Rise Of The Dictatorial Regimes.

CEOX

RISE OF DICTATORIAL REGIMES

Mrs. Salcedo
9° “B”
World History

Francisco Garcia Garcia

ITALY
Italy before 1919
Italy achieved her unification in 1870. She had a constitutional monarchy like that of Great Britain. But democratic traditions failed to develop in Italy because the government was controlled by corrupt politicians, called the party bosses.
They controlled theelections by bribing the voters. Once they were in power, they were more interested in making personal gains for themselves than in solving the social and economic problems of the people. As a result, by 1914 Italy remained a poor and backward country. The franchise was limited to 2.5 per cent of the population until after the election of 1913. Industrial progress was slow. Moreover, Italy waspoor in natural resources and lack of fertile land. Many of the farm laborers were landless and were often unemployed. Thus millions of Italians were forced to emigrate abroad.

Fascism In Italy
In the early 1920s Benito Mussolini established the first European fascist movement in Italy. Mussolini began his political career as a Socialist. In 1919, he created a new political group,Fascio di Combattimento, or League of combat. The term fascism is derived from that name. as a political philosophy, fascism glorifies the state above the individual by emphasizing the need for a strong central government, and any opposition is suppressed.
Rise of Fascism
Like other European countries Italy experienced severe economic problems after World War I. Inflation grew, and both industrialand agricultural workers staged strikes. Socialists spoke of Revolution. The middle class began to fear a Communist takeover like the one that had recently occurred in Russia. Industrial and agricultural strikes created more division.

The Red Menace
As the government became increasingly unpopular, many Italians turned to support the Socialist Party and the Catholic Popular Party in the electionsof 1919. The Socialist Party won more than one-third of all votes and became the largest single party in the Chamber of Deputies. They were followed at a distance by the Popular Party which won one-fifth of all votes on a platform of social reform. The ruling parties (the Liberals and Democrats) lost heavily. Encouraged by the success of the general election, the Socialists were prepared to makemore strikes.
Socialist agitation reached its climax in September 1920 when the General Confederation of Labour called for a general strike. During the strike the workers took over more than six hundred factories and established soviets on the Russian model to rule a number of industrial towns in northern Italy. Although the Socialists had established their control over a number of towns in theNorth, they failed to seize power in Italy.
There were two reasons which might explain their failure to seize power: The leaders of the General Confederation of Labour were chiefly interested in the improvement of workers' livelihood. When the Italian government promised a 20% wage increase to the workers, the Confederation was satisfied and decided to call off the strike. The Socialists lackedthe support of the peasants because they proclaimed socialization of all land. Early in 1921 the Socialist threat was over. The Socialist Party also split into several factions. About one-third of the members withdrew to form a Communist Party.
New Strength For The Fascist Movement
The turning-point for the growth of the Fascist movement came by the end of 1920. Three important events werechiefly responsible for bringing new strength to the Fascist movement. The first event was that after D'Annunzio and his followers were driven from Fiume by the end of 1920, many Italian nationalists took Mussolini as their leader for he had always advocated a strong foreign policy and the annexation of Fiume and Dalmatia. The second event was that during 1919-1920, governments in Italy changed...