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Italy's Quest for Great Power Status 1871–1943

The crisis of the Liberal state and the Biennio Rosso

  • 3 things to know
  • AS Unit 2

Overview

Partito Popolare Italiano and biennio Rosso.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Your recallNot started
Key term

Name three economic problems facing Italy in 1919.

Key term

Give three reasons the socialist threat failed.

Numbers

How did proportional representation change Italian politics in 1919?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    Name three economic problems facing Italy in 1919.

    Model answer

    Italy faced rapid inflation that destroyed savings and fixed incomes, the collapse of the war industries and the unemployment of some two million demobilised soldiers, and a state debt it could not service without further borrowing.

  2. 2

    How did proportional representation change Italian politics in 1919?

    Model answer

    Proportional representation replaced single-member constituencies in 1919 and ended the old politics of local deals, producing a Chamber of organised mass parties in which no Liberal majority could be assembled.

  3. 3

    What was the outcome of the election of November 1919?

    Model answer

    The Socialists became the largest party with about 156 seats and the new Catholic Popular Party won around 100, while the Liberals fragmented and the Fascists won no seats at all.

  4. 4

    What was the Partito Popolare Italiano?

    Model answer

    The Partito Popolare Italiano was the Catholic mass party founded in 1919 by the priest Luigi Sturzo, and its emergence ended the Non Expedit era but gave the Liberals a partner they could neither control nor do without.

  5. 5

    How unstable were Italian governments between 1919 and 1922?

    Model answer

    Five governments held office in three years under Orlando, Nitti, Giolitti, Bonomi and Facta, none of them able to command a stable majority or to act decisively against disorder.

  6. 6

    What is meant by the Biennio Rosso?

    Model answer

    The Biennio Rosso, the two red years of 1919 and 1920, was the period of mass strikes, land seizures and factory occupations in which many Italians believed a revolution on the Russian model was imminent.

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