Storia d'Italia -- the latter years

Luigi Speranza

We can imagine that, if there is controversy about GARIBALDI, there is going to be much MORE POLEMIC about more RECENT Italian history. Let's revise it.

Italy -- "Italia", as the Italians call it -- became a nation-state belatedly -- on

March 17, 1861,

when most of the states of the peninsula were united under Re Vittor Emmanuele II of the Savoia house, which ruled over Piemonte, really.

The architects of Italian unification were

Conte Camillo Benso di Cavour,

-- the Chief Minister of Re Vittorio Emmanuele II,

and

-- Giuseppe Garibaldi, a general and national hero we all love. (His original French name was Joseph-Marie, though).

In 1866 Prussian Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck offered the re Vittorio Emmanuele II an alliance with the Kingdom of Prussia in the Austro-Prussian War.

In exchange, Prussia would allow Italia to ANNEX Austrian-controlled Venezia.

Re Vittorio Emmanuele II agreed to the alliance and the Third Italian War of Independence began.

The victory against Austria allowed Italy to annex Venezia.

The one major obstacle to Italian unity remained Roma.

In 1870, Prussia went to war with France starting the Franco-Prussian War.

To keep the large Prussian army at bay, France abandoned its positions in Roma in order to fight the Prussians.

Italia benefited from Prussia's victory against France by being able to take over the Papal State from French authority.

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Italian unification was completed,
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and shortly afterward Italy's capital was moved to Roma.

Roma itself remained for a decade under the Papacy, and became part of the Kingdom of Italy only on

September 20, 1870

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the final date of Italian unification.

"The Vatican City" is now, since the Lateran Treaty of 1929, an independent enclave surrounded by Italy, as is San Marino, only more important and with more art -- usually by Italians, rather than Vaticanians, who don't reproduce so frequently.

In Northern Italy, industrialisation and modernisation began in the last part of the 19th century, including the Riviera!

The south, at the same time, was overpopulated, forcing millions of people to search for a better life abroad.

It is estimated that around one million Italian people moved to other European countries such as France, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium and Luxembourg -- leaving their villas and such.

Parliamentary democracy developed considerably in the 20th century.

The Sardinian Statuto Albertino of 1848, extended to the whole Kingdom of Italy in 1861, provided for basic freedoms, but the electoral laws excluded the non-propertied and uneducated classes from voting.

After unification, Italia's politics favoured radical socialism due to a regionally fragmented right, as conservative Prime Minister Marco Minghetti only held on to power by enacting revolutionary and socialist-leaning policies to appease the opposition such as the nationalization of railways.

In 1876, Minghetti was ousted and replaced by socialist Agostino Depretis, who began the long Socialist Period.

The Socialist Period was marked by:

-- corruption,
-- government instability,
-- poverty, and
-- use of authoritarian measures by the Italian government.

Depretis began his term as Prime Minister by initiating an experimental political idea called

"Trasformismo" (transformism) -- which should NOT be confused with Chomsky's transformational syntax.

The theory of Trasformismo was that a cabinet should select a variety of moderates and capable politicians from a non-partisan perspective.

In practice, trasformismo (the 'n' of 'trans' is dropped) was authoritarian and corrupt, Depretis pressured districts to vote for his candidates if they wished to gain favourable concessions from Depretis when in power.

The results of the 1876 election resulted in only four representatives from the right being elected, allowing the government to be dominated by Depretis.

Despotic and corrupt actions are believed to be the key means in which Depretis managed to keep support in southern Italy.

Depretis put through authoritarian measures, such as the banning public meetings, placing "dangerous" individuals in internal exile on remote penal islands across Italy and adopting militarist policies.

Depretis enacted controversial legislation for the time, such was abolishing arrest for debt, making elementary education free and compulsory while ending compulsory Catholic teaching in elementary schools.

The first government of Depretis collapsed after his dismisal of his Interior Minister, and ended with his resignation in 1877.

The second government of Depretis started in 1881.

