Security Threats
The League of Nations was Wilson's great
internationalist project for the new era. The
League was to provide the foundations for order
in the post-war scenario, to remake the
international state system which had been
successively undermined by conflicts among
European powers. The league's main project was
'collective security'. But in reality, different
countries in Europe perceived their security needs
differently. For instance, Britain perceived Soviet
Russia to be the main enemy, France saw the
main threat from the neighbouring Germany.
French moved towards a policy of
bilateralism and concluded a series of
independent pacts with states surrounding
Germany. Locarno treaties of 1925 were born
out of a previous German request that France
and Germany conclude a pledge of not resorting
to war between each other, something which
would also involve Britain and Belgium. By 1925
the British agreed to guarantee such a treaty,
which would also include the Belgium-German
frontier. The sum total of the Locarno treaties
was as follows: Britain would guarantee the
frontier of Belgium against future (German)
aggression while France would do the same in
the east-protecting Poland and Czechoslovakia.
Germany would join the League of Nations.
The Locarno treaties were followed up by
the Kellog-Briand pact of 1928 also known as
the Pact of Paris. The pact was universal in scope
and the signatories renounced the use was as an
instrument of international relations. Ultimately
Sixty Five States signed the treaty.
Economic Crisis
To a great degree, the 'recovery' in Europe in
the years after World War I was built almost
entirely on US loans. The process also ensured a
constant supply of liquidity back to US lenders.
To take an example, the US lent money to
Germany in the 1920s for her recovery. In turn
Germany passed on money to the French and
the British as part of reparation payments. The
French and the British for their part re-routed
money back to the US as part of repayment for
war loans. The world economy was flush with
money supply, most of it US-dominated. The
atmosphere was ripe for speculation.
The crisis actually began over the rapid drop
in agricultural prices in North America. With
European recovery the world agricultural surplus
began to rise, and the North American producers
(who had vastly increased production during the
war period) were convulsed by rapid drop in
prices. Bankruptcies began in US agriculture and
saw a rapid drop in expenditure. It was only a matter
of time before the stock market would be affected.
The actual events began to unfold in October
1929. On 24th and 29th of October 1929, thirteen
and sixteen and a half million shares were sold.
In that month US investors lost 40 billion dollars,
a huge sum at that time. The meltdown had
begun. The crash was followed by the worldwide
fall in agricultural prices. Given the fairly
advanced integration of the world economy for
agricultural products, millions of primary
producers were affected.
This crisis had earlier been predicted by
writers like Karl Marx who had spoken about
the cyclical nature of capitalism: how its chaotic
and unplanned character would lead to periodic
crises of over-productions. In fact, the tendency
towards over-production in capitalism is blamed
by many writers for its cyclic nature.
However none of the previous downturns
of the world economy had such serious
consequences as that beginning in 1929. The
downturn of 1871 was significant in that it
undermined British hegemony in the worldeconomy,
but in no way did world-wide
depression occur. The only country that was
relatively unaffected by the crisis was the Soviet
Union.
Fascism
Fascism emerged in Europe as a synthesis of
organic nationalism and anti-Marxist socialism.
Organic nationalism means a belief in the
harmonious collectivity of Nations superseding
all other forms of human identification. Its organic
nationalism accounts for its deep-rooted hostility
to internationalism and organizations and
movements based on internationalism such as
communism, freemasonry, the League of Nations,
finance capital and the multi-national Jewish
community.
Fascism emerged as a radical movement based
on the rejection of nations of liberalism,
democracy and Marxism. The Fascist synthesis
symbolized the rejection of a political culture
inherited from the Enlightenment and its ideas
such as rationalist materialism, individualism and
pluralist autonomy.
The other major cultural variables of fascism
were: activism, vitality and social-darwinism.
Sorel's philosophy of action was based on
intuition, energy and elan. Its activism was used
to mobilize the masses. Social Darwinism believed
that people in society compete for survival and
only superior groups and races succeed.
The war did provide sociological and
psychological conditions for the crystallization
of Fascism. It revealed the capacity of nationalism
in the mobilization of masses and economic
resources. It further demonstrated the importance
of unity of command, of authority, of moral
mobilization and of propaganda in the service of
the modern state. Its perfect expression being
the quasi-sacred figure of the leaders like the
Duce (as in Italy) or the Fuehrer (as in Germany).
