The myth of the nation has permeated all aspects of Fascism from the beginning: culture and ideology, the concept of the individual and of masses, relations between state and society, domestic policy and foreign policy, the sense of tradition and attitude towards the future.1
The words of Emilio Gentile are particularly suited to introducing this work, resulting as it does from a reflection on the ideological dimension of the fascist phenomenon generically understood.2 It is true that fascism had as a âprinciple of its ideology the critique of ideologiesâ and preferred to emphasise its practical action-oriented nature.3 Nonetheless, it was not âonly a set of polemic negationsâ, but expressed a revolutionary vision of society and the state to be achieved in the light of its principles.4 Among these principles, corresponding to the âcore conceptsâ of the fascist ideological universe, is the concept of the nation.5 Far from constituting the object of a sterile theoretical debate within the fascist intellectual elites, it was, on the contrary, a real political myth that decisively contributed to the construction of the fascist reality and crucially influenced fascist political practices.
Retracing how fascism approached the issue of the nation and how it broke with the previous liberal national tradition is central. To this end, it is appropriate to dwell on the modern idea of the nation for a moment, drawing on an enlightening comparison of the historical experience of France and Great Britain by Roberto Vivarelli. In I caratteri dellâetĂ contemporanea, the Italian historian stresses that in both countries the appearance of the nation-state went hand in hand with the renovation of public institutions and with the substitution of âcitizensâ for âsubjectsâ. The citizensâno longer the monarch or an oligarchyâheld sovereignty and collectively constituted the nation, leading Vivarelli to conclude that the nation âis born after the stateâ: without the state, there is no public right and the qualification of âcitizensâ has no value.6
Determining who were these new political actors is by no means simple, since the possession of political rights was not sufficient to identify them. The British and French models reveal that the right to vote, for instance, was not an essential concession for attributing the status of citizen. This right was progressively recognised throughout Europe from the end of the eighteenth century but was fully applied without distinction of social class or gender about a century and a half later. The central issue, therefore, is not so much to investigate what rights determined the attribution of the title of âcitizenâ to an individual, but rather to establish âwho [had] the right to be recognised as belonging to a [particular] national communityâ.7
In this regard, Vivarelli recalls the lesson of Federico Chabod who pinpointed the existence of two different concepts of the nation: one of French origin, and one of German origin. The former evokes the Rousseauian concept of the volontĂ© gĂ©nĂ©rale and emphasises the âwill of actionâ of the individual who feels part of a national community and consciously decides to be a member of it.8 The latter has, instead, a naturalistic feature. It presumes that belonging to a nation is primarily dependent on nature, which attributes ââpermanentâ physical characteristics to different nations [âŠ] based on blood (that is, the generation) and the âsoilâ to which that particular blood remains attachedâ.9
In Vivarelliâs opinion, the most obvious limitation of Chabodâs thesis is that he did not adequately take into account the relationship between the state and the nation. The nation, to be a real community of citizens, could not have a voluntary or naturalistic foundation since both were insufficient to ensure the presence of free and stable institutions. According to him, a community presupposes shared ideals and principles, and involves âthe acceptance of rules that, in the life of a state, are the lawsâ.10 Ultimately, the essence of a nation-state lies in the âquality of civil valuesâ which each social community shares and in its ability to answer âthe pivotal problem in the history of modern institutionsâ, namely the issue of freedom.11
This conceptualisation is of exemplary clarity, but it must be noted that the nation-state described above corresponds to the liberal-democratic state. How did fascism relate to such a model and how did it plan to replace it? The thought of Alfredo RoccoâMinister of Grace, Justice and Religious Affairs from 1925 to 1932 and a critical figure in the construction of the fascist institutional orderâprovides important indications in this respect. In La trasformazione dello Stato, which summarises the fundamental principles of the legal organisation of Fascist Italy, he stressed the existence of two main features of the liberal-democratic state. First, in his view, this kind of state placed on the same level and protected equally all the forces that were active in a country. Second, it did not have its own identity and consistency, meaning it welcomed all ideals and programmes without distinction. This implied that the state would become a battlefield in which different forces would compete for power. In Roccoâs opinion, such was the case in Italy, where the âalmost complete triumph of liberalism and democracyâ inexorably brought the country to the âedge of the abyssâ.12
The Fascist jurist acknowledged that the liberal-democratic experience yielded good results for the Anglo-Saxon peoples and in France due to the presence of an unbroken national tradition and a strong sense of the state. In Italy, things were different since the Roman traditionânurtured by the Catholic Church and based on the âprinciple of discipline, hierarchy and the submission of individuals to the stateââfell apart because of âGermanismâ, âmedieval anarchyâ and âforeign servitudeâ.13 This last feature in particular made the state appear like an âinstrument of oppressionâ of external powers, which caused a particular âspirit of mistrust and revolt against public authorityâ in the Italian people.14 The liberal-democratic state should have tamed this constant feeling of rebellion through a systematic process of âpolitical educationâ and âstate disciplineâ, but it was âspiritually and materially incapableâ of doing so.15 Precisely because of this failure, the Italian masses inevitably showed the unified nation-state the same mistrust and aversion they had towards foreign domination.
For Rocco, the fact that the liberal state had survived under such conditions for more than 60 years was almost miraculous. Nonetheless, he believed it was just a matter of time before it would crumble since âat the first great blow, that state larva would [be] shatteredâ.16 During the Great War, the Italian people showed their virtue and courage and saved the fatherland from destruction. However, once the hostilities had ended, the country entered a phase of complete confusion and disorientation. All weaknesses were exposed as fighting ensued between opposing internal factions that tore it apart, and which it was unable to control. For the Fascist jurist, it was evident that the experience of the liberal-democratic state had exhausted Italy, and that the March on Rome represented the âhistorical consecration of the collapseâ.17
Once Mussolini had taken over the reins of the country, the building of the Fascist state began. It was conceived as the âjuridical incarnation of the nationâ, and in content and form its characteristics were distinct from those of the liberal-democratic state.18 It was a state with its own âmoralsâ and âreligionâ, its own idea of âsocial justiceâ, a precise âeconomic taskâ and âits political mission in the worldâ that foreshadowed its potential imperial expansion.19 Moreover, and above all, the Fascist state had its âfunctionâ, its âwillâ and âaims superior to those of individualsâ.20 Ultimately, it was a âtruly sovereignâ state since, following a Machiavellian approach to politics, its goals prevailed, justifying any means to realise them.21
Fascism would have wiped out the old âatomistic and mechanicâ interpretation of the state.22 For Rocco, this was typical not only of the liberal and democratic doctrine but also of the socialist ideology that sacrificed the nation in favour of blind loyalty to the proletarian cause.23 To such an idea of the political community, Fascism opposed a new organic and historical understanding of society. It was organic because society has âobjectives and life that go beyond the objectives and life of individualsâ; it was historica...