The Politics of Everyday Life in Fascist Italy

"A most impressive collection of essays that gives us a new and deeper understanding of what life was like for ordinary people under Mussolini's repressive regime ... . Addressing a wide variety of subjects, ranging from the impact of fascist violence and the regime's dictates about everyday eating habits, to fascist ideas about masculinity, the role of coercion, the priorities of fascist education, abortion under fascism, and the attitudes of fascist colonisers in Libya, this study throws fresh light on the ways in which people adjusted to a would-be totalitarian regime which tried to invade almost all aspects of daily life. A most welcome contribution that combines an innovative theoretical approach with a series of rich empirical studies." (Paul Corner, Centre for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, University of Siena, Italy)

This book explores the complex ways in which people lived and worked within the confines of Benito Mussolini’s regime in Italy, variously embracing, appropriating, accommodating and avoiding the regime’s incursions into everyday life.

This book explores the complex ways in which people lived and worked within the confines of Benito Mussolini’s regime in Italy, variously embracing, appropriating, accommodating and avoiding the regime’s incursions into everyday life. The contributions highlight the experiences of ordinary Italians – midwives and schoolchildren, colonists and soldiers – over the course of the Fascist era, in settings ranging from the street to the farm, and from the kitchen to the police station. At the same time, this volume also provides a framework for understanding the Italian experience in relation to other totalitarian dictatorships in twentieth-century Europe and beyond.