was less nationalized:

• • High-literacy regions. Minority nationalisms were more likely to gain ground because the printed public sphere and an open audience allowed non-official nationalistic ideas to spread more easily.

• • Low-literacy regions. We expect less diffusion since individuals were not as reachable as in high-literacy regions.

In countries where education was more nationalized:

• • High-literacy regions. This was the least favorable configuration for minority nationalisms: literate publics were largely socialized into the state identity, leaving only small niches for minority nationalism. We expect very marginal minority nationalism.

• • Low-literacy regions. Minority nationalisms were more likely to spread since their illiteracy kept them less nationalized than other regions in the same country, making it relatively easier for them to advance through non-printed channels — oral, face-to-face, ritual, and associational networks.

Therefore, this article’s argument is comparative and conditional: in highly nationalized settings, the schooling/press nexus tends to make the mainstream printed public sphere less receptive to minority-nationalist frames, raising the costs of scaling through print. Under those constraints, minority-nationalist entrepreneurs are more likely to rely relatively more on non-printed channels (oral, face-to-face, ritual, associational networks) as a complement that sustains mobilization and spreads frames where print diffusion is harder. In less-nationalized education contexts, by contrast, minority narratives can compete more easily within print itself, so the mechanism does not rely as much on non-printed diffusion.

Table 1 summarizes the four scenarios generated by combining curricular nationalization with regional literacy levels, and it states the paper’s core expectation in terms of sub-state nationalist mass implantation. Importantly, these are within-country, comparative expectations: we compare higher- and lower-literacy regions within the same state, holding constant national institutions while leveraging subnational variation in literacy. In Spain — a low-nationalization educational setting — higher literacy regions are expected to exhibit a higher likelihood of mainstreaming because print-based diffusion can reach broader publics, whereas lower literacy regions are expected to display weaker mainstreaming because the potential print audience is smaller. In France — a high-nationalization setting — higher literacy regions are expected to be the least favorable for mainstreaming because literate publics are more thoroughly socialized into the state identity and the mass printed sphere is more nationally homogeneous; by contrast, relative to other French regions, lower literacy regions are expected to offer comparatively greater room for minority-nationalist popularization because the schooling/print nationalizing nexus penetrates less deeply and non-print diffusion channels become relatively more viable.

Table 1.

Expected level of sub-state nationalist mass implantation

Table 1. Long description

The matrix is organized with literacy rates as the column headers and the level of state nationalization of education as the row headers.

* Column headers: Regions with lower literacy rates and Regions with higher literacy rates.

* Row 1: State with low nationalization of education. The intersection with lower literacy rates results in a Lower likelihood of mainstreaming. The intersection with higher literacy rates results in a Higher likelihood of mainstreaming.

* Row 2: State with high nationalization of education. The intersection with lower literacy rates results in a Higher likelihood of mainstreaming. The intersection with higher literacy rates results in a Lower likelihood of mainstreaming.

Note: Illiteracy rates taken at the end of the 19th century.

Source: Data from Official Statistical Documents of each Country.

Spain

In late 19th and early 20th-century Spain, Catalonia, the Basque Country, and Navarre developed significantly stronger nationalist movements than regions like Galicia, Valencia, or the Balearic Islands. In the case of Catalan nationalism, it grew rapidly during the second half of the 19th century, becoming a major political force at the beginning of the 20th century. The Catalan nationalist coalition Solidaritat Catalana swept the 1907 Spanish general election in Catalonia, winning 41 of 44 Catalan seats in the Spanish parliament, and in the following years secured institutions of self-government — the Mancomunitat de Catalunya (1914) — which were unique in Spain. From then on, Catalan nationalism became a powerful political tradition with many parties and social expressions.

In the Basque Country, Basque nationalism began as a minority discourse in the 1890s but became a mainstream political force by the Second Republic (1931–1939). Founded in 1895 by Sabino Arana, the main Basque nationalist party, the PNV, initially mobilized limited, urban, Catholic-conservative circles around Bilbao and parish associations. By the 1930s, however, the party had expanded organizationally and electorally, regularly attaining nearly one-third of the vote in two of the three Basque provinces, Biscay and Gipuzkoa. This mainstreaming culminated institutionally in 1936, when the Basque Statute of Autonomy was approved (Granja Sainz Reference Granja Sainz2008; Pablo et al. Reference Pablo, Mees and Ranz2018).

