eExtreme - September 2013

Electronic Newsletter of the ECPR-SG on Extremism and Democracy

Electronic Newsletter of the ECPR-SG on Extremism & Democracy

September 2013 Volume 14 Number 3

e-Extreme

Volume 14, No. 3, September 2013

Managing Editor Mark Pitchford King’s College London, UK Email: m.pitchford@tees.ac.uk

Book Reviews Editor Janet Dack Teesside University, UK Email: j.dack@tees.ac.uk

The e-Extreme is the newsletter of the ECPR Standing Group on Extremism and Democracy and is published quarterly. For any enquiries about the newsletter, please contact the managing editor, Mark Pitchford. For inquiries regarding book reviews please contact the book reviews editor, Janet Dack.

Copyright Š 2013 by the ECPR Standing Group on Extremism and Democracy All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, in any form or by any means, electronic, photocopying, or otherwise, without permission in writing from the ECPR Standing Group on Extremism and Democracy.

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Table of Contents

Standing Group Announcements …………………………………………………………….4 Conference Reports ………………………………..……………….…….…………………… 6 Book Reviews ………………………………………………….….……………………........... 8 Publications Alert ………………………………………………………………………….…. 15

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Standing Group Announcements

Forthcoming conferences and workshops Please do visit our website for details of forthcoming conferences, workshops and symposia: www.extremism-and-democracy.com. There are upcoming events at Florence, Melbourne and Berlin.

This month, we have a report by Dr. Dan Keith (Exeter), who attended the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation’s conference on the Radical Left and the 2012 elections. It is well worth a read.

Book reviews The book review section is one of the highlights of e-Extreme. We know that producing book reviews can seem like a chore in our busy lives, so we are grateful to those who have done so. However, we are always open to new reviewers, so if anyone is happy to produce reviews and has not yet done so, please make our book review editor, Janet Dack, aware at J.Dack@teesside.ac.uk.

This month’s newsletter contains some very interesting reviews, with contributions from Professor Tim Bale (QMUL), Professor Nigel Copsey (Teesside) and Professor Elisabetta Wolff (Oslo). It is great to see reviews from some leading lights in our research areas.

Book series in Extremism and Democracy As you might know, the Standing Group has close links with the Routledge Book Series in Extremism and Democracy. Originally founded by Roger Eatwell and Cas Mudde, this series has two strands aimed at different audiences. The ‘Routledge Studies in Extremism and Democracy’ is targeted at students and teachers, while the ‘Routledge Research in Extremism and Democracy’ is aimed at a more specialist readership. Please contact Roger or Matthew via the Standing Group website if you would like to discuss ideas or suggestions for titles.

Member database by research interest Also, remember that the website contains a database which enables members to browse and search for other members by research interests, as well as by name. If you would like to update your own details, please just email us at info@extremism-and-democracy.com.

Please also encourage colleagues and PhD students to join the Standing Group.

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Keep us informed!

Please keep us informed of any upcoming conferences or workshops you are organizing, and of any publication or funding opportunities that would be of interest to Standing Group members. We will post all details on our website. Similarly, if you would like to write a report on a conference or workshop that you have organized and have this included in our newsletter, please do let us know.

Please also tell us of any recent publications of interest to Standing Group members so that we may include them in the ‘publications alert’ section of our newsletter, and please get in touch if you would like to see a particular book (including your own) reviewed in e-Extreme, or if you would like to review a specific book yourself.

Finally, if you would like to get involved in the production of the newsletter, the development of our website, or any of the other activities of the Standing Group then please do contact us. We are always very keen to involve more members in the running of the Standing Group! Email us at: info@extremism-and-democracy.com

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Conference Report

The Radical Left in Europe and the 2012 Elections, Brussels Dr Dan Keith, University of Exeter 25-27 June I was delighted to be invited to give a keynote presentation at a three-day conference on The Radical Left in Europe and the Elections 2012-13 held by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in Brussels in June. The conference aimed to assess the reasons behind the rather poor election results of radical left political parties in Europe since the 2008economic crisis. The conference also gave a timely opportunity to question whether radical left parties need to (or can) reposition themselves to find electoral success.

