Totalitarianism from Above: State Security and Criminal Law under Fascism and Democracy

The Fascist regime in Italy constructed its ideological identity in terms of opposition to democracy, and democracy is generally understood as a non-repressive system grounded in liberty, which differentiates it from Fascism. However, both state systems needed to ensure their security in similar ways, through military strength and laws to protect it. In the 1920s-30s, both Fascist Italy and the burgeoning democratic order in Britain faced internal political threats to military discipline and loyalty, which risked undermining the state’s security apparatus and its monopoly of force. Yet while the accommodation of troops in urban barracks was essential to the state’s ability to maintain control in the event of disorder, and modern mechanized warfare led to the need for large numbers of military personnel to operate in one place to man warships and bases, such concentrations fostered the very risk of infiltration by dangerous ideas that the states feared. As the Italian Minister of Justice Alfredo Rocco observed, the fight against such threats was an essential aspect of twentieth-century warfare, understood as a conflict of peoples and requiring state intervention in the realm of ideas. This paper considers the nature of totalitarianism from above by examining Fascism through the lens of criminal law. Comparing the offence of inciting the armed forces to disobey the law under Article 266 of the 1930 Italian Penal Code with the similar provisions of the British Incitement to Disaffection Act 1934, considered in their socio-political context, it shows how both systems introduced flexible and repressive measures in response to ideological threats. The paper thus argues that from a top-down perspective Fascist totalitarianism needs to be understood as encompassing problematic areas of overlap with the practices of a democratic system, and that both ‘totalized’ security through efforts to contain and shape political thought.