Why Did Mussolini Come into Power?

Why Did Mussolini Come into Power?

1. DISILLUSIONMENT AND FRUSTRATION IN POST-WAR ITALY

   • Treaty of Versailles did not give them what they had been promised.
     • Fiume was taken over by Gabriele D'Annunizio
     • Lands not given: Dalmatia, Adalia, some Aegan islands and a protectorate over Albania
   • Terrible economic effects of the war
     • Value of Lira has decreased from 5 to the dollar in 1914 to 28 to the dollar in 1921
       • therefore cost of living also went up x5
   • Hatred for the parliamentary system
     • 5 different cabinets with shaky majorities came and went
       • Nine different parties in May 1921
         • Indecisive government

2. WAVE OF STRIKES 1919-20

   • Unification of socialist parties and trade unions thanks to industrialization
     • Italian Communist Party formed in Jan 1921
       • However the revolution had already fizzed out thanks to this

3. MUSSOLINI ATTRACTED WIDESPREAD SUPPORT

   • Went from extreme left to extreme right
     • Dropped the republican part of his program, made conciliatory speeches for the Church, and spoke in favour of big-businesses.

4. LACK OF EFFECTIVE OPPOSITION

   • Socialists and Nationalists had not united to eradicate Fascism.
     • Giovanni Giolitti resigned
       • Socialists called strike in summer of 1922
         • Strike failed, Mussolini emerged as the 'saviour of nation from communism"
           • King Victor Emmanuel III did not declare state of emergency, invited Mussolini to power
             • He did this because:-
               • Lack of confidence in Luigi Facta (the PM)
               • doubts as to whether army could be relied on to obey orders
               • fear of a civil war