Despite the terrible shared circumstances of the death of the three university professors of this exhibtion (Manuel Broseta, Ernest Lluch and Francisco Tomás y Valiente), the aim is to emphasize their life and work, offering to the visitors the opportunity of accessing to their extensive contributions; to university life and to democracy and coexistence. The three of them were relevant professors and prominent politicians; committed with democracy during the last years of the Franco regime and foreground participants in the construction of the democracy that now we are sharing.

 

Therefore, we believe that in this exhibition to explore the educational possibilities of their life and work and to disseminate both aspects is the best contribution that can be done for commemorating the three professors. Thus, remembering them is a way to continue their commitment and their competency. This involves incorporating the principles for which these professors fight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The main goal, of the exhibition is to reflect about the life and work of the professors,Broseta, Lluch and Tomás y Valiente, highlighting their contribution as university students in their respective fields of specialisation and the training of disciples, and their praxis as citizens who supported democracy. Their academic and politic career is therefore, the heart of the exhibition.

 

The three belong to the same generation: they born in 1932 (Broseta and Tomás y Valiente) and in 1937(Lluch). They studied at the University of Valencia (Law) and Barcelona (Economics) during the fifties (1950-55 and 1956-61). They completed and expand their studies, and become part of the University as assistants and researchers. They completed their doctoral studies and they go in for a public competition for a post as tenured professors (full university professors or tenured-track 2 professors) and they got it in 1964 Broseta and Tomas y Valiente and Lluch in 1970, what allow them the development of a fruitful task as researchers in their areas of knowledge, and as professors and masters of disciples.

 

 

 

 

They belong to the same generation, the generation of “students with concerns”, which they represent. This generation of university students is characterised, mainly, by overcoming with their own effort the mediocrity and the cultural isolation imposed by the dictatorship. These students, sometimes, have been called “generation of the 56” referring to the date of the first actions that they carried out. But the main actions, beyond public protests or infiltration and the exhaustion of the SEU (Spanish University Union), were two. On the one hand, to change the course of university activity: to achieve that the university takes care and worries about citizens’ life, to open this one to the world, that the University adapt a modern thinking, releasing itself from the ropes that bound it. On the other hand, they were the first generation that condemns the iniquitous division of the two Spains, the winners and the losers, and their first manifesto started demanding a free union with the famous sentence: “We the children of the winners and the losers…”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They belong to the generation of university students, who once they become full university professors, renewed the knowledge: from the political history of close perspective they went on to social history; they look for the practical reason of law and saw in it the tool for defending citizens and justice. A common trait of the three is that as the best professors at the time, they believed in the usage of social sciences for changing life. They were democrats and the Dictatorship considered them subversive persons, but mostly they were competent individuals. All three had a deep university vocation, which is intellectual vocation of research, readings, good teaching and direction of projects; all three came back to teaching when they ceased politics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They supported democracy with flexibility of ideas, critical lucidity and timeliness. They get involved in the conquest of democracy, as students, as professors, as “democrat deans”, as committed or supportive individuals in the opposition organisations. When democracy arrived, following their ideals they opted for commitment with socialism, two of them and the other for centrism. Then the time to put in practice all that they had share when they were young arrived. All three occupied important positions, where they tried to change the country and the three wrote in the press to the end creating their opinion, an aspect that they considered essential as intellectuals. They didn’t consider their political career decisive, but a phase of life, a service and in fact they never neglect research. They belong, in short, to the generation that revived freedom in Spain, and this aspect must be highlighted in the exhibition.

 

All three lived their life with vocation and plenitude. They were scholars, intellectuals and politicians with the deepest conviction. They had their own or shared ideas and defended them dialectically: to varying degrees the three professors were polemicists, which is part of democratic life. They were strongly committed to the academic and political world, and with their actions contributed to rebuild, distinguishing mark of their generation.

 

In a nutshell, the three of them met a tragic ending. But, without ignoring it and civically it is more relevant to emphasise their life, their contribution to: civic coexistence, democracy building, and the design of the autonomous map, universal health… The humanist factor pushed them all their life: in their “concerns” as students, in the renewal of knowledge as full university professors and in politics as citizens.

 

According to the above mentioned, the exhibition is organised in four thematic sections that engage the three protagonists of this project:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

L'exposició Mestres de Ciutadania, s'acompanya de 35 entrevistes fetes tant a persones que conegueren als professors Broseta, Lluch i Tomás y Valiente (fills, companys, deixebles, ciutadans) com a historiadors, periodistes i professors experts en dret o en el sistema de salut. Aquest treball, per un costat, enriqueix i contextualitza el període, la generació que va protagonitzar aquells canvis i els mateixos personatges objecte de l'exposició, i per l'altre és un valuós document d'informació sobre la transició democràtica espanyola on no hi falten reflexions sobre el present.

 

Per escoltar les entrevistes completes consulteu ací.

 

Persones entrevistades: