An Authoritarian Political Movement - Case Study Example

European Peasantry Stratified by ethnic and social cleavages, the countries of Europe over the centuries have developed in tandem with the forces of industrialization, modernization and later, globalization. During the early part of the 20th century, Imperial Russia was overthrown by a peasant-inspired Bolshevik revolution. The Russian Revolution of 1917 which destroyed the Tsarist regime, succeeded earlier peasant-driven revolutions around the world including the Chinese Revolution of 1911. Importantly, the Chinese Republican period was short-lived after the victorious Maoists disposed of Chiang Kai-shek’ Republicans in 1949. Accordingly, the Communist revolt led by Mao is arguably the most prominent peasant-inspired revolution of modern times. Although China and Russia both provide examples of peasant-inspired revolution, the collective actions of peasants in Europe have not veered towards revolution. Accordingly, this essay will show through an analysis of the emergence of authoritarianism in Italy and that the fascist revolution was not driven by the peasantry. We will explore the history of this revolution and show that while fascism did seek widespread social, political and economic change, it were not inspired nor carried out through an appeal to the peasantry. In conclusion we turn the reasons why this revolution was not peasant inspired and conclude with an overall summary of our analysis. THE RISE OF FASCISM IN ITALY An authoritarian political movement which evolved during the early half of the twentieth century, fascism was the dominant political ideology in Italy for more than two decades. Championed by the ever charismatic torchbearer of this new and increasingly powerful political movement, Benito Mussolini brought fascism to the forefront of Italian politics through an appeal to nationalism and by tapping into widespread social discontent following World War I. The following will explore the fascist movement and look at the factors which led to its emergence in Italy during the 1920s. The March on Rome was a significant event which effectively legitimized the fascist doctrine with dramatic domestic as well as international ramifications. Once in power, an analysis of the nationalist transformation of Italian society sought by the fascist government will be followed by an overview of how these changes impacted the lives of regular Italians. Finally, overseas expansion and the geopolitical role of Italy under the regime of Benito Mussolini will be discussed in depth. Arguably the most important political movement to grow out of Italy in the twentieth century, fascism arose in response to a variety of domestic and international factors following World War I. Fascism can be defined as a militant political movement which promoted a unique mixture of ideology and organization in an attempt to create a “new type of civilization” (Knox 11). Italian fascism advanced an ideology of extreme nationalism, secular idealism and national rejuvenation. From a tactical and organizational standpoint, this movement employed the use of violence to achieve its aims and rejected parliamentary democracy. Additionally, it drew upon corporatist ideas of harmony through hierarchy and advocated national efficiency. Revolutionary in nature, it sought to transform and renew Italian society though a rejection of egalitarianism and by embracing rigid hierarchical classifications. Created in opposition to socialism, communism, liberal democracy and the egalitarianism espoused by preceding political movements, fascists found fertile ground for their movement in Italy after World War I. Fascism in the Italian context was inherently nationalist, xenophobic and at times, violent (Wellhofer 91). An important international impetus for the rise of fascism in Italy was the so-called “Red Menace”, the communist threat to the current political order and the revolutionary appeal of international communism. The fear of communist revolution played into the hands of early fascists who were vocal in their dislike of communism and their rejection of its emphasis on class struggle. Importantly, the Red Menace was also a particular important domestic antecedent for the rise of fascism in Italy (Brustein 662-64). As mentioned above, a rejection of class cleavages and the divisive class ideology of communism gave fascism wide appeal among members of the upper strata of Italian society. The peasantry, as active supporters of Communism in Russia during its revolution, was not actively courted by early fascists. A heavily patrimonial society with deep social and economic divisions, Italy was beset by strong social cleavages. Fascism was able to appeal to the aristocracy, the bourgeoisie as well as the working classes in its appeal to a strong and unified Italy. Importantly, peasants were not the primary adherents to the fascist doctrine in its early years (Brustein 662-64). Recent