Nationalism and fascist
Blackshirt youth in 1935 Italian fascism is based upon
Italian nationalism and in particular, it seeks to complete what it considers the incomplete Italian nationalist project of
Risorgimento ("Resurgence", 1815–1871) by incorporating the
"unredeemed" Italian-inhabited territories scattered across the
Balkans and
Southern Europe that both Italian nationalists and fascists regarded as
Italia irredenta ("unredeemed Italy") into the
Kingdom of Italy after
its unification under the
House of Savoy (1861). The
National Fascist Party (PNF:
Partito Nazionale Fascista), founded in
Milan by
Benito Mussolini in 1921, declared that the party was to serve as "a revolutionary militia placed at the service of the nation. It follows a policy based on three principles: order, discipline, hierarchy". Italian fascism has directly promoted
colonialism and
imperialism, expounded through the politico-philosophical essay and ideological manifesto
The Doctrine of Fascism (
La dottrina del fascismo, 1932),
ghostwritten by the
actualist Italian philosopher
Giovanni Gentile on behalf of
Benito Mussolini and published in 1932: In 1914,
Italian nationalists began to campaign actively against the
Austro-Hungarian Empire, which still controlled some
Italian-speaking "irredent lands" in the aftermath of the
Third Italian War of Independence (1866), and
Italian neutrality between the major European Powers after the
outbreak of the Great War. After the end of
World War I and during the
Interwar period (1918–1939), the
Fascist regime sought the incorporation of claimed "unredeemed" territories into the
Kingdom of Italy and the
Italian Empire. To the east of Italy, the Italian fascists claimed that
Dalmatia was a land of
Italian culture, whose Italian population (
Dalmatian Italians), including those of Italianized
South Slavic descent, had been driven out of Dalmatia and into exile in Italy, and supported the return of Italians of Dalmatian heritage. Mussolini identified Dalmatia as having strong Italian cultural roots for centuries due to their heritage being linked to the
Roman Empire and the
Republic of Venice. The fascists especially focused their claims based on the Venetian cultural heritage of Dalmatia, claiming that Venetian rule had been beneficial for all Dalmatians and had been accepted by the Dalmatian population. resulting in a quarter of Slovene ethnic territory and approximately 327,000 out of a total population of 1.3 million Slovenes being subjected to forced
Italianization. The fascist regime imposed mandatory Italianization upon the German and South Slavic populations living within Italy's borders. The fascist regime abolished the teaching of minority German and Slavic languages in schools, German and Slavic language newspapers were shut down, and geographical and family names in areas of German or Slavic languages were to be Italianized forcibly. The fascist regime endorsed Albanian irredentism, directed against the predominantly
Albanian-populated Kosovo and
Epirus, particularly in
Chameria, inhabited by a substantial number of Albanians. After Italy annexed Albania in 1939, the fascist regime endorsed assimilating Albanians into Italians and colonizing Albania with Italian settlers from the
Italian Peninsula to gradually transform it into an Italian land. The Fascist regime claimed the
Ionian Islands as Italian territory on the basis that the islands had
belonged to the Venetian Republic from the mid-14th until the late 18th century. To the west of Italy, the fascists claimed the territories of
Corsica,
Nice, and
Savoy and to the south claimed the territories of
Malta and
Corfu due to the presence of
Corsican Italians,
Niçard Italians,
Maltese Italians,
Corfiot Italians, and
Savoyard Italians. During the period of Italian unification in 1860 to 1861, Prime Minister of
Piedmont-Sardinia,
Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, who was leading the unification effort, faced opposition from
French Emperor Napoleon III who indicated that France would oppose Italian unification unless France was given the
County of Nice and Savoy that were held by Piedmont-Sardinia, as France did not want a powerful state having control of all the passages of the Alps. As a result,
Piedmont-Sardinia was pressured to concede Nice and Savoy to France in exchange for France accepting the unification of Italy. The fascist regime produced literature on Corsica that presented evidence of the
italianità (Italianness) of the island. The fascist regime produced literature on Nice that justified that Nice was an Italian land based on historic, ethnic and linguistic grounds. To the north of Italy, the fascist regime in the 1930s had designs on the largely Italian-populated region (
Swiss Italians) of
Ticino and the
Romansch-populated region of
Graubünden in
Switzerland (the Romansch are a
Latin-speaking people of the
Western Alps). In November 1938, Mussolini declared to the Grand Fascist Council: "We shall bring our border to the
Gotthard Pass". The fascist regime accused the Swiss government of oppressing the Romansch people in Graubünden. Ticino was also claimed because the region had belonged to the
Duchy of Milan from the mid-fourteenth century until 1515, as well as being inhabited by Italian speakers of Italian ethnicity. Claim was also raised on the basis that areas now part of Graubünden in the
Mesolcina valley and
Hinterrhein were held by the Milanese
Trivulzio family, who ruled from the
Mesocco Castle in the late 15th century. Also during the summer of 1940,
