To what extent had the liberal government created a united Italy by 1900? The liberal government of Italy, founded in 1871 after the unification that made the nation, adopted the task of creating a ‘united’ Italy. The government made certain prosperous changes such as the vast improvements in education and steel production; however there were several matters they had to overcome along the way, including the strong influence from the Pope and the strong North South divide, as well as the fact that the new liberal government was corrupt, these all contributed to Italy being by no means united by 1900. The new Government were condemned from their beginning as The Roman Catholic church had ordered Italians not to vote for the government as it had lost a lot of land during unification; also the Pope refused to recognise the legitimacy of the kingdom of Italy and instructed Italian Catholics to boycott Italian politics. This proved a problem for the newly formed government as Italy was a predominantly Catholic country and many Italians were devoted to the Pope.
In 1915 Italy made the decision to go to war which had many positives as well as negatives. Italy was promised a lot by joining the war however, many of those promises were not met. Furthuremore, war created division within the country and the parliament. Italy did not benefit from the war however only lost many troops and they spent more money on military services then ever. Between 1915 and 1917, Italian troops only got 10 miles inside Austrian territory.
At the beginning of 1922, Italy was in a state of permanent political instability. Fascist violence was increasing in intensity. Parliamentary government could only function through patched-up coalition government by political parties who were incapable of united action. The First World War was mostly fought in the North East against Austria. Italy was defeated at Caporetto in 1917 but rallied to win the battle of Vittorio Veneto in 1918.
By the time it came to 1918 food shortages had caused riots and discontent and the government was finding it difficult to keep the army supplied. Industrialists became independent on war time business and they severely struggled when the war came to an abrupt end in 1918. Due to the opposition from many neutralists the government operated through the use of emergency powers, where parliament played the role of simply rubber stamping legislation. The Italian socialists openly condemned the conflict as a capitalist or ‘bosses’ war. Italian politics was largely divided during war years.
These factors led to a fragile liberal government, with the main threat in my opinion being posed not by the nationalists but the socialists. The PSI was founded in 1895 and soon became a strong threat to the liberal government. They were fiercely opposed to the liberal regime, saying it was a cover for the capitalist exploitation of Italian working classes, and used evidence that wages were still low and hours were still long in comparison to the rest of Western Europe. Also welfare benefits compared unfavourably. This led to strong support of the socialists from working classes, so much so that a relatively new party was winning over 20% of the vote by 1913.
But the empire were very inconsiderate and silly as people were paying the taxes by growing and harvesting crops which they would sell to the markets in order to pay for the taxes. The markets then started to bring in less money as there were fewer products being sold to the markets. They then had to raise the taxes leaving more people in poverty, which also caused many deaths. This is just one reason for the collapse for the Empire. The second reason for the collapse of the army was Religion, Christianity that had a massive influence on a lot of the population of
In this essay I will discuss if hyperinflation was completely caused by the Treaty of Versailles (1918-19). The Treaty of Versailles was responsible for thee suspension of the Ruhr, this was a place of great industrial power and brought in a lot of money to Germany. However when it was taken away from the Germans, there was halt in the industrial production which caused the collapse of the German economy. This meant that there were very few goods therefore the government printed the money. This lead to prices rocketing and the savings unfortunately became worthless.
This also meant that the land was not used to it full potential, all these factors lead to the famines and causing peasants to up rise using violence against government officials. This was on the verge of the revolution. The deep resentment from the peasantry towards the Tsar increased after the war as lots of money had being invested in the war and Russia had lost. Moreover, Sergei Witte had tried to improve the economy of Russia but it was to make sure that the Russian social order stayed the same. Due to industrialisation, factories were built which lead to rapid growth of population in the towns and cities for example from 98 million in 1885 to 125 million in 1905.
Germans were forced to pay for various repairs across different country what inevitably caused damage to country’s economy. The instability across the nation has been consistently rising, and the ruling government had to resign. In Italy the dissatisfaction of the nation with the government has also been significant, especially taking into account the defeat at Ceporetto or the collapse of the economy, which over past years was based on manufacturing weapons and other equipment that was needed for participation in the war. Both in Italy and Germany people were desperate for a change, they needed economic growth and development. There were no jobs, poverty was spreading.
Whereas prior most plebeians were farmers or laborers who owned small but significant portions of property or earned adequate payment for their toils, upon the second Punic War, Hannibal destroyed this land, leaving plebeians homeless with little source of income. However, the cities inside Rome lent opportunity for both, and accordingly led to an inundation of migrations towards the cities. Farmland left behind was soon purchased by the wealthy, incensing the poor further, in addition to the increase in slavery and thus decrease in job opportunity. This condition, with a flood of enraged plebeians entering Rome, set the stage for further tumult. Civil war broke out in 133 BCE, as Tiberius Gracchus was elected tribune.