La noblesse de la municipalité havanaise (1763-1838)

The relationship between elites and municipality (Cabildo) which was early established by the society of the Spanish Ancien Regime both colonial and peninsular, attained particular strength in Havana, thanks to the intensely aristocratic cast that predominated there. After first reviewing the correspondences between municipal offices and Castilian noble titles, the article focuses on the numerical preponderance of the aristocratic elites, masters of the sugar plantations, in the make-up of the Council. In effect, a process of enumeration and identification of ordinary mayors and of families possessing a position of regidor reveals the strength of the relationship between aristocracy and municipality, which moreover worked to the detriment of a merchant elite. This special link brought with it a complex interplay of powers between the municipal aristocracy and the Spanish Crown —for the latter was obliged to limit the power aspirations of the absolutist nobility while depending on their support to shore up the throne against independentist and liberal threats. The dominant idea is, then, one of symbiosis.