Unlike Biscay and Gipuzkoa, mass territorial attachment in Navarre during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was expressed chiefly as foralism rather than as electoral Basque nationalism. While the PNV created a Navarrese executive in 1911, its vote shares remained limited since the Carlist-traditionalist right dominated the conservative space. By contrast, support for Navarre’s own laws ( fueros ) generated large cross-cleavage mobilizations, most notably the Gamazada (1893–94) — with mass demonstrations in Pamplona and a petition reportedly signed by around 120 thousand residents — followed by the Monumento a los Fueros (1903) as an institutionalized commemoration of that defense (Larraza Micheltorena Reference Larraza Micheltorena1995). Navarre did participate in early autonomy initiatives during the Second Republic alongside Álava, Biscay, and Gipuzkoa (Estella Statute project, 1931) (Pablo et al. Reference Pablo, Mees and Ranz2018), but Basque nationalism did not become mainstream in Navarre during this period. Its consolidation there was later and more contingent than in the core Basque provinces.

By contrast, the other three Spanish substate units saw only modest or delayed minority nationalist agitation. Galicia’s movement remained largely cultural before the 1910s. The turning point came when the Irmandades da Fala (“Brotherhoods of the Language”) became politically nationalists in their Lugo Nationalist Assembly (1918), which articulated a program for “integral autonomy.” Under the Second Republic, the current consolidated in the Partido Galeguista (1931), which secured broad adhesions to a draft statute of autonomy that never entered into force owing to the outbreak of the Civil War (Beramendi Reference Beramendi2021).

Early manifestations of Valencian nationalism were primarily cultural until the 1910s. Explicitly political organization crystallized later — around the Declaració Valencianista (1918) and the creation of the Unió Valencianista Regional — and, even under the Second Republic, Valencian nationalist parties achieved only a minority, unstable influence, never being able to consolidate massive support (Alfons, Reference Alfons1971). In the Balearic Islands, as in Valencia, a Catalan-oriented cultural revival took root, but it did not translate into a durable, island-wide nationalist party at the turn of the century. Early initiatives appeared intermittently and locally (notably the Centre Regionalista de Mallorca 1917-1919, in Palma) yet proved short-lived and failed to build stable electoral or organizational reach beyond the municipal arena (Mir Reference Mir1990).

France

In the early 20th century, Brittany and Corsica developed the most significant minority nationalist movements in France, whereas Occitania and Savoy exhibited only incipient, largely cultural currents that never coalesced into durable parties or mass mobilization. This within-France contrast provides the key comparison for the mechanism: the most literate regions had the thickest printed public sphere but the weakest minority-nationalist implantation, whereas the less literate regions exhibited the most visible minority-nationalist currents despite a thinner print ecosystem. Brittany saw the earliest and most robust regionalist organizations. The Union Régionaliste Bretonne was founded in 1898 as a conservative Breton cultural-political group dedicated to preserving Breton identity and some autonomy. In 1911, a Breton Nationalist Party (PNB) formed, explicitly calling for Brittany’s “resurrection” as a nation independent of France. Although Breton nationalist parties remained minority players in elections, they built a persistent base. In the interwar period, the Parti Autonomiste Breton was established in 1927 (succeeding earlier groups) and later gave rise to a revived Breton National Party in the 1930s, which continued to push for autonomy. By the mid-1930s, Breton nationalist lists achieved occasional municipal gains but no sustained parliamentary representation under their own labels (Reece Reference Reece2014).

Slightly later than Brittany, Corsica developed a coherent autonomist current after World War I. Under the leadership of Petru Rocca, veterans and intellectuals organized the Partitu Corsu d’Azione (1922–23) — inspired by Sardinian autonomism — and reconstituted it as the Partitu Corsu Autonomista (1927). The movement built a durable cultural-political network but achieved only limited, localized electoral gains (occasional municipal footholds in Ajaccio or Bastia), no parliamentary seats, and faced growing repression at the decade’s end. Even so, by the late 1930s, Corsica had established a recognizable autonomist tradition (Crettiez Reference Crettiez1999).

