This volume examines the manifestations of early fascist politics in regional societies. The focus of the analysis is on the key phase encompassing the transition from the beginnings of fascist movements (Original Fascism, ‘Kampfzeit’, ‘Squadrism’) to the assertation and establishment of power. The collected volume consists of the written contributions to the international conference “Regionale Frühfaschismen. Faschistische Herrschaftsdurchsetzung und -re- zeption im interregionalen Vergleich/Prefascismi regionali. Esercizio e ricezio- ne del potere fascista in un confronto interregionale” (Early Regional Forms of Fascism. Implementation and Reception of Fascist Rule in Interregional Comparison), organized by the Competence Centre for Regional History of the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano in Brixen-Bressanone (South Tyrol) from 12–13 November 2021, which focused on types of fascism during the interwar period in Central and Southern Europe.1 The majority of the chapters in this volume are, therefore, case studies from Germany, Italy, and Austria (Hoffmann 2021, 108–30).
From a historiographical perspective, since the 1960s and increasingly since the 1970s, the study of local and regional history has made significant contributions to the research on the origins of European fascism—and especially the history of National Socialism and Italian Fascism—in a variety of thematic contexts (Schaarschmidt 2007, 14; Wirsching 1996, 26; Szejnmann 2003, 208). In rethinking the classical theory of totalitarianism, it is precisely this focus on regional societies that has called into question the thesis of a centrally dominated state with no room for individual and (non-conformist) collective action. Fascist politics at all levels was ultimately much more contradictory and complex than initially assumed, and especially regional historical analyses have explored this quasi-polycratic character in great detail. Varieties of European fascism are increasingly understood—as Martina Steber put it—“as a phenomenon embedded in the region, regionality as an explanatory factor for its implementation and specific manifestations […]” (Steber 2018, 53).
With regard to research on the regional dimension of National Socialism, the project “Bavaria in the Nazi Era” at the Institute of Contemporary History in Munich during the late 1970s and early 1980s opened up new perspectives in a pioneering way and marked the beginning of a kind of “territorialization of Nazi research” in German-speaking countries (Schaarschmidt 2007, 14; Szejnmann 2003, 208–25). Regional studies have also provided valuable insights into the development of Italian Fascism in its early stage. This was all the more true as early Italian Fascism evolved into different “provincial principalities” and thus initially developed strongly regionalized, rapidly consolidating forms of rule (cf. Engelmann 1996, 305–12; Albanese 2021; Millan 2024). These early regional manifestations of fascism also had a decisive influence on both national Italian Fascism and the development of the movement as a whole.
Furthermore, in recent decades, a large number of micro-historical, local-historical, and especially regional-historical works on the operationalization of modern research designs in the fields of cultural history and the history of everyday life and mentalities (for example the milieu approach) have shown, mostly in the form of case studies, that regional fascism was by no means primarily structured from the top down (Gruner 2018, 71–90). On the contrary, the outcome and performance of fascist politics depended on different regional or local mobilizing forces and the dynamics of change. Regional peculiarities and specificities acted as filters that affected the process of appropriation and reception of power to either a greater or lesser extent (Umbach and Szejnmann 2012, 1–22).
The contributions in this volume discuss the significance of these very obvious ‘regionalisms’ for the fascist assertion of power in the transition period outlined above. Which styles, practices, circumstances and sensitivities, i.e. specific ‘regional cultures’, helped or hindered the efforts to assert power and penetrate society? Which policies, ideologies and traditions, often embedded in a regionally specific habitus, and which institutions, social collectives and informal networks characteristic of the region influenced the social practice of acceptance, compliance, indifference, rejection or even resistance to the continuing fascist rise and expansion of power?
Within this thematic framework, a number of overarching issues and topical research areas were of particular interest to the participants of the conference, and these are addressed in the contributions, with varying degrees of intensity. At the same time, however, they also identify important research topics to which more attention should be devoted in the future:
First, it is crucial to consider how modern regional historical approaches can be used to analyse early fascist transition processes. Which methodological and content-related concepts and developmental steps have played a decisive role in regional historical analyses of early fascist ‘systems’? And what research desiderata can be identified in the context of recent research on regional fascism? In what ways do individual national historiographies differ in their approach to early regional fascist societies from a comparative perspective?
