Barcelona's new memory plan includes a terrorism interpretation center and a website about slavery

BarcelonaWith an initial investment of 6.7 million euros in 2026, Barcelona City Council will launch a plan that seeks to reclaim "the city's democratic, social, and feminist tradition." To this end, it has presented a roadmap that will be rolled out until 2030 and which, among other things, foresees the creation of the Model Memorial Center, where the political repression, social conflict, penal control, and democratic struggles of the 20th century will be explained. It is, therefore, a new Center for the Interpretation of Terrorism, which will primarily focus on the Hipercor (1987) and La Rambla (2017) attacks, at the "Montjuïc Castle; and the Center for the Interpretation of Labor in Barcelona, in the old Fabra i Coats factory.

Before summer, the centers for the interpretation of terrorism and labor will be inaugurated, but the Model center will not be ready before 2030. Furthermore, the Center for the Interpretation of Montjuïc Castle will be renovated. "It will have new rooms and a broader view of repression and the different struggles," assures the deputy mayor for Social Rights, Feminisms, and Democratic Memory, Raquel Gil. For example, there will be a new temporary exhibition room where "SEAT: 1950-2025. A factory, a neighborhood, many lives" and "International Brigades and multilingualism" can be seen.

The plan also foresees the creation of the interactive website "Barcelona as a slave owner," the dissemination of LGBTI memory, and the removal of the last Francoist symbols still present in the city, mostly in private spaces. In no case does it foresee the removal of other symbols that have also received criticism for their link to the colonial past, such as the statue of Columbus. Another pillar of the project is the revision of the regulations of the Nomenclator Commission with new criteria that prioritize memories and presences that have been "little visible" until now, with special attention to the feminization of the city's nomenclator.

The rejection of memorialist entities

The City Council has highlighted that the plan has been drawn up after a long participatory process, but different memorialist entities have already expressed their rejection. They regret that the plan does not include that "the Vía Layetana police station and the Trinitat prison become spaces of memory. On the other hand, they consider that an interpretation center of terrorism "should not be part of a strategic plan for memory" because "the incorporation of elements unrelated to democratic memory may distort its focus." Furthermore, they warn that the "budget is opaque and insufficient": "The document [from the City Council] only specifies a budget for 2026, which is understood to be mainly allocated to the architectural project of La Modelo," they state in the communiqué signed by the Ateneu Memoria Popular, the Associació Catalana de Persones Ex-preses del Franquisme, the Fundació Cipriano Garcia-CCOO, l'amical de les Brigades Internacionals, l'Amical Mauthausen, Ca la Dona and l'Associació Pro-Memòria dels Immolats per la Llibertat de Catalunya, among others. All of them consider that the project has been created without the real participation of the associative fabric.