By contrast, the Occitanie saw only modest and primarily cultural regionalist agitation in this period. Most famously, through the Félibrige, a society of Provençal poets founded in 1854 by Frédéric Mistral and others to promote the Occitan language. The Félibrige and related associations celebrated local languages and folklore, but they remained apolitical or pro-French in loyalty, often led by conservative or monarchist notables who sought cultural recognition without challenging French unity. Around 1900, a more progressive strand of Occitan regionalism emerged among some republican-minded intellectuals in Languedoc and Provence, advocating decentralization or federalism within France, but it remained marginal (Lafont, Reference Lafont1974).

The Alpine region of Savoy represents another case of limited substate nationalist implantation. There was initial resistance to French annexation, and a small pro-Savoyard current did exist in the 1850s–60s, reacting to Italian unification and the loss of Savoy’s historic autonomy. However, once Savoy was united with France, most separatist or autonomist sentiment quickly died out. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Savoy’s political life was dominated by French national parties (often conservative Catholic or Republican factions), and no regionalist party or league gained lasting traction. Savoyard identity was preserved, but there was no nationalist mass movement comparable to Brittany’s or Corsica’s (Sorrel Reference Sorrel2009).

France

In this regard, France stands as a paradigmatic example of the successful use of education to forge a cohesive statewide national identity out of a fragmented population. By the late 19th century, the French state faced a population deeply divided by region, language, religion, and local loyalties. National unification was not simply a political or military achievement. It required cultivating in individuals a sense of belonging to a singular French nation. Among the tools available to the state, education emerged as the most sustained and ideologically potent instrument. As Weber (Reference Weber1976) argued, the school was the most important institution in the process of national integration, transforming culturally isolated rural populations into self-identifying citizens of the Republic.

In 19th-century France, the educational system was deliberately constructed to serve the ideological aims of national unification, particularly under the Third Republic. The Ferry Laws of the 1880s — mandating free, compulsory, and secular primary education — enabled the state to replace the Church as the moral and civic educator of the population. Schools became a central tool for shaping republican citizens through a curriculum rich in nationalist symbolism. History lessons emphasized France’s revolutionary heritage and the glory of past heroes, while geography cultivated an emotional attachment to the territorial unity of the “Hexagon” (Greenwalt Reference Greenwalt2009; Grew et al. Reference Grew, Harrigan and Whitney1983). This educational project not only aimed to inculcate loyalty to the Republic but also to overwrite regional and religious affiliations by disseminating a standardized national history, civic morality, and the French language. As Blanc and Kubo (Reference Blanc and Kubo2024) argue, this transformation had long-term consequences: the territories where school-based French language instruction was stronger exhibited greater attachment to national identity, stronger resistance to foreign occupation (for example, during WWII), and greater support for centralized state authority. This shift also led to a decline in identification with regional cultures and languages, effectively subordinating them within the national narrative.

Spain

While France developed a highly centralized and ideologically coherent educational system during the 19th century to nationalize its citizens, Spain pursued markedly weaker and more fragmented nationalist educational projects. In Spain, despite liberal efforts to construct a centralized curriculum after the 1857 Ley Moyano, nationalist content remained underdeveloped and poorly implemented. The central government struggled to maintain control over education, lacking the administrative strength and ideological cohesion to impose a national system capable of promoting a shared Spanish identity. The Church retained major control over education, while political instability and civil conflict repeatedly disrupted efforts at centralization (Boyd Reference Boyd2001; Cardona Reference Cardona2007; Molina and Villaverde Reference Molina, Villaverde, Van Ginderachter and Beyen2012; Viñao Reference Viñao2012). This fragmented governance — where Church-linked and private provision remained substantial — made the implementation of any uniform nationalizing curriculum uneven across territories and school types. The implementation of educational policies faced serious obstacles, including political instability caused by frequent revolutions and coups d’état, chronic financial constraints, and caciquismo — the entrenched system of local political patronage (Bonnet Reference Bonnet2021; De Gabriel Reference De Gabriel2019; Gabriel Reference Gabriel2018).

From 1900 onwards, the central government introduced a series of educational reforms — primarily through greater centralization of school management, increased state funding, and curriculum reforms — which allowed the promotion of a Spanish national identity.Footnote ¹ These efforts were implemented in response to the deep identity crisis Spain was experiencing at the time, as well as the perceived threat posed by substate nationalist movements (Terrón Bañuelos Reference Terrón Bañuelos1997).

France

In the French case, Occitania and Savoy were the regions where the minority nationalist movements were less deeply implanted. They also happened to have widespread participation in the printed public sphere. Apart from literacy rates, this is also observed when we look at bookshop density (Figure 1). Corsica and Brittany, where almost half of the population was illiterate, also had less access to written documents (Lyons Reference Lyons2008). At the same time, the fact that French mass schooling had strong nationalist content resulted in a nationally homogeneous printed public sphere. Journals were crucial in constructing and spreading statewide nationalist narratives, particularly during geopolitical conflicts, shaping public memory and identity through visuals and journalism (Bacot Reference Bacot2001). While exhaustive data on newspaper circulation in 19th-century France is lacking, it is well established that the press was tightly controlled by the state until the late 19th century, with publications deemed ideologically threatening largely excluded from press freedom (Lyons, Reference Lyons2008; R. L. Smith, Reference Smith1976). Altogether, from these elements, we can infer that the French printed public sphere was not only antagonistic towards minority nationalist claims but also likely played a role in reinforcing the dominant French nationalist ideology.

Figure 1.

Density of bookshops in provincial France, 1881. From Martyn Lyons, Le Triomphe du Livre (Paris: Promodis/Cercle de la Librairie, 1987).

Figure 1. Long description

A map titled FRANCE Départements displays the density of bookshops using five categories of shading.

* Solid black represents the highest density with less than 7500 inhabitants per bookshop. This is concentrated heavily in the North, Northeast (including Seine, Marne, and Doubs), and parts of the Southeast (Isere, Vaucluse, and Var). Isolated high-density pockets appear in the Southwest (Gironde and Gers).

* Cross-hatching represents 7500 to 10000 inhabitants per bookshop. These areas are scattered, appearing in departments like Somme in the North, Maine-et-Loire in the West, and Saone-et-Loire in the East.

* Diagonal lines from top-left to bottom-right represent 10000 to 15000 inhabitants per bookshop. This pattern is prevalent in the Northwest (Cotes-du-Nord, Morbihan) and central regions (Indre, Creuse).

* Dotted shading represents 15000 to 20000 inhabitants per bookshop. This is found in a few departments such as Correze in the center and Ariege in the South.

* Solid white represents the lowest density with more than 20000 inhabitants per bookshop. These are primarily located in the South (Pyrenees Orientales, Landes, Lozere), the West (Vendee), and the island of Corse.

The map illustrates a clear divide where the northern and eastern regions generally possess a higher concentration of bookshops relative to the population compared to the southern and western regions.

We see this in both Occitania and Savoy. They witnessed a significant proliferation of the press from 1881 onwards. This growth was largely facilitated by high literacy rates and the liberalization of press laws under the Third Republic. As Occitanie’s regionalism was primarily rooted in a previous tradition of linguistic and cultural activism, part of its press focused on linguistic preservation and cultural revival, following the path of agitation by the cultural association the Félibrige — founded by Frédéric Mistral in 1854. Publications such as L’Aïoli , La Lauseto , and L’Action régionaliste (1906–1912) actively promoted the Occitan language while avoiding open opposition to French national integration; in some cases, they made pro-decentralization demands (Zantedeschi Reference Zantedeschi2025). However, regionalist publications in 19th-century France had limited reach and were often ephemeral compared to the expanding national mass press (R.L. Smith Reference Smith1976). In Savoy, most of the printed public sphere was aligned with the ideological scope of French national unity. Its minoritarian regionalism, which was a direct consequence of Savoy’s recent and contested annexation to France in 1860, usually focused on economic grievances — particularly concerning the free-trade zone — alongside broader calls for political autonomy (Milbach Reference Milbach2008).

In Brittany, a cultural revival movement in the mid-19th century was led by the Catholic clergy. The journal Feiz ha Breiz (“Faith and Brittany”) defended Catholic interests against the secular Republic while also promoting the Breton language. It was published from 1865 to 1884, and from 1899 to 1944, but its circulation was very limited, reaching its peak with 7 thousand copies in 1912 and 30 thousand in 1919 (Gemie Reference Gemie2012). However, before that, the Union Régionaliste Bretonne, the first formal Breton regionalist organization, was founded in 1898 and already had wide support among illiterate peasants (Tranvouez Reference Tranvouez1979). As some research points out, the Catholic Church played the main role in spreading regionalist and Breton nationalist ideas to its parishioners (Gicquel Reference Gicquel2019). Taken together, this paints a picture of the Church exercising its influence primarily through oral channels — sermons, parish instruction, and face-to-face interactions with largely illiterate peasants — to diffuse a regionalist ideology aligned with its interests.