Second, emphasis is placed on the strategies and methods of the implementation of fascist rule and the role of regional actors (top-down perspective). In this context, the main question is how fascist ideologies and politics were communicated and implemented in the region. What regional administrative, political, and social structures facilitated or hindered the implementation of fascist rule? How did the regional and national levels interact, and how did regional practices influence the overall system of fascist politics? What ‘sensitivity’ to regional values, sensibilities and interests can be discerned from the perspective of the history of communication and instrumentalization? What role did the existence of regionally specific milieus, pressure groups and established ideological convictions play, and to what extent did the direct consequences of the First World War and the Paris Peace Treaty influence the rise of fascism? Which—sometimes regional—examples, traditions, and ideological points of reference did regional fascism adopt?
A third thematic perspective opens by examining regional social cultures of perception, participation, and difference within the early fascist transition process (bottom-up perspective). How was ‘emerging’ fascism perceived and understood by members of regional society and individual social groups—a question posed by several contributions in this volume? How was the relationship between inclusion and exclusion, collaboration, and opposition, or rather resistance, and how did this relationship change over the course of the transition process outlined above? Were radicalization tendencies able to gain a foothold in the early fascist period, and how did regional societies react to this? And finally, what role did the newly emerging communicative and social spaces at the regional level play in the formation of consensus and dissent?
Fourth, the contributions discuss similarities and differences in the nature of early fascism from the perspective of comparative regional history: the case studies in this volume, which take into account the regions of several nations or different national fascisms, make it possible to draw insightful comparative conclusions. Despite the long-standing demand that “the goal of future research must above all be to advance to interregional comparative studies” (Wirsching 1996, 46), a more regional-comparative view of the phenomenon remains a desideratum to this day (cf. Steber 2018, 67). A number of key questions have arisen in this context: what similarities and differences can be discerned in a comparative analysis of different regions? And with regard to the process of the implementation of fascist rule, as well as to the cultures of participation or resistance, is there some set of regional specificities and peculiarities that influenced the shaping of fascist spheres of influence and power? What similarities and differences emerge when comparing intra-regional spaces (for example rural vs. urban or peripheral vs. central territories), on the one hand, and when comparing regions of different fascisms (for example National Socialism vs. Italian Fascism) on the other? The main focus of the conference was precisely this interregional comparative perspective that allowed for an intensive discussion within the context of the case studies presented and against the backdrop of potential similarities and differences in the establishment of regional fascist movements. Priority was given to comparative perspectives that, based on the “intrinsic power of the regional” (Martina Steber), drew on a set of analytical tools from the field of societal history and developed innovative theoretical, methodological and content-related approaches to early regional fascism.
The fifth and final thematic focus of the conference was on the particularities of early fascism in ethnically or socially fragmented border regions and hybrid border societies: what particular challenges and conditions did early fascism face in nationally or ethnically mixed border regions—for example in Tyrol, Vorarlberg, Aosta, the eastern Adriatic or the Saarland? How did the strategies for establishing power differ from those in ‘traditional’ regions in terms of language, content, and political and ideological practice? Which border-regional characteristics led to a change or adaptation, or even radicalization, of fascist strategies and practices, and in which specific political fields did the respective ‘border status’ facilitate or hinder fascist penetration?
In their chapters, eleven contributors illustrate these manifold manifestations of early fascism in different regional settings. Considering the rural and urban areas of Italy and Germany, interwar Spain, personalities, and strategies on a large scale, this volume contains a vast number of hitherto untold stories that underscore the importance of studying the developments that shaped European fascism long before the political movements supporting it gained control over countries on the continent.
Fascist transnational networks are depicted as essential tools for contact in Daniele Toro’s chapter centring on the figure of Waldemar Pabst in the 1920s. Pabst had thrived in German military and counter-revolutionary circles after the First World war, before escaping to Austria and establishing himself among the Tyrolean “Heimwehr”. Still, the article does more than explain the role of a single broker in the fascist milieu. Interactions between and within Italian, German and Austrian right-wing circles take the centre stage in the author’s methodical approach. Therefore, the role of Pabst is presented within blossoming alliances among like-minded groups in different national and regional scenarios and as a catalyst for the establishment of lasting connections in a new era of European politics after the First World War.
A special case of regional fascist movements is represented in Daniel Marc Segesser’s and Wolfgang Weber’s chapter on the peripheral Austrian province of Vorarlberg, situated on the border to Switzerland and Germany. “Law and order” was a central tenet of the ruling class under long-time governor Otto Ender of the Conservative Party. The relevance of different political movements for regional decision-making is portrayed through the study of key sources regarding Ender that explain which political ideas he rejected or endorsed to implement his vision of an orderly state in contrast to socialist and revolutionary Marxist proposals. Moreover, two antagonistic national-socialist movements that were established in Vorarlberg in the interwar period and their influence on regional politics are also considered. Finally, this analysis, encompassing multiple political ideas and movements in the sphere of fascist politics, is an effective tool for better understanding the gradual shift of regional politics toward the extreme right, culminating, arguably, in Ender’s role as the architect behind Austria’s authoritarian constitution of May 1934.