Depretis' goals included widening suffrage in 1882 and increasing the tax intake from Italians by expanding the minimum requirements of who could pay taxes and the creation of a new electoral system called which resulted in large numbers of inexperienced deputies in the Italian parliament.

In 1887, Depretis was finally pushed out of office after years of political decline.

In 1887, Depretis cabinet minister and former Garibaldi republican Francesco Crispi became Prime Minister.

Crispi's major concerns before during his reign was protecting Italy from their dangerous neighbour Austria-Hungary.

To challenge the threat, Crispi worked to build Italy as a great world power through increased military expenditures, advocation of expansionism, and trying to win Germany's favor even by joining the Triple Alliance which included both Germany and Austria-Hungary in 1882 which remained officially intact until 1915.

While helping Italy develop strategically, he continued trasformismo and was authoritarian, once suggesting the use of martial law to ban opposition parties.

Despite being authoritarian, Crispi put through liberal policies such as the Public Health Act of 1888 and establishing tribunals for redress against abuses by the government.

The overwhelming attention paid to foreign policy alienated the agricultural community in Italy which had been in decline since 1873.

Both radical and conservative forces in the Italian parliament demanded that the government investigate how to improve agriculture in Italy.

The investigation which started in 1877 and was released eight years later, showed that agriculture was not improving , that landowners were swallowing up revenue from their lands and contributing almost nothing to the development of the land.

There was aggravation by lower class Italians to the break-up of communal lands which benefited only landlords.

Most of the workers on the agricultural lands were not peasants but short-term labourers who at best were employed for one year.

Peasants without stable income were forced to live off meager food supplies, disease was spreading rapidly, plagues were reported, including a major cholera epidemic which killed at least 55,000 people.

The Italian government could not deal with the situation effectively due to the mass overspending of the Depretis government that left Italy in huge debt.

Italy also suffered economically because of overproduction of grapes for their vineyards in the 1870s and 1880s when France's vineyard industry was suffering from vine disease caused by insects.

Italy during that time prospered as the largest exporter of wine in Europe but following the recovery of France in 1888, southern Italy was overproducing and had to cut back which caused greater unemployment and bankruptcies.

In 1913 male universal suffrage was allowed.

The Socialist Party became the main political party, outclassing the traditional liberal and conservative organisations.

Starting from the last two decades of the 19th century, Italy developed its own colonial Empire.

Italian colonies were Somalia and Eritrea.

An attempt to occupy Ethiopia failed in the First Italo–Ethiopian War of 1895-1896.

In 1911, Giovanni Giolitti's government sent forces to occupy Libya and declared war on the Ottoman Empire which held Libya.

Italy soon conquered and annexed Tripoli and the Dodecanese Islands.

Nationalists advocated Italy's domination of the Mediterranean Sea by occupying Greece as well as the Adriatic coastal region of Dalmatia.

The First World War (1914–1918) was an unexpected development that forced the decision whether or not to honour the alliance with Germany.

At first Italy remained neutral, saying that the Triple Alliance was only for defensive purposes.

Public opinion in Italy was sharply divided, with Catholics and socialists recommending peace.

However extreme nationalists saw their opportunity to gain their "irredenta" – that is, the border regions that were controlled by Austria. The nationalists won out, and in April 1915, the Italian government secretly agreed to the London Pact. Italy would declare war on the Austro-Hungarian Empire in exchange for promises of major territorial rewards. Italy entered the war with an army of 875,000 men, but the army was poorly led and lacked heavy artillery and machine guns, their war supplies having been largely depleted in the war of 1911-12 against Turkey. Italy proved unable to prosecute the war effectively, as fighting raged for three years on a very narrow front along the Isonzo River, where the Austrians held the high ground. In 1916, Italy declared war on Germany, which provided significant aid to the Austrians. Some 650,000 Italian soldiers died and 950,000 were wounded, while the economy required large-scale Allied funding to survive.

