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Violence in Italian Fascism, 1919–25

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Social Protest, Violence and Terror in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-century Europe

Abstract

Mussolini, hard-pressed by radical Fascism, both provincial and agrarian, and by the Aventino’s intransigent opposition, in his parliamentary speech of 3 January 1925 proclaimed the breakthrough to the fascist one-party state. Answering his anti-fascist critics, he said:

They say that Fascism consists of a horde of barbarians who have pitched their tents within the nation, that it is a movement of bandits and robbers! They raise the moral issues … very well, I hereby declare … that I alone take the political, moral and historic responsibility for everything that has happened … The fault is mine if Fascism has been nothing but castor oil and cudgels, rather than the noble passion of the flower of Italian youth! If all acts of violence have been the outcome of a certain historical, political, moral climate, then the responsibility is mine, for I created this climate … by a propaganda beginning at the time of the intervento and lasting to the present day.1

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Notes

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Authors
  1. Jens Petersen
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Düsseldorf, Germany

    Wolfgang J. Mommsen (Professor of History, Director) (Professor of History, Director)

  2. German Historical Institute, London, UK

    Wolfgang J. Mommsen (Professor of History, Director) & Gerhard Hirschfeld (Fellow) (Professor of History, Director) &  (Fellow)

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© 1982 Wolfgang J. Mommsen and Gerhard Hirschfeld

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Petersen, J. (1982). Violence in Italian Fascism, 1919–25. In: Mommsen, W.J., Hirschfeld, G. (eds) Social Protest, Violence and Terror in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-century Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-16941-2_17

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