Historians interpretations of the rise of fascism Flashcards
Clark
M did not need to use force to seize power. He won by threatening to use it and having the squads ready to obey.
M won by being brought into the system by a governing elite who could see no other way of containing the organised violence
Although it is right to stress the longer term causes of his victory, there was nothing inevitable about it. If there had been a respectable conservative to exploit anti union sentiment in 1920-21, if Giolitti had not made fascism respectable in 1921, if the PPI had not been so opposed to a new Giolitti govt in 1922, if the socialist had not called a general strike, if Facta had resigned earlier in Oct, if Giolitti had been in Rome instead of Piedmont or if the King had not been worried by his cousin all might have been different. The idea of absorbing the fascists into the establishment may have been ignoble but was not foolish - it might have worked. Absorbing troublemakers had normally worked in Italian politics up until this point, but on this occasion it misfired, and politicians cannot be blamed too harshly for trying it
Blinkhorn
Complex issue
Important underlying causes included the failure of the Italian liberals during and immediately after the risorgimento to involve the masses in the nation’s political affairs. When greater democracy did arrive it did so with explosive suddenness between 1912-22, when Italy was faced with the compulsive effects of war, post war economic crises, mass demobilisation, frustrated nationalism and social unrest. Such problems might have been absorbed by a pre existing parliamentary system. It was liberal Italy’s misfortune to confront acute social conflict and the arrival of mass political involvement at the same time. Millions of Italians had no habitual political allegiance. Among them were the two overlapping groups of frustrated ex soldiers and the petty bourgeoisie. These Italians attached neither to socialism, liberalism or political catholicism comprised fascism’s mass base
Fascism obtained power not through revolution but as a result of M’s compromise with conservative and liberal interests
Tannenbaum
A liberal political system can only work when a majority of people with anything to say agree to make it work. This consensus simply did not exist in Italy. Therefore the first well organised attack against the liberal system succeeded in destroying it altogether.
Fascism was not a parenthesis as Croce would have it, nor was it a last stand of capitalism against the proleteriat, as Gramsci would have it
The arguement that Italy was too economically underdeveloped to maintain a liberal system discounts the fact that the main attacks against the system came from the wealthy north
The most that can be said is that liberal leaders failed to prepare the people for political participation
It is easy to argue that the war is what went wrong. The war and its immediate aftermath aggravated existing tensions and created new ones in other victorious nations without seriously threatening their liberal parliamentary regimes. One must therefore assume that there was something different about the Italian setting, at least since unification
Carocci
Fascism was allowed to rise to power due to the wishes of the bourgeoisie to halt the advance of democracy which had occured since the war and restore the old balance of power between the ruling classes and the masses. In order to achieve this they had to suppress the challenge of working class parties, lower wage levels and restore total freedom to entrepreneurs by abolishing the controls and attempts at control that had been introduced in those years
The March on Rome, like the intervention of 1915 was a show of strength against a parliamentary majority. This show of strength would have failed if the King had opposed it. But, as in 1915, the King felt it was right not to oppose it
Kedward
Any account of 20th century European fascism must begin by saying that its strength lay in the willingness and enthusiasm with which large numbers of ordinary people welcomed its ideals, believed in its claims and endorsed its methods. This was the case in 1921 Italy and even more so in 1933 Germany. The wide appeal and attraction of fascism is something which must first be admitted before any understanding of it can emerge
Abse
Any analysis of the Italian political crisis stretching from the armistice ti the March on Rome which ignores or minimises the role of class conflict us absolutely valueless. The mire into which even the most intelligent of consciously anti marxist historians are liable to sink is brilliant exemplified by Clark’s idea that the rise of fascism was merely a series of accidents and that if the King had simply woken up in a different frame of mind then there would be no fascist regime at all
