I've been slowly reading Peasants into Frenchmen by Eugen Weber and I constantly find myself thinking about and contrasting with their neighbor to the south, Spain. France managed to mostly absorb its various identities that had previously only been tied together by the monarchy; Spain still looks as if the nation will fracture at any moment. Two World Wars certainly helped solidify France as opposed to the bitter struggle of the Spanish Civil War but from what little I know of Spanish history I get the sense that the centralizing elements of Spain never had a hold to begin with. Could someone please elucidate for me?
The thing is that not Spain is the exception but France is. The unification of the French after the Revolution is unparalleled in Europe.
It was supported by a new distribution of gouvernment-districts wich divide the old Identity-cores and sometimes mend parts of them this others.
Spain on the other hand is much more 'normal'
Compare it with the german area: there are 3 States wich speak "high-german" as main-language and two with "low-german" wich is still even present as a dialect in Germany. Compare it to the British isles. You will see that Ireland is (almost completely) a separate state, as is Portugal on the Iberian Peninsula or the Netherlands and Swizz. Political borders simply aren't there for eternity.