Stefan Eminger describes National Socialist networks from a micro-historical perspective, reflecting on the case of Wolkersdorf, a small community situated to the north of Vienna. The author argues that by analysing the situation in rural Austria in the early 1920s, the “first wave” of National Socialist policies can be better explained. By doing so, it is also possible to comprehend the success of the “second wave” that emerged in the 1930s during Austria’s severe internal political crisis. In particular, this chapter covers local clubs, societies and associations to better understand how national socialist networks were rooted in rural Austria and how they contributed to a normalization of National Socialism in the country. The importance of individuals who were part of the bourgeois establishment in the community is a central factor that paved the way for National Socialist views. Moreover, local networks between like-minded personalities and groups helped to prepare the groundwork for the more radical “second wave” of National Socialism in this rural scenario.
Edith Raim analyses a vanguard of National Socialism in the Bavarian countryside. Murnau, a small constituency in southern Bavaria, took a “Sonderweg”, as the author claims, when compared to other constituencies in the area. Detailing the impact of the First World War on a remote community in Upper Bavaria, the article dwells on economic, social, and very personal developments from a micro-historical perspective. By doing so, the author goes well beyond established patterns of analysis regarding the ascent of early National Socialism and discusses in detail which endemic and external dynamics led to the success of early National Socialism in Murnau. Immigration by former army officers, fear of a Bolshevik upheaval, economic hardships, local clubs and societies, Bavarian traditionalism and disappointment after 1918, were factors that contributed to the establishment of far-right ideas in Upper Bavaria, bringing a sizeable number of volunteers to Hitler’s ranks during his putsch attempt in 1923. By analysing a string of factors and detailing how National Socialism could root itself at a local level very early on, the author paints a clear picture that enlightens the reader on micro-historical developments and early power grabs by Hitler’s movement.
Jens Späth depicts the special case of the Saar region, whose population chose to return to Germany via a referendum in 1935. By considering regional press, the article dwells on questions regarding the views on Italian Fascism and German National Socialism in the 1920s and 1930s, providing indicators on how international developments were perceived in a regional context. The sources analysed show a great interest in the Saar for Italian developments that are also considered in connection with similar developments in Germany. Moreover, attention is drawn to developments in border regions and inconsistencies in fascist policies. For a long time, political extremism in the Saar region was markedly smaller than in other German regions, owing to the fact that associationism in Catholic and Socialist milieus could counteract fringe movements, while the location of the region made it more sensible to international developments as a whole. Restrictions by the League of Nations also played a crucial role. Nevertheless, the Saar region witnessed rapid successes by the National Socialists in 1933 for a multifaceted matrix of reasons that has yet to be fully explained. These range from propaganda, intimidation attempts, national sentiment, and the peculiar situation of the region after the First World War.
Newly conquered lands on the eastern border of Italy are in the focus of Antonella Fiorio’s contribution. Dalmatia becomes the lens through which phenomena of political change and radicalism are described in a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual environment, where ideological shifts were felt down to the level of local communities and individual families. These dynamics were amplified by a situation in which the fate of this region had been left in limbo for some time after the war when Italy and the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes competed for control, creating fertile ground for political and social radicalization that led to a singular manifestation of fascist policies. Diplomatic solutions that divided the Dalmatian territories between the two nations sparked nationalist and fascist violence as well as resentment in the early 1920s leading to incidents and retribution on both sides of the newly established border. In the Italian part of Dalmatia, in particular, liberal elites and fascist groups clashed over policies for the region, gradually leading to the establishment of fascist rule over the recently annexed lands. Therefore, this chapter presents the dynamics of a borderland in tumult and the actions taken by old and new elites to address issues in a conflicted regional context.
