fascist essay

To what extent does disappointment with the outcome of the first world war explain growing support for the Italian fascist party in the years 1919-1922?
The disappointment of the outcome of the first world war was indeed a contributing factor as to why support for fascism grew as it highlighted the weakness of the liberal government. However this factor alone was simply not enough to explain the very significant rise in support for the fascists from 1919-22. The party had around 1000 members in 1919 which the party claimed rose to half a million members and 250,000 blackshirts by 1922. Other factors such as the fear of socialism, weakness of the liberal government and the Fascist tactics themselves also played a large role in the growth of fascist support.
The reason people were disappointed with the outcome of the first world war, especially nationalists, was due to the fact the even though Italy won the war on the side of the triple entente, they did not receive the land they were promised before entering the war. This showed the liberal government to be weak as they did not challenge the decisions made. There was also the economic percussions that Italy faced after the war due to the government borrowing and putting them in debt. This meant the people of Italy were looking for a strong leader that would stand up for Italy and not just be passive on every circumstance. This played greatly into the fascists favour as they stood for being a strong and decisive party that would tackle problems head on rather than standing by and letting things go on without intervention.
Another reason which can be linked back to the point before is that the Italian people were tired of the weak liberal government. The liberals had been in power since the 1860s and had shown their weakness due to being neutral on every matter of importance. This led factory owners and industrialists to turn to the fascist party as the liberals did nothing about the workers strikes.
One of the most important reasons that the fascist party rose to power was that there was a ‘threat’ and fear of the socialist party. Landowners were worried that the socialists were gaining too much power and would confiscate their land to make everything ‘fairer’ in Italy, especially for the lower classes. This meant they turned to the fascist party as they were taking action against the socialists. They used the ‘black shirts’ or ‘squadrismo’ to beat up socialist party members and destroyed 8 trade unions which showed the Italian people they meant business and meant they gained support from those who opposed the socialists. Mussolini was very astute in positioning the Fascists as the ‘protectors’ of Italy against socialism. It may not always have won him huge numbers of active supporters among the masses, who often disliked the violence, but it did win him a lot of publicity and plenty of sympathy. It also won him more concrete support among industrial and much of the political elite, such as the king, aristocracy and wealthy land owners.

The fascist tactics themselves also played a large role in gaining support. Mussolini used a tactic called ‘dual policy’. This was where he used both the political system and violence to get a foot hold in politics and to gain support. While Mussolini went through the electoral system he used the ‘black shirts’ to intimidate and use violence against people who supported other parties especially the socialists.

However it cannot be overlooked that although the fascists did gain support it was not an overwhelming majority, they were still only seen as a relatively small party therefore not a threat to government.

Overall although the disappointment after world war one did lead to a growth in support for the fascists, factors such as the threat of socialism and liberal weakness had a bigger impact.