Italy blocked serious peace negotiations, staying in the war primarily to gain new territory to the north. The Treaty of St. Germain awarded the victorious Italian nation the Southern half of the County of Tyrol, Trieste, Istria, and the city of Zadar.

Italy did not receive other territories promised by the Pact of London, so this victory was considered "mutilated". Subsequently, after the Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922, Italy formally annexed the Dodecanese (Possedimenti Italiani dell'Egeo), that she had occupied during the war.

Premier Vittorio Orlando fell from power June 1919, suffering blame for mismanagement of the Italian position at the peace conference. Severe economic difficulties, disillusionment, and wounded national pride caused severe unrest and the rise of extremism. Rebel peasants seized lands promised to them during the war. In 1920-21 major strikes broke out in the northern factories areas and the government seemed helpless.

Premier Giovanni Gioliti alienated the rich and the Catholic Church by his plan to make holders of national bonds register and pay taxes.

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In 1921 Giolitti won the national election with the assistance of Benito Mussolini's Fascist Party, which controlled 35 seats.

A series of weak governments resulted. Mussolini announced a march on Rome on October 27, 1922, and the King refused to proclaim martial law.

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Mussolini's "Black shirts", a paramilitary unit, took control of Rome.
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Mussolini was made Premier, and a month later he received dictatorial powers.

In 1924, Mussolini's coalition won two-thirds of the vote and 375 of the 403 seats.

The enemies of Fascism were silenced by terrorism and brute force, as the opposition deputies withdrew in protest in 1924.

Mussolini took control of Albania in 1927, and in 1929 made peace with the Catholic Church.

The "Lateran Accords" made Catholicism the official state religion, established Vatican City as an independent country, and paid the pope for the papal territory seized in the 19th century.

Until 1925, when Alberto de Stefani ceased to be Minister of Economics, policies were mostly in line with classical liberalism (suppression of inheritance and luxury tax, suppression of taxes on foreign capital.

Life insurance transferred to private enterprises in 1923, state monopoly on telephones and matches was abandoned, etc.).

However, this policy did not contradict seemingly opposite-minded ones.

Various banking and industrial companies were financially supported by the state.

One of Mussolini's first acts was to fund the metallurgical trust Ansaldo to the height of 400 millions Liras.

Following the deflation crisis which started in 1926, banks such as the Banco di Roma, the Banco di Napoli or the Banco di Sicilia were also assisted by the state.

In 1924, the Unione Radiofonica Italiana (URI) was formed by private entrepreneurs and part of the Marconi group, and granted the same year a monopoly of radio broadcasts.

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After the war, the URI became the RAI.
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Starting in 1925, Italy's policies became more protectionist.

Tariffs of grains were increased in an attempt to strengthen domestic production ("Battle for Grain"), which was ultimately a failure. Thus, according to historian Denis Mack Smith (1981), "Success in this battle was... another illusory propaganda victory won at the expense of the Italian economy in general and consumers in particular". also pointed out "Those who gained were the owners of the Latifondia and the propertied classes in general... his policy conferred a heavy subsidy on the Latifondisti."

Affected by the Great Depression, the Italian state attempted to respond to it both by elaborating public works programs such as the taming of the Pontine Marshes, developing hydroelectricity, improving the railways which in the process improved job opportunities, and launching military rearmament.

The Istituto per la Ricostruzione Industriale (IRI) institute was created in 1933, with the aim of subsiding floundering companies. It soon controlled important parts of the economy, through government-linked companies, including Alfa Romeo.

Economically Italy improved with the GNP growing at 2% a year; automobile production was increasing especially those owned by Fiat,[47] its aeronautical industry was making advances.[48] Mussolini also championed agrarianism as part of what he called battles for Land, Lira and Grain; in aims of propaganda, he physically took part in these activities alongside the workers creating a strong public image.[49][50]

Italy conquered an empire in Ethiopia in 1936, defying the league of Nations and world opinion. An economic boycott proved ineffective, and only strengthened Mussolini's political stature. Italy sent forces into Spain in 1936-39 to fight against the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War.

