Critica Sociale - History - World War I and Opposition To Fascism

World War I and Opposition To Fascism

When Italy entered the First World War in May 1915, Critica Sociale did not lose its neutrality nor did it lose its reformist ideals when faced with the Bolshevik Revolution in October 1917. While not denying the legitimacy of Vladimir Lenin's revolutionary method, Critica Sociale editors argued it was inapplicable to the Italian situation. But from 1917, the positions of the two wings the PSI became intractable. At the Livorno Conference of January 1921, the nascent Marxist-Leninist wing led by Amadeo Bordiga left the PSI to become the Partito Comunista Italiano. Critica Sociale continued to support the reformist Partito Socialista Unitario.

Benito Mussolini's rise to power was a second blow to Critica Sociale. Press censorship and seizures by the government led to irregular publication.

Deprived of resources, writers such as Turati, Anna Kulischov, Giacomo Matteotti, Claudio Treves, and Carlo Rosselli continued to defend the democratic order which was being swept swept away by the Fascists, and total censorship loomed. Its last political article was published the day after the murder of Giacomo Matteotti on 10 June 1924, an act which Mussolini used to take absolute power in Italy.

Thereafter the editors sheltered behind inoffensive cultural and doctrinale essays. The next year the Fascist government pronounced a blanket ban on opposition press; the last issue was dated 16 September - 15 October 1926.