What Problems did the Italian Government Face at the end of the First World War?

The war had left Italy with many economic problems. Italy had spent a lot of money on the war 41 billion lire in total, which caused the National debt to increase from 16 billion lire to 85 billion lire and with huge sums of money been borrowed from the USA and Britain, Italy resorted to printing paper money which cause massive inflation and the lire became worthless. Also the Liberal government started to tax the Italian people to get some of the work back.

The inflation crisis was very steep;

1913 price index 100

1918 413

1920 591

With the war being over there was huge unemployment in Italy because of the 2.5 million soldiers returning home from war, in 1920, 90,000 Italians were unemployed and in 1921, 600,000 Italians were unemployed, so the increase was dramatic. The war had also brought a lot of jobs to Italy, working in the factories making weapons and other supplies for the war, so the end of the war put an end to that. Large companies e.g. Pirelli tyres, Montecatini chemicals and Fiat had made huge profits from government contracts during the war, however, victory meant the end of easy profits. There was also a food and raw material shortage supply.

During the war the southern peasants were promised a piece of land each, at the worry of the middle class because the middle class and the large land owners (aristocracy) were worried that the land would be taken from them, but at the end of the war when the peasants didn't get the land they were promised they each took a piece of waste land in total 1 million was taken and the government legalised these occupations.

In 1919 the cost of living rose more than 50%, so the economic problem of the money inflation were affecting the social way of living. So because of the new increased cost of living the Italian people needed more money to pay for food, which was on a shortage and so more expensive, so the Italian people needed jobs and there was huge unemployment. It was a downward spiral that seemed to have no end. The work that few people had in factories, the conditions were unbearable and hour's unworkable and because they were so bad the workers started a strike all over the north of Italy. In 1919 over 1 million workers took part in the strike and by 1921 almost 8 million workdays were lost by strikes. The factories needed the workers and so were forced to improve the working conditions and working hours. The strikes only really affected the north because the factories were only in the north, their was a very much a north and south divide. The north was the wealthier of the two because of the factory owners living up there and the large landowners also living up there. Whereas in the south is the poorer Italian farmers live.

The Italian people blamed the liberal government for the state at which the country was in and so looked at other political parties, which they felt, could do a better job. The PSI and the PPI were the two largest parties but still not getting an over all majority and so the only way they could rule was if they joined together and with neither of them having any experience of joining in a coalition government and they both believed in different things when it comes down to religion they didn't form one.

From the graph above it shows that in 1913 the Giolittian Liberals had a huge majority, which decreased dramatically in 1919 and then even more in 1921. The PSI and the PPI took over the role of the liberals. Even though the liberals were losing votes they still stayed in power until 1922 and that was because, the liberals had been in government for a long time and were used to joining with the other governments and working together. They managed to form five brief governments between 1918 and 1922. It was trasformismo, not democracy. Such governments were largely unrepresentative of opinion in parliament and in the country. Only if they achieved some outstanding successes would they gain credibility and consolidate the liberal regime. The government did pass various measures to try to help the masses, such as bread subsides and the eight-hour day, and began to make the tax system fairer. But once again these reforms didn't satisfy and worried the elite. Generally, the succession of weak liberal governments failed to solve Italy's social, economic and political problems.

The social government made concessions to try and win support of the lower classes. The government set up food committees in response to the food riots. The conservatives (landowners and industrialists) were disgusted with the liberal government who appeared to be doing nothing to deal with the socialist threat. The socialists were failing in trying to run the government and gain support for many reasons e.g. they talked of revolution and the Italian people did not want that. The socialists didn't get the message across to the people in the south due to bad communication this could be because they are a newly formed party and didn't have much experience.

The failure of the government to deal with the socialist unrest gave the Fascists their opportunity to show Italy that they had the power to run the country. The threat of the revolution led many of the elite to support the Fascists.

So there were many problems that the Italian government faced at the end of the First World War some because of the war and some problems, which were there at the start of the war but all forced Italy into a slump.