Alessandro Celi presents fascist policies in the Aosta Valley in the early years following the First World War through the lens of the regional newspaper Le Mont-Blanc, which retained its independence until March 1940, when the last issue before Italy entered the war was issued. Led by a woman, Joséphine Duc-Teppex, this newspaper set itself apart from other publications that had been banned in the 1920s by following a publishing line not harmful to fascism. The author argues that this phenomenon can be traced back to the owner of the paper’s political and ideological views. In many cases, Le Mont-Blanc and Italian Fascism shared common ideas such as the superiority of the white race and eugenics, though their views may have stemmed from other considerations. The contrast to clerical partisanship, the call for industrial modernization and the opposition to worker strikes after the war made the newspaper a congenial partner for Mussolini’s Blackshirts in 1919/20. Moreover, a synergy developed between the newspaper and the fascist movement in addressing regional industrial leaders, anti-communists, and the liberal classes. Finally, the question of the use of French in the Aosta Valley was also one that saw a convergence between fascist policies that allowed more freedoms to French-speakers than to German-speaking or Slovenian-speaking minorities in Italy and Le Mont-Blanc, which advocated bilingualism in the region. Therefore, this chapter is a unique example of regional elites and fascist ideals merging in a peculiar frontier setting that is well worth exploring to better understand mutations in fascist principles according to local necessities.
The question of fascist violence and resistance takes centre stage in Ruth Nattermann’s chapter dedicated to early fascism in the Tuscan capital, Florence. The author focuses on political networks, such as that of the Rosselli family, bringing to light different aspects of antifascist activism and the experiences of individuals and groups. The author uncovers realities beyond the traditional reference to Florence as an antifascist bastion in her analysis. With a privileged perspective on female actors, this text analyses unpublished ego-documents, correspondence, and collections from different organizations. The role of antisemitism is explored as well, adding to a complex scenario in the early years of Italian Fascism when opposition and intellectual networks were connected to Judaism for the first time. This all led to the dismantlement of opposition and, in many cases, to the emigration of its exponents. Finally, the path to fascistization of the region as well as the radical and violent means used by Mussolini’s movement are a testament to the nature of Fascism and its strategies for consolidating power at the regional level.
Dario Salvatore’s contribution focuses on yet another peculiar case in fascist regional policies with Naples as the example. Southern Italy in general and Naples in particular are fields of study that diverge from common analyses of fascist practices. This is the result of multiple factors. The absence of the Socialist Party in the region combined with the strong influence held by agrarian political elites make this scenario compelling for an analysis of differing early fascist cultures throughout Italy, while scholars routinely neglect the south, rather focusing on areas of fascist manifestation in northern Italy after 1918. This makes the re-evaluation of the Neapolitan case so compelling. The author argues that the conquest of the port of Naples through the fascist dock workers’ union was a pivotal moment for early fascism in the city. The creation of the union was followed by the infiltration of and attacks on established organizations, luring parts of the workforce through the promise of lucrative arrangements, followed by the gradual fascist takeover of activities in this sector in 1922. Salvatore also examines inner frictions within the fascist movement in the context of Neapolitan-Genoese concurrence in the maritime field, which indicates how fractious the early fascist experience could be between national policies and regional necessities, also highlighting the diverging interests of Mussolini and his local allies.
Molise, a region situated “on the edge of Southern Italy”, is the focal point for Giuseppe Iglieri’s analysis of the affirmation of fascism in a rural Italian region. Molise faced the same problems as the rest of Italy after the end of hostilities in 1918. Unrest due to the precarious economic situation was a common thread throughout the country, yet, in Molise, the Socialist Party refrained from the same acts of violence that characterized the worker’s struggles in the north. The establishment of the first fascist groups was even welcomed, considering similar societal goals. Nevertheless, in 1920, the clashes between fascist and socialist groups became fierce and the region experienced violent battles over the control of local economies. The article exemplifies the problems within the opposition to fascism and explains how the fascist movement could profit from dysfunctional policies on the whole political spectrum. Therefore, the case of Molise is a prism through which larger events in Italy in the early 1920s can be better understood.
“Iron Surgeons”, as described in Joaquín Costa’s work, and the dictatorship of Miguel Primo Rivera (1923–1930) are at the centre of Florian Grafl’s analysis of interwar Spain. While Francisco Franco’s decade-long reign looms large in European memory as the fascist period in Spanish history, Rivera’s rule is pointedly compared by the author to Germany’s “Bewegungszeit” and Italy’s “Squadrismo”. The focus is on the Catalan case for how power was imposed regionally during 1924 and 1925. The chapter details how different interests in Catalan politics of the time need to be considered to understand the reach of Primo de Rivera’s dictatorship and its regional genesis. Regional actors and national institutions were ultimately responsible for the power structure that ensued in the region after Primo de Rivera’s coup. The regional peculiarities of the system can be traced back not only to the long history of Catalan autonomy but also to more subtle factors such as personal ties, fears among the elites, and support for law-and-order policies. This makes the Catalan case a remarkable example of intertwined interests and policies that led to the formation of a particular form of early fascist rule in a Spanish region.