Galeazzo Ciano met with Hitler and Ribbentrop and proposed to them the dissection of Switzerland along the central chain of the
Western Alps, which would have left Italy also with the canton of
Valais in addition to the claims raised earlier. of 9 May 1936, where the
Italian Empire was proclaimed To the south, the regime claimed the
archipelago of Malta, which had been
ruled by the British Empire since 1800. Mussolini claimed that the
Maltese language was a dialect of Italian and theories about Malta being the cradle of the Latin civilization were promoted. Italian had been widely used in Malta in the literary, scientific and legal fields and it was one of Malta's official languages until 1937 when its status was abolished by the British as a response to Italy's invasion of Ethiopia. Italian irredentists had claimed that territories on the coast of
North Africa were Italy's
Fourth Shore and used the historical Roman rule in North Africa as a precedent to justify the incorporation of such territories to Italian jurisdiction as being a "return" of Italy to North Africa. In January 1939,
Italy annexed territories in Libya that it considered within Italy's Fourth Shore, with Libya's four coastal provinces of Tripoli, Misurata, Benghazi and Derna becoming an integral part of metropolitan Italy. At the same time, indigenous Libyans were given the ability to apply for "Special Italian Citizenship", which required such people to be literate in the
Italian language and confined this type of citizenship to be valid in Libya only. Upon entering
World War II, Italy declared its intention to seize Tunisia as well as the province of
Constantine of
Algeria from France. To the south, the fascist regime held an interest in expanding Italy's African colonial possessions. In the 1920s, Italy regarded
Portugal as a weak country that was unbecoming of a colonial power due to its weak hold on
its colonies and mismanagement of them, and as such Italy desired to annexe Portugal's colonies as well. Italy's relations with Portugal were influenced by the rise to power of the
authoritarian conservative nationalist dictatorship of
António de Oliveira Salazar, which borrowed fascist methods, though Salazar upheld Portugal's traditional alliance with the
United Kingdom. In 1932 during a conversation with
Emil Ludwig, Mussolini described antisemitism as a "German vice" and stated: "There was 'no Jewish Question' in Italy and could not be one in a country with a healthy system of government". On several occasions, Mussolini spoke positively about Jews and the
Zionist movement. Mussolini had initially rejected Nazi racism, especially the idea of a
master race, as "arrant nonsense, stupid and idiotic". In 1929, Mussolini acknowledged the contributions of Italian Jews to Italian society, despite their minority status, and believed that Jewish culture was Mediterranean, aligning with his early
Mediterraneanist perspective. He also argued that
Italian Jews were natives to Italy, as
they had been living in the Italian Peninsula since
Roman times. Initially,
Fascist Italy did not enact comprehensive racist policies like those policies which were enacted by its
World War II Axis partner
Nazi Germany. Italy's
National Fascist Party leader,
Benito Mussolini, expressed different views on the subject of
race throughout his career. In an interview conducted in 1932 at the
Palazzo Venezia in Rome, he said "Race? It is a feeling, not a reality: ninety-five percent, at least, is a feeling. Nothing will ever make me believe that biologically pure races can be shown to exist today". After the
repression of anti-colonial resistance in Italian Libya (1911–1932) and the
Second Italo-Ethiopian War (1935–1936), the Italian Fascist government implemented strict
racial segregation between Italians and Africans in all colonies of the
Italian Empire. By 1938, Mussolini began to actively support racist policies in the Italian Fascist regime, as evidenced by his endorsement of the
Manifesto of Race, the seventh point of which stated that "it is time that Italians proclaim themselves to be openly racist", although Mussolini said that the Manifesto was endorsed "entirely for political reasons", in deference to
Nazi German wishes. The
Manifesto of Race was published on 14 July 1938, paving the way for the enactment of the
Racial Laws. Leading members of the
National Fascist Party, such as
Dino Grandi and
Italo Balbo, reportedly opposed the Racial Laws. Balbo, in particular, regarded antisemitism as having nothing to do with fascism and staunchly opposed the antisemitic laws. After 1938, discrimination and persecution intensified and became an increasingly important hallmark of
Italian Fascist ideology and policies. Nevertheless, Mussolini and the Italian military did not consistently apply the laws adopted in the
Manifesto of Race. In 1943, shortly after the
downfall of the Italian Fascist regime, Mussolini expressed regret for the endorsement, saying that it could have been avoided.
Totalitarianism In 1925, the
National Fascist Party (PNF) declared that
Italy's fascist state would be
totalitarian. However, since
World War II historians have noted that in Italy's colonies Italian fascism displayed extreme levels of violence. The
deaths of one-tenth of the population of the Italian colony of Libya occurred during the fascist era, including from the use of gassings,
concentration camps, starvation and disease; and in Ethiopia during the
Second Italo-Ethiopian War and afterwards by 1938 a quarter of a million Ethiopians had died.