Italian unification as well as the existence of regional cleavages – between northern Italy and southern Italy – played an important role in the growth of fascism. As an ideology, fascism promoted a strong and united Italy and nationalism was an inherent component of the movement. Conflict between church and state and divisions between north and south as well as rich and poor were discounted as being less important than the promotion of Italian pride and a return to Italy’s great Roman past. As a result, the fascist doctrine served to unify all peoples of Italy (Woolf 187-196). Finally, economic crisis following the end of World War I propelled the fascist movement to the center of the Italian political stage. Following World War I, Italy was beset by massive inflation, large-scale unemployment and the inability to reintegrate its soldiers into society. This was coupled with weak political institutions and the inability of the liberal democratic regime to solve economic woes afflicting Italians in the post-War period. Social unrest followed and Benito Mussolini’s Blackshirts stepped in during this period to bring law and order to Italy through an appeal to the nationalist sentiments of the Italian people. Marginally involved at the outset, peasants were not Mussolini’s primary audience though his appeal was nation-wide (Szymanski 399-404). The first fascist government officially came to power in Italy on October 29th, 1922 when King Victor Emmanuel III declared Benito Mussolini the new Prime Minister and asked him to form a government. This followed the March on Rome, a two-day long event featuring Benito Mussolini and his fascist Blackshirts, marching in nationalistic stride towards the Italian capital of Rome. Technically a coup d’état, this event, which began on October 27th ,1922, culminated a day later when up to 40,000 men marched on Rome as part of a display of fascist force. The day before the fascists officially assumed power in Italy, the government attempted to use force to quell the marchers and suppress the fascist marchers. Although the government at the time sought the power to suppress the march, King Victor Emmanuel III refused to support a decree of martial law and fearing civil war, effectively caved into the impressive show of force put forth by the fascists during their March on Rome. The following day, the King asked Benito Mussolini to form a government and appointed him prime minister. Although fascism later claimed revolutionary credentials, at the time that it came to power, it did so through purely constitutional means following established norms dating back to the Statuto Albertino (Keserich 135-36). Social Transformation under Italian Fascism Italian fascists sought a complete transformation of Italy society. Under the watchful eye of Benito Mussolini, the regime embarked upon a revolutionary overhaul of society. Seeking to “destroy the old Italy of decadent liberalism and democracy” (Cannistraro 117), fascism fought to transform the country and give birth to a nation which was “young, virile and new” (Cannistraro 117): a sharp contrast from the society that it set out to replace. Cultural nationalism was an important component of this transformation and culture became an instrument of the state. Actively promoted as an important tenant of the movement, cultural nationalism took many forms and served to give the new revolutionary culture a sense of authenticity. Accordingly, Fascism, like similar movements elsewhere in Europe, sought to give its ideology legitimacy by claiming that its origins lay in an ancient and more glorious national past. The ethos of the Italic race and the traditions of ancient Rome, evoked in the mysticism and ritual surrounding much of fascist public display, provided the regime with the national roots of official culture. It never claimed that history began with fascism, but that fascism was the fulfillment and rebirth of the true spirit and soul of the Italic race, which had found its first and greatest expression in Imperial Rome (Cannistraro 126). Importantly, cultural nationalism during the late 1920s also involved the rejection of foreign influences on Italian life. Restrictions were thus placed upon various forms of foreign media. Censorship was enforced while foreign newspapers, films, magazines, and even music were withdrawn from circulation. Popular American culture, in particular aspects of twentieth-century American culture which glorified the liberal democracy tradition of continental Europe as well as the United States, disappeared in Italy during this period. Accordingly, cultural self-sufficiency was promoted while prohibitions were put in place on things like beauty contests, seen as “expressions of foreign decadence” and the removal of foreign words such as “bar” and “soda parlor” from storefronts and shop windows. Seeking to impose fascist ideals on Italian society, Mussolini’s cultural revolution sought the complete