Mussolini supported Hitler at the Munich conference in 1938, and increasingly became an ally of the Germans.

Although Italy was militarily weak and unprepared, Mussolini declared war on France once it had been defeated by Germany in 1940. Italy then signed an official "Axis" alliance with Germany and Japan in September 1940.

Now at war with Britain, Italy sent an invasion army into Egypt.

However, British warplanes severely damaged half the Italian fleet at Toronto on November 11, 1940.

The British counterattack in Egypt was successful, reaching deep into Libya.

The British, with only 555 killed, captured 130,000 Italian prisoners.

In Ethiopia Italy scored some initial gains but by spring 1941 the British counterattack destroyed the Italian base in Ethiopia.

Germany now had to rescue its weak Italian ally, and sent its tank forces to north Africa to fight the British.

The British took control of the Mediterranean, and cut off reinforcements and supplies to the Germans and Italians, leading to their surrender in early 1943.

The Allied Powers invaded Sicily in August 1943 and then invaded the peninsula in September.

Mussolini and his Fascists lost power after these debacles, as the King brought in a new government under Pietro Badoglio.

Italy now joined the Allies.

However, Germany had invaded and seized control of Italy north of Naples, rescued Mussolini from prison, and installed him as the nominal leader of a puppet state, the Italian Social Republic.

The Italian campaign from 1943 to 1945 involved mountainous warfare, with little movement and high casualties.

The civilians suffered heavily.

Rome fell on June 4, 1944, and the Allies soon reached Florence, but could make no further progress.

The Allied breakthrough came in April 1945, as the German defenses collapsed.

Mussolini try to flee to Switzerland, but was captured and executed by Communist Italian partisans on April 28, 1945.

Italia was in chaos at the end of the war, with numerous resistance groups settling old scores, with weekly killings and assassinations.

The political system was totally reorganized.

Fascism was suppressed, and new parties emerged, especially the Christian Democrats led by Alcide de Gasperi (1881–1954), the Socialists led by Pietro Nenni, the Social Democrats led by Giuseppe Saragat, and the Communists led by Palmiro Togliatti (1893–1964). In June 1945, an all-party government was formed, headed by De Gasperi, and including the Communists. A referendum ended the monarchy in June 1946. Elections in 1946 elected 556 members of the Constituent Assembly, with 207 Christian Democrats, 115 Socialists, and 104 Communists. A new constitution was written, setting up a parliamentary democracy. The 1929 Concordat with the Vatican was continued, while Catholicism was not the official state religion anymore. From the Fascist era, the Republic retained the Institute for Industrial Reconstruction (IRI) and Eni, the national oil company which headed by Enrico Mattei, became a powerful economic force. In 1947 the communist were expelled from government. Economic chaos continued, with large-scale strikes in 1947. The Italian general election, 1948 set up the framework of government for the following 40 years: a blocked parliamentary system, with the Democrazia Cristiana always in government and the Italian Communist Party always in opposition; cabinets were very short (usually less than one year) and reshuffles involved the same politicians in different combinations. By 1950, the economy had largely stabilized, with the industrialized North far more prosperous than the Mezzogiorno (the rural South). [51]

Under the Paris Peace Treaties of 1947, the eastern border area was annexed by Yugoslavia. In 1954, the Free Territory of Trieste was divided between Italy and Yugoslavia. In 1949, Italy joined NATO. The recovery of the Italian economy was helped through the Marshall Plan. Moreover, Italy was a founding member of the European Economic Community, which later transformed into the European Union (EU).

[edit] The economic boomIn 1950s and 1960s the country enjoyed prolonged economic growth, which was accompanied by a dramatic rise in the standard of living of ordinary Italians.[52]

This section requires expansion.