Corporatist economics Italian fascism promoted a
corporatist economic system. The economy involved employer and employee
syndicates being linked together in corporative associations to collectively represent the nation's economic producers and work alongside the state to set national economic policy. Italian fascism supported criminalization of strikes by employees and
lockouts by employers as illegal acts it deemed as prejudicial to the national community as a whole.
Age and gender roles The Italian fascists' political anthem was called
Giovinezza ("Youth"). Fascism identifies the physical age period of youth as a critical time for the moral development of people that will affect society. Italian fascism pursued what it called "moral hygiene" of youth, particularly regarding
sexuality. Fascist Italy promoted what it considered normal sexual behaviour in youth while denouncing what it considered deviant sexual behaviour. once saying that "war is to man what maternity is to the woman". In an effort to increase
birth rates, the Italian fascist government initiated policies designed to reduce a need for families to be
dependent on a dual-income. The most evident policy to lessen female participation in the workplace was a
program to encourage large families, where parents were given subsidies for a second child, and proportionally increased subsidies for a third, fourth, fifth, and sixth child. Italian fascism called for women to be honoured as "reproducers of the nation" and the Italian fascist government held ritual ceremonies to honour women's role within the Italian nation. In 1934, Mussolini declared that employment of women was a "major aspect of the thorny problem of unemployment" and that for women working was "incompatible with childbearing". Mussolini went on to say that the solution to unemployment for men was the "exodus of women from the work force". Although the initial
Fascist Manifesto contained a reference to
universal suffrage, this
broad opposition to feminism meant that when it granted women the right to vote in 1925 it was limited purely to voting in local elections, and only applied to a small section of the female population. Furthermore, this reform was quickly made redundant as local elections were abolished in 1926 as a part of the .
Tradition she-wolf, symbol of the
founding legend of Rome Italian fascism believed that the success of
Italian nationalism required a clear sense of a shared past amongst the Italian people along with a commitment to a modernized Italy. Other traditional symbols of ancient Rome used by the fascists included the
she-wolf. In that year, the fascist government attempted to have the Italian national flag redesigned to incorporate the fasces on it. Years later, and after Mussolini was forced from power by the King in 1943 only to be rescued by German forces, the
Italian Social Republic founded by Mussolini and the fascists did incorporate the fasces on the state's war flag, which was a variant of the Italian tricolour national flag. The issue of the rule of monarchy or republic in Italy was an issue that changed several times through the development of Italian fascism, as initially the fascist movement was
republican and denounced the
Savoy monarchy. However, Mussolini tactically abandoned republicanism in 1922 and recognized that the acceptance of the monarchy was a necessary compromise to gain the support of the establishment to challenge the liberal constitutional order that also supported the monarchy. However, this compromise with the monarchy did not yield a cordial relationship between the King and Mussolini. The King initially held complete nominal legal authority over the military through the
Statuto Albertino, but this was ended during the fascist regime when Mussolini created the position of
First Marshal of the Empire in 1938, a two-person position of control over the military held by both the King and the head of government that had the effect of eliminating the King's previously exclusive legal authority over the military by giving Mussolini equal legal authority to the King over the military. In the 1930s, Mussolini became aggravated by the monarchy's continued existence due to envy of the fact that his counterpart in Germany
Adolf Hitler was both head of state and head of government of a republic; and Mussolini in private denounced the monarchy and indicated that he had plans to dismantle the monarchy and create a republic with himself as head of state of Italy upon an Italian success in the then-anticipated major war about to erupt in Europe. On 18 September 1943, Mussolini made his first public address to the Italian people since his rescue from arrest by allied German forces, in which he commended the loyalty of Hitler as an ally while condemning King Victor Emmanuel III of the Kingdom of Italy for betraying Italian fascism. The relationship between Italian fascism and the
Roman Catholic Church was mixed, as originally the fascists were highly
anti-clerical and
hostile to Roman Catholicism, though from the mid to late 1920s anti-clericalism lost ground in the movement as Mussolini in power sought to seek accord with the Church, as it held major influence on
Italian society, with
most Italians being Roman Catholic. In 1929, the Fascist regime signed the
Lateran Treaty with the
Holy See, a
concordat between the Kingdom of Italy and the Roman Catholic Church that allowed for the creation of a small enclave known as
Vatican City as a sovereign state representing the
papacy. This ended years of perceived alienation between the Church and the Italian government after Italy annexed the
Papal States in 1870. Italian fascism justified its adoption of
antisemitic laws in 1938 by claiming that Italy was fulfilling the Christian religious mandate of the Roman Catholic Church that had been initiated by
Pope Innocent III in the
Fourth Lateran Council of 1215, whereby the Pope issued
strict regulation on the life of Jews in Christian lands. Jews were prohibited from holding any public office that would give them power over Christians and Jews were required to wear distinctive clothing to distinguish them from Christians. == Doctrine ==