Thus, the analyses contained in this volume are a valuable addition to our knowledge of fascist movements and their policies in different regional contexts and in changing political landscapes. The contributions refer above all to the diversity of local and regional factors and to a whole series of regional peculiarities, each of which constituted a specific, regionally differing conglomerate of causes that did not necessarily correspond to the national logic of the development of early fascist movements and can only be generalised with great difficulty. The contributions emphatically demonstrate the decisive role played by local or regional networks and the actors operating within them in the development of different forms of early fascism. In many cases, considerable tensions and conflicts of interest between the policies at a national level and the fascist movements ‘on the ground’ can be identified in the regional context. Finally, the success of fascist policies in the border regions analysed in this volume seems to be fundamentally linked to the extent to which they considered the needs, traditions and peculiarities of the respective regional minorities and how controversial the border demarcation before or after 1918 was in the respective region.
In this way, the volume sets a new framework for our understanding of fascist policies after the First World War, providing new tools for the development of this fascinating field of research on a European scale.
Finally, a word of thanks: The editors would like to thank the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano and the Stiftung Südtiroler Sparkasse for funding the conference on this topic, from which this volume emerged. We would also like to thank the staff of the Competence Centre for Regional History, in particular Maria Diana, Francesca Brunet and Siglinde Clementi, for their support, as well as the staff of the Facility Management of the Faculty of Education of the University of Bolzano, who made it possible to organise the conference during the Corona crisis.
Of course, we would also like to thank all the authors who contributed to the volume, as well as Gregory Weeks (Vienna), who edited this English-language volume, and Diethard Sawicki from Schöningh/Brill, who showed great interest in the topic from the very beginning, for including the publication in the publishing programme.
Works Cited
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Gruner, Wolf (2018). “Das Dogma der ‘Volksgemeinschaft’ und die Mikrogeschichte der NS-Gesellschaft.” Detlef Schmiechen-Ackermann, Marlis Buchholz, Bianca Roitsch and Christiane Schröder, eds. Der Ort der ‘Volksgemeinschaft’ in der deutschen Gesellschaftsgeschichte (Studien zu Konstruktion, gesellschaftlicher Wirkungsmacht und Erinnerung 7). Paderborn: Schöningh, 71–90.
Hoffmann, Georg (2021). “NS-Zeit und Zweiter Weltkrieg.” Dirk Rupnow and Marcus Gräser, eds. Österreichische Zeitgeschichte – Zeitgeschichte in Österreich. Eine Standortbestimmung in Zeiten des Umbruchs (Zeitgeschichtliche Bibliothek 41). Vienna: Böhlau, 108–130.
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Steber, Martina (2018). “Die Eigenkraft des Regionalen. Die ungeschöpften Potenziale einer Geschichte des Nationalsozialismus im kleinen Raum.” Detlef Schmiechen- Ackermann, Marlis Buchholz, Bianca Roitsch and Christiane Schröder, eds. Der Ort der “Volksgemeinschaft” in der deutschen Gesellschaftsgeschichte (Studien zu Konstruktion, gesellschaftlicher Wirkungsmacht und Erinnerung 7). Paderborn: Schöningh, 50–90.
Szejnmann, Claus Christian W. (2003). “Verwässerung oder Systemstabilisierung? Der Nationalsozialismus in Regionen des Deutschen Reichs.” Neue Politische Literatur 48, 208–225.
Umbach, Maiken and Claus-Christian W. Szejnmann (2012). “Introduction. Towards a Relational History of Spaces under National Socialism.” Claus-Christian W. Szejnmann and Maiken Umbach, eds. Heimat, Region, and Empire. Spatial Identities under National Socialism. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 1–22.
Wirsching, Andreas (1996). “Nationalsozialismus in der Region. Tendenzen der Forschung und methodische Probleme.” Horst Möller, Andreas Wirsching and Walter Ziegler, eds. Nationalsozialismus in der Region. Beiträge zur regionalen und lokalen Forschung und zum internationalen Vergleich. Schriftenreihe der Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, Sondernummer. Munich: De Gruyter, Oldenburg, 25–46.
See the conference programme at: https://www.unibz.it/assets/Events/Pdf/Api/201689.pdf.