[edit] The Years of LeadMain article: Years of lead (Italy)
Italy faced political instability in the 1970s, which ended in the 1980s. Known as the Years of Lead, this period was characterized by widespread social conflicts and terrorist acts carried out by extra-parliamentary movements. The assassination of the leader of the Christian Democracy (DC), Aldo Moro, led to the end of a "historic compromise" between the DC and the Communist Party (PCI). In the 1980s, for the first time, two governments were managed by a republican (Giovanni Spadolini 1981-82) and a socialist (Bettino Craxi 1983-87) rather than by a Christian-democrat.

At the end of the Lead years, the PCI gradually increased their votes thanks to Enrico Berlinguer. The Socialist party (PSI), led by Bettino Craxi, became more and more critical of the communists and of the Soviet Union; Craxi himself pushed in favour of US president Ronald Reagan's positioning of Pershing missiles in Italy.

In 2000, a Parliament Commission report from the Olive Tree left-of-centre coalition concluded that the strategy of tension had been supported by the United States to "stop the PCI, and to a certain degree also the PSI, from reaching executive power in the country".[53][54] The report was not approved by the right-of-centre coalition. A source in the U.S. Embassy in Rome characterized the report as "allegations that have come up over the last 20 years" and have "absolutely nothing to them", while other commentators deemed it nothing more than "a manoeuvre dictated primarily by domestic political considerations".[55]

[edit] The Second Republic (1992-present)
Bettino Craxi, viewed by many as the symbol of Tangentopoli, leader of the Italian Socialist Party, is greeted by a salvo of coins as a sign of loathing by protesters.From 1992 to 1997, Italy faced significant challenges as voters disenchanted with political paralysis, massive government debt, extensive corruption, and organized crime's considerable influence collectively called the political system Tangentopoli. As Tangentopoli was under a set of judicial investigations by the name of Mani pulite (Italian for "clean hands"), voters demanded political, economic, and ethical reforms. The Tangentopoli scandals involved all major parties, but especially those in the government coalition: between 1992 and 1994 the DC underwent a severe crisis and was dissolved, splitting up into several pieces, among whom the Italian People's Party and the Christian Democratic Center. The PSI (along with other minor governing parties) completely dissolved.

The 1994 elections also swept media magnate Silvio Berlusconi (leader of "Pole of Freedoms" coalition) into office as Prime Minister. Berlusconi, however, was forced to step down in December 1994 when his Lega Nord partners withdrew support. The Berlusconi government was succeeded by a technical government headed by Prime Minister Lamberto Dini, which left office in early 1996.

In April 1996, national elections led to the victory of a centre-left coalition under the leadership of Romano Prodi. Prodi's first government became the third-longest to stay in power before he narrowly lost a vote of confidence, by three votes, in October 1998. A new government was formed by Democrats of the Left leader and former communist Massimo D'Alema, but in April 2000, following poor performance by his coalition in regional elections, D'Alema resigned. The succeeding centre-left government, including most of the same parties, was headed by Giuliano Amato (social-democratic), who previously served as Prime Minister in 1992-93, from April 2000 until June 2001. In 2001 the centre-right formed the government and Silvio Berlusconi was able to regain power and keep it for a complete five-year mandate, becoming the longest government in post-war Italy. Berlusconi participated in the US-led multinational coalition in Iraq.

The elections in 2006 returned Prodi in government, leading an all-encompassing centre-left coalition of 11 parties (L'Unione). Prodi won with only a slim majority in the Senate, also due to the new proportional electoral law introduced by Berlusconi and Calderoli in 2005. In the first year of his government, Prodi had followed a cautious policy of economic liberalization and reduction of public debt. His government, in loss of popularity, was anyway sacked by the end of support from centrist MPs led by Clemente Mastella.

Berlusconi won the last snap elections in 2008, with the People of the Freedom party (fusion of his previous Forza Italia party and of Fini's Alleanza Nazionale) against Walter Veltroni of the Democratic Party. In 2010, Berlusconi's party saw the splintering of Gianfranco Fini's new faction, which formed a parliamentary group and voted against him in a no-confidence vote on 14 December 2010. Berlusconi's government was able to avoid no-confidence thanks to support from sparse MPs, but has lost a consistent majority in the lower Chamber.