Ramiro de Maeztu y Whitney was a prolific Spanish essayist, journalist and publicist. His early literary work adscribes him to the Generation of '98. Adept to Nietzschean and Social Darwinist ideas in his youth, he became close to Fabian socialism and later to distributism and social corporatism during his spell as correspondent in London from where he chronicled the Great War. During the years of the Primo de Rivera dictatorship he served as Ambassador to Argentina. A staunch militarist, he became at the end of his ideological path one of the most prominent far-right theorists against the Spanish Republic, leading the reactionary voices calling for a military coup. A member of the cultural group Acción Española, he spread the concept of "Hispanidad" (Spanishness). Imprisoned by Republican authorities after the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, he was killed by leftist militiamen during a saca in the midst of the conflict.

Hispanidad is a Spanish term describing a shared cultural, linguistic, or political identity among speakers of the Spanish language or members of the Hispanic diaspora. The term can have various, different implications and meanings depending on the regional, socio-political, or cultural context in which it is used.