In Corsica, some of the most famous regionalist publications included the satirical weekly A Tramuntana , published entirely in the Corsican language and launched in 1896. It regularly invoked emblematic island figures to construct a cohesive historical narrative and reinforce a shared sense of identity. However, almost half of the Corsicans were illiterate, so nationalist ideas had to travel by oral and popular means. Here, as in the case of Brittany, the Catholic Church played a central role in the early diffusion of Corsican nationalism by acting as both a cultural transmitter and a symbolic anchor in opposition to the secularizing aims of the French Republic (Pellegrinetti Reference Pellegrinetti2003). Pomponi (Reference Pomponi, Américi, Daumalin, Raveux, Regnard and Renaudet2014) further highlights that religious networks, particularly confraternities, functioned as proto-mutualist institutions that laid the groundwork for civic solidarity and identity formation in Corsican villages. These Catholic structures, deeply rooted in Corsican social life, helped to disseminate nationalist ideals not through formal political platforms, but via oral culture, ritual, and communal memory. In a context of widespread rural illiteracy, the Church thus became a key mediator in making Corsican discourse accessible and emotionally resonant. This should not be read as implying that oral networks substitute for print-based standardization. Rather, where the schooling/press nexus makes the mainstream printed public sphere less accessible to minority frames, non-print infrastructures (sermons, parish instruction, confraternities, ritual life, face-to-face networks) can operate as complementary channels of diffusion.

France displayed major interregional differences in the magnitude of its printed public spheres. On one side were Occitania and Savoy — highly literate regions with a dynamic circulation of ideas — while on the other were Corsica and Brittany, where the printed public sphere was far more limited and only a small fraction of the population could take part in it. In all cases, regionalist newspapers were marginal or nonexistent, even in those regions where market conditions would have supported them, such as Occitania or Savoy.

Spain

In Catalonia, Navarre, and the Basque Country, as inferred from Figure 2 and from specialized literature, the printed public sphere was both dynamic and plural in terms of national perspectives. Regionalist and minority nationalist newspapers maintained a relatively stable presence over time and exhibited notable internal diversity. Although precise circulation figures and region-specific readership data are not always available, the number of these publications and the length of their publication trajectories suggest that they reached a substantial readership. Qualitative evidence further supports this view, indicating that Catalan, Basque, and NavarreseFootnote ² nationalist ideas were visibly present and actively circulated within the broader print ecosystem.

In Catalonia, the media landscape was very dynamic and significantly more diverse, encompassing monarchist, conservative, and liberal newspapers aligned with Spanish nationalism, as well as religious and left-wing Catalan nationalist publications. Among the most prominent Catalan nationalist newspapers — both in terms of longevity and influence — were La Renaixensa (1882–1905), La Veu de Catalunya (1899–1936), and El Poble Català (1906–1918), alongside widely read satirical magazines such as La Campana de Gràcia (1870–1934) and Cu-Cut! (1902–1912). The Catalan press became the main vehicle for Catalanist mobilization, especially from 1901 onward (with the founding of the Lliga) (Casasús Reference Casasús2015). In this regard, Catalan nationalist ideas were prominently present in the printed public sphere, coexisting and competing with Spanish nationalist narratives (Artigues Reference Artigues2002).

