Also another large problem due to military defeats were the large debt that the Italian government fell into. This large debt that the government was in led to an economical crisis for the Italian nation. The government in 1914 was in debt by 16 billion lire and by 1919 it was in 85 million lire debt. D. Mack Smith quoted “The final figure for the cost of the whole war was 148 billion lire, that is say twice the sum of all government expenditure between 1861 and 1913”. The quote clearly shows that the war cost the Italians a fortune and they were left in a lot of debt at the end of the war and the Italian somehow had to sort this problem out.
The increase in national debt meant that the government would increase tax, mainly on the poor peasants and farmers who could hardly afford to pay current taxes. The high price of taxes caused a lot of unrest, this can clearly proven in 1919 when citizens went out on the streets of Northern Italy and voiced there concerns to the government but only to be ignored. In aggression a riot was started and a mob started to wreck towns and cities in Northern Italy.
Another economical factor that lead the country further into depression when inflation increased, there was a 14 fold increase in prices. This helped the peasants as this lead to a decrease in the cost of living, where as the middle class or commonly known as the Bourgeoisie class lost out most from this economical trouble. Also another large problem economically that the Italian government faced was the large number in unemployment. This was particularly clear when you counted the returning of demobilized and wounded soldiers who were not skilled at all. Also as the war ended the war time industries such as gin manufacturing were contracting as there was a decrease in demand and workers started to get sacked as the industries did not need them anymore. The economical trouble that Italy faced demoralized a lot of the workers, and this was very critical because the workers slowed the production rate down.
Economically the Italian government faced a lot of problems such as unemployment and inflation at the end of the First World War. This was a major issue as the economical strength of a country judges how strong the country is overall and Italy being so economically weak was seen as a very weak country, and the Austrians took full advantage of this during the war.
The economical problems link very close to the political problems that the Italian government faced at the end of the First World War. The Italian government was a very weak government and faced a lot of difficulties during and after the war. The Italian government was not a very well represented government, it was not proportional represented and this lead to a lot of chaos between different people in different parts of the Italian society. The two main parties (Socialists and Catholic Centralized party) had a lot of rivalry and this was a very disturbing factor for the government as this led to a lot of disagreement between the parties. This caused minority governments to make the decisions that the parties should have.
Throughout the decade the people disliked the government and supported its rivals but during the end of the war there was an increase of support from the people of Italy, due to the weakness of the Austrians, which lead to the Italian army to increase victories. But just as there are supporters there were also a lot of enemies that opposed the government and tried to overthrow. Examples being the Futurists who rejected the Liberal view and their main aim was a pure Bourgeoisie existence. Another opponent were the nationalists who disliked the Liberals because they did not take action but soon as they saw action they started to support the government. Another opposition to the government at the time which was a very famous opponent as he was the head of the Roman Catholic church, the Pope. The pope disagreed with the views of the government and disliked the government mainly because when the liberals tried to reunify Italy they took his land of Naples, which he was furious about. The people believed in the Pope and if they were told not to believe in the government they would believe him cause they thought he was in touch with God and they believed the Pope as if he was God. Most of the Italian population was Catholic and believed in the Pope and they were told not to support the government and so they did not, the Pope criticized the government by saying “useless slaughter” meaning that the government are sending soldiers to die for no good reason. The government of the time had a lot of power during the time and as the war went by there power increased which was a little bit of a problem because this could lead to a dictatorship government if someone were to takeover.
Agriculture was a problem that caused havoc in the Italian countryside of Southern Italy. The peasants started to steal a lot of land as taxes started to rise this was a very unfortunate because some of the soldiers were promised land when they came back from the war, and now they have non. Another problem that the Italian government faced in an agricultural sense was the fact that a lot of the Italian peoples still worked on the farms and not a lot in the cities. This meant that most of the people were unskilled and could only work in the countryside’s in primary sector jobs. But even though there were a lot of people working on the land Italy produced less wheat than its European counterparts such as France and Britain who produced more than 5 fold of what the Italians grew.
Also there is the problems faced on an industrial level. The main production during the war was the war equipment but as the war ended the wartime industries compressed and people lost jobs, which led to an increase in unemployment. Also the industries provided only minimum wages which the workers saw as an outrage and they revolted against this. But overall the industries of Italy were not particularly weak and compared to other European nations they were up to standard.
Another large problem was the Social dilemma that the Italian government needed to address and solve before it became a nationwide crisis. Socially Italy was a very backward country, roughly 2.5% of the Italian population spoke Italian and there was a high level of illiteracy. This meant that there was a poor sense of patriotism, meaning that people did not believe that Italy was one whole country. Also there was the difference between the northern part of Italy and the Southern part of Italy. The Northern part of Italy was seen as the rich and more upper class region of Italy whereas the Southern part as seen as the poor peasant area of Italy. Northern Italy was more industrialized and the Southern more agriculture. Another social problem that the government needed to solve was the fact that only 5% of the entire population could vote and they all belonged to the Bourgeois class. In the working areas of Italy people had to work 75 hours a week to have minimum wages and also in the factories there was strict discipline nobody was allowed to mess around.
The major social dilemma was the division of people in Italy; it was like the soldiers against the workers. The socialists were frightened to create a breading ground for fascism when people started to become more into politics, and people became very polarized. This means that the people went to one end of the government, right for the socialists, who the soldiers polarized around and the left for conservatives, which the workers polarized around. This left the liberals in the middle and the liberals could not satisfy everyone. This polarization led to the society being split amongst many divisions and caused disorder for the government of Italy.
At the end of the First World War the Italian government faced a lot of problems and if they wanted to keep order in Italy they knew they needed to solve the problems. I think that the biggest problem that caused confusion in the government was the economical problems. I think that the government caused the economical problems on itself and it was the biggest problem that the government faced at the end of the war. I think this because of the large debts, which caused an increase in taxes, this caused the peasants to revolt and once they revolted about this they started to revolt about other things such as minimum wages. I think that the debt issue led to an increase in political opposition, the economical factors left the country in turmoil and I think that the economical factors led to all the other problems.
