intimidation of the electors, per cent of the votes were cast for the Fascists. Matteotti, a socialist leader, who questioned the fairness of the elections was Mussolini The World between Two World Wars murdered. The opposition parties boycotted the Parliament in protest. Mussolini reacted by banning opposition parties and censoring the press.
Opposition leaders were killed or imprisoned. Assuming the title of Il Duce (the leader), in he became a dictator with power to legislate. He passed a law forbidding strikes and lockouts. Unions and employers were organized into corporations.
In Parliament was abolished and was replaced by a body representing the Fascist Party and the corporations. This new arrangement bolstered Mussolini’s dictatorial control of the economy, as well as enabling him to wield enormous power as head of the administration and the armed forces. Mussolini’s Pact with Pope In order to give respectability to the Fascist Party, Mussolini won over the Roman Catholic Church by recognising the Vatican City as an independent state. In return the Church recognised the Kingdom of Italy.
The Roman Catholic faith was made the religion of Italy and compulsory religious teaching in school was ordered. The Lateran Treaty incorporating the said provisions was signed in . Italy during the Great Depression During the years of the Great Depression the much publicised public works of building new bridges, roads and canals, hospitals and schools did not provide solution to the unemployment problem. In , Mussolini invaded Ethiopia.
This was useful to divert attention of the people away from the economic troubles. (b) Germany in the post-War From to Germany was a republic. The factors which led to the eventual triumph of Fascism in Germany were many. Between and Germany had risen to dizzy heights of economic, political and cultural accomplishments.
Germany’s universities, its science, philosophy and music were known all over the world. Germany had surpassed even Britain and the US in several fields of industrial production. Germany’s defeat and humiliation at the end of World War