In the Basque Country and Navarre, the press landscape was notably dynamic and ideologically diverse during the late 19th and early 20th centuries (Ruiz Reference Ruiz2008; Sebastián Reference Sebastiánn.d.; Sese Reference Sesen.d.). Spanish nationalist and Catholic conservative newspapers coexisted with emerging Basque nationalist and regionalist publications. Among the latter, Carlist newspapers played a particularly influential role in promoting discourses rooted in tradition, Catholicism, and the defense of historical self-government ( fueros ) — elements that would later become central to regionalist and nationalist narratives in the Basque public sphere (Noci Reference Noci2012). In this regard, La Gaceta del Norte (1901–1987) was one of the most influential and long-lasting conservative Catholic dailies in the region, closely aligned with the Church and with Carlism. Similarly, incipient Basque nationalism launched Bizkaitarra (1893–1895), among other publications, in the three Basque provinces. In 1913, the Basque Nationalist Party founded Euzkadi (1913–1937). In Navarre, we find a similar ideological balance, with the presence of Carlist ideology and fuerismo in the main regional newspapers, such as Diario de Navarra (1903) and el Pensamiento Navarro (1897–1981), among others. There were also minority nationalist newspapers, such as Napartarra (1911–1919), and La Voz de Navarra (1923–1936).

However, in Valencia, the Balearic Islands, and Galicia, the media landscape was much more limited in magnitude compared to the previous substate units and lacked nationalist pluralism at the end of the 19th century. In Valencia, there were no Valencian nationalist newspapers, not even mildly regionalist, with the intermittent exception of Las Provincias and Lo Rat Penat bulletins (Roca Ricart Reference Roca Ricart2013). During the 19th century and early 20th century, the Valencian press was remarkably active, but the presence of explicitly regionalist or nationalist newspapers remained limited and relatively late in comparison with Catalonia. Of all newspapers published between 1813 and 1936, only around 20% can be classified as Valencian nationalist, with most appearing after 1906 and concentrated in the city of Valencia (Martínez-Gallego Reference Martínez-Gallego2023). These included Valencia Nova (1904-1907), Terra Valenciana (1908), El Poble Valencià (1917), and Acció Valenciana (1930–31), among others. Despite their cultural ambition and efforts to introduce issues such as linguistic normalization and regional autonomy into the public discourse, these publications emerged belatedly, lacked continuity, had limited social reach, and ultimately failed to mobilize a broad-based nationalist movement.

The Balearic Islands, during the 19th century and early 20th century, developed a significant press culture, despite their low literacy rates. However, most general information newspapers followed either conservative or liberal Spanish national orientations. Mallorca and Menorca saw the rise of various publications that, from the 1880s onward, began to articulate regionalist and culturalist ideas. Notably, the weekly Mallorca Dominical (1897–1901) adopted a conservative regionalist stance, and La Veu de Mallorca (1900, 1917–1919, and 1931) expressed early Mallorcan nationalist positions. These initiatives, alongside others such as La Roqueta , Foch-y-Fum , and several parish or literary publications, reflected an increasing — but minoritarian — interest in regional identity, language normalization, and political modernization, even if nationalist discourse remained secondary to cultural revival. The presence of such press indicates that regionalist sensibilities were indeed present in the Balearic print sphere, albeit in fragmented and often short-lived forms (Busquets Reference Busquets2023; Vidal Reynés Reference Vidal Reynés2002).

Similarly, in Galicia, the late-19th and early-20th-century newspaper market was thin, and expressly nationalist outlets were scarce and fragile. Apart from the statewide press, which was dominant, O Tío Marcos d’a Portela (1876–80; 1883–89; 1917–19) was the first newspaper that had some regionalist content and reportedly reached circa 4,000 copies at its peak but appeared intermittently. Beyond this pioneer, explicitly regionalist/nationalist venues arrived late and episodically — notably La Patria Gallega (1891–92), the short-lived organ of the Asociación Regionalista, and A Monteira (1889–90). Meanwhile, broader “regional” or cultural periodicals such as Revista Gallega (1895–1907) offered space for Galicianist themes yet did not sustain a continuous nationalist platform (Beramendi Reference Beramendi2021; Beramendi and Núñez Seixas Reference Beramendi and Seixas1996).

Considering the media landscape in Valencia, the Balearic Islands, and Galicia—and their comparatively low literacy rates—the limited pluralism of nationalist newspapers is best understood as a demand-side constraint: too few potential readers to sustain a diverse partisan press. Fewer literates meant fewer viable titles, narrowing the spectrum of perspectives that could find a foothold in the market. A parallel consequence was a skewed, elite readership—often tied to political power—that disproportionately shaped the printed public sphere. Such audiences were typically less receptive to anti-system ideologies, while their dominance further curtailed the diffusion of minority-nationalist frames beyond restricted circles.