overhaul of Italy through the rejection of foreign influence and the promotion of national myths to encourage a return to Italy’s once glorious past (Cannistraro 126-34).. The fascist government of Benito Mussolini also enacted important changes to the lives of Italians. Although rejecting the class struggle of Bolshevism, Mussolini maintained the stratified nature of Italian society and actually exacerbated it through the implementation of state-corporatist policies which favored business at the expense of workers. Accordingly, workers suffered as trade unions were progressively abolished and minimum wage protections were lost. Women were initially promoted as important actors within the fascist movement but were quickly appropriated and used to further the ideological aims of fascism. Far from emancipating women, fascism actually embodied a sense of conservativism with regards to the role of women and gender in Italian society. Public works projects were highly publicized and were implemented in an attempt to promote Italian self-sufficiency and economic growth. Many of these initiatives though favored the north, the traditional home of the fascist movement. Arguably Mussolini’s most popular achievement was the Lateran Treaty between the Catholic Church and the government of Italy, effectively granting the Vatican statehood and formal political independence. A popular initiative in heavily Catholic Italy, this treaty was welcome by Italians of all stripes (Schmidt 24-49). Fascism was the dominant political movement and ideology of Italy for more than two decades. This authoritarian political movement evolved during a period of widespread dissatisfaction with the status quo following the end of World War I and achieved prominence in Italian politics due to Benito Mussolini’s successful appeal to Italian nationalism across class-lines and feelings of past injustices. Imbued with this sense of intense nationalism and inherently militaristic, fascism became a force to be reckoned with following Benito Mussolini’s March on Rome. His coup d’état allowed the movement to engage in a complete and revolutionary transformation of Italian society along national and cultural lines. As has been shown, the peasantry played little role in Mussolini’s overhaul of Italian society. Concluding Remarks As this analysis of the rise of Italian fascism has shown, the peasantry did not play a large role in the development of this authoritarian political movement. Accordingly, early fascists were wary of the peasantry who represented perhaps a third column of Soviet sympathizers who threatened the overtly nationalist project of fascism in Italy. Accordingly, the lessons learned from the Italian fascist revolution will be similarly applied to the rise of fascism in Germany. Although China and Russian both experienced peasant-driven revolutions in the 20th century, Europe was immune to this type of revolution because it had abandoned feudalism many centuries earlier. Although heavily stratified, the case of Italy demonstrates the impotence of the peasant class in Europe in stimulating revolutionary change. Works Cited Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso, 1991. Berezin, Mabel. “The Organization of Political Ideology: Culture, State, and Theater in Fascist Italy”. American Sociological Review, 55.5(1991): 639-651. Brustein, William. “The "Red Menace" and the Rise of Italian Fascism.” American Sociological Review, 56.5(1991):652-664. Cannistraro, Philip V.. “Mussolinis Cultural Revolution: Fascist or Nationalist?”, Journal of Contemporary History 7.3/4(1972), 115-139. Chaliand, Gérard et al. The History of Terrorism: From Antiquity to Al Qaeda. Berkley: University of California Press, 2007. Cirillo, Nancy R.. “Dannunzios poem of aggression: The constitution of the regency at Fiume”. The European Legacy (1997): 1185-1207. Keserich, Charles. “The Fiftieth Year of the "March on Rome": Recent Interpretations of Fascism”. The History Teacher, 6.1(1972), 135-142. Knox, MacGregor. “Conquest, Foreign and Domestic, in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany”. The Journal of Modern History 56.1 (1984): 2-57. Labanca, Nicola. “Colonial rule, colonial repression and war crimes in the Italian colonies”. Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 9.3: (2002), 300 — 313. Schmidt, Carl T. The Corporate State in Action: Italy Under Fascism, New York: Read Books, 2007. Strang, Bruce. “Imperial Dreams: The Mussolini-Laval Accords of January 1935”. The Historical Journal 44. 3 (2001), 799-809. Szymanski, Albert. “Fascism, Industrialism and Socialism: The Case of Italy”. Comparative Studies in Society and History 15.4: (1973), 395-404. Wellhofer, E. Spencer. “Democracy and Fascism: Class, Civil Society, and Rational Choice in Italy”, The American Political Science Review, 97.1: (2003), 91-106. Woolf, S. J. “Mussolini as Revolutionary”, Journal of Contemporary History 1.2 : (1966), 187-196. Read More