A party militia was often used to reinforce
the sense of nationalism and constant struggle
as well as to wipe out opposition. The exaltation
of youth and the specific tendency towards an
authoritarian, charismatic, personal style of
command (whether elective or non-elective) were
other features related to this militarization of
politics.
The ideas of corporatism (as a community of
people, of producers free from class strife)
emerged in reaction to individualism, social
atomization and new centralizing states. Its two
distinct forms were societal corporatism (based
on autonomy to corporations) and state
corporatism. At the same time it also made use
of anti-semitism and an embryonic militant group
of young activists.
Another trend toward the crystallization of
the fascist right was symbolized by an
instrumental, modernizing radical right which
combined domestic modernization with militant
nationalism. It is important to understand the
ideological range that is covered by the rightwing
regimes. All of them are not similar, and
can cover a broad spectrum starting from
conservative regimes to extreme fascist ones.
Fascism in Italy
Fascism in Italy was created by the
convergence of certain existing trends. The split
in the radical syndicates Confederation of Trade
Unions took place in 1914 over the issue of Italian
participation in the war. The syndicates believed
in the 'self-emancipation' of the 'producers',
which could be achieved through 'regulation at
factory level', and not through 'seizure of state
power'. The state would be replaced at an
appropriate time by worker's syndicates or
associations, which would act as the instruments
of self-government of the producers.
The Syndicate wing which moved towards
fascism embraced extreme nationalism, and
nations were described by it in class terms as
proletarian or plutocratic. The futurists who
rejected traditional norms and existing institutions
and exalted violence, and were fascinated
by speed, power, motors and machines, or all
the modern technological possibilities, were
another major ideological factor. Mussolini's
socialistic views, and ideas on leadership, massmobilization
and national revolution contributed
yet another strand.
The growth of fascist squads led by ex-military
personnel and supported by the local police and
army especially in northern and central Italythe
Po Valley and Tuscany was directly linked
to the actual or perceived threat of the left. The
King appointed Mussolini as the Prime Minister
on 29th October 1922, who temporarily observed
all the constitutional norms after the assumption
of power.
In February 1923, a fusion of Fascist Party
and Nationalist Association of Italy (ANI) took
place. This fusion with a conservative, elitist,
monarchist right-wing was essential to gain
broader support among army officers, academics,
civil servants and businessmen. The traditional
right groups co-operated with fascists in passing
the Acerbo Bill in 1923 which proposed that the
party receiving a quarter of votes in an election,
should be automatically given two-thirds of seats
in the parliament.
Using force and fraud, Fascists swept the
1924 election. Mussolini went ahead with his
institutionalization of dictatorship. In October
1926, all opposition parties were banned. The
press was shackled, and the Public Safety Law
(1926) made the security of state take precedence
over personal liberty. The Syndical Laws (1926)
brought labour under the control of state, in the
interest of production. The law confirmed the
fascist unions in their monopoly of negotiations,
set up tribunals for compulsory arbitration and
banned strikes and go-slows.
The 'Corporate State' was formally created
in 1934 with 22 new combined corporations of
employers and employees, Mussolini also tried
to appease the church. Large grants were made
for the repair of war damaged churches. In 1923,
religious education was made compulsory in
secondary schools.
A military type Militia developed out of the
fascist squads. It was trained to use all kinds of
weapons and centered around a core of professional
soldiers. Its cadres were indoctrinated and
used against opponents. The semi-military
propaganda-type organization included Balilla,
young vanguards and the young fascists.
However, unlike the Nazi German state,
Fascism in Italy never achieved a day-to-day
institutional control. The state intervention in the
economic life of the nation was marginal in the
early part or regime. The Direct state investment
during the Depression was only an emergency
measure. The Fascist State also introduced certain
welfare schemes for workers in 1930s. e.g. family
allowances were given in 1934.
The Italian state also lacked any policy of
racial anti-Semitism, at least, up to 1937. In
November 1938, however, under the influence
of Nazis, racial laws were passed which banned
marriage with Jews, denied jobs to them in public
services, debarred them from joining the Fascist
Party and from owning more than 50 hectares
of land.