The conference began with a lively panel discussion on the question ‘Is there a Future for the European Radical Left?’. Gabriele Zimmer (Chair of the Confederal Group of the European United Left-Nordic Green Left in the European Parliament) outlined several challenges for European left parties. Most significantly, she argued that the left is weakened by the unwillingness of some parties to cooperate at European level. It was noticeable that a number of important Left parties did not attend this event. It was also clear that left wing politicians are increasingly frustrated with the orthodox Portuguese and Greek Communist parties. These parties remain unwilling to look beyond their ideological doctrines and outright rejection of European integration to work with other parties at European level.

I explored the obstacles that the radical left faces in developing links at European level in a report commissioned by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. The report analysed the challenges that the left faces in constructing an ‘Alternative Europe’. It asked whether the left’s Euroscepticism or, on the other hand, calls for more integration in the form of a ‘Social Europe’ are the reasons for its disappointing election results in recent years. It is clear that the radical left has a long way to go to present a united and coherent vision of an alternative Europe. Moreover, while the radical left’s Euroscepticism often finds significant support from European citizens in opinion poll data this is not the foundation for electoral expansion. It is clear that Europe is usually a non-issue in parliamentary election campaigns, while even elections for the European Parliament are generally contested on domestic issues. Analysis of opinion poll data also paints a very mixed picture on whether there is support for a social Europe. My advice to the left was to focus on other issues in election campaigns.

A highlight of the conference was an engaging speech on ‘The European Radical Left and the Crisis’ by Dr Luke March (University of Edinburgh). Luke’s talk gave an excellent outline of the reasons why some left parties have found greater levels of electoral success since the collapse of Communism in East Central Europe in 1989. He argued that the major weaknesses of the left can be found in the lack of a vision that is compelling with voters.

Internal divisions, weak links to social movements and a relative lack of support in East Central Europe were also shown to be major weaknesses of the radical left. Luke’s arguments were well received by the conference and the discussant Helmut Scholz (MEP).

My presentation focused on the Dutch Socialist Party and the 2012 Dutch parliamentary election. It outlined how the Socialist Party enjoyed a huge surge in opinion polls. For a while it looked as if the party could become the largest party in the Netherlands

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and trigger a major realignment in the left. However, the Socialist Party peaked too soon and it faced a collapse in support in the final weeks of the election campaign. I discussed how the Socialist Party had enjoyed electoral expansion through sacrificing radical policies and seeking inclusion in governing coalitions and explanations for the collapse in support.

There has been considerable debate as to how the Socialist Party should respond to the disappointing election result. My research is based on interviews with Socialist Party politicians. It shows that the party is likely to stick to its office seeking strategy. The party’s leaders still promote a form of ‘social democracy from the 1970s’ rather than retuning to a revolutionary or explicitly theoretical brand of left wing politics. My presentation was discussed by Hans van Heijningen (General Secretary of the Socialist Party) who outlined the party’s efforts to engage in direct activism during the economic crisis. Hans spoke of the party’s efforts to ‘practice what it preaches’ through organising food drops for those in need.

He also outlined how the SP has found increased influence in Dutch trade unions during the economic crisis.

Two other presentations at the conference also stood out. Auður Lilja Erlingsdóttir (Secretary General of the Left Green movement in Iceland) discussed how her party faced organisational challenges as it found inclusion in coalition government 2009-13. Her fascinating presentation explained how the Left Greens coped with the need to take austerity measures in Iceland’s economic crisis and negotiations with the IMF. The party claims to have been successful in ensuring that cuts to health and education budgets were minimised. Auður Lilja argued that the party was pleased with what it achieved in office as a junior coalition partner but was punished by voters in the 2013 election. The conference also welcomed Fausto Bertinotti (former leader of the Partito della Rifondazione Comunista in Italy) and Jiri Hudecek (Party of Democratic Socialism, Czech Republic) who discussed the question of how the left needs to reinvent itself. Bertinotti claimed that the left had been wreaked because of changes in the nature of global financial capitalism. He added that the left is failing to expand because it lacks the charismatic leaders of the past and gave his thoughts on how it can construct a new theoretical vision. He ended by telling us how his background in the Italian Communist Party had taught him that the ‘quality of a great revolutionary is to organise pessimism’.

Rosa Luxemburg conferences provide an excellent opportunity to hear a range of perspectives from left wing politicians, trade unionists, activists and academics. I thoroughly recommend them to other researchers studying the left. The presentations were very interesting, entertaining and provided me with a chance to gather a lot of information on the political parties that I research.

More information about the conference and other Rosa Luxemburg Foundation events can be found here: http://rosalux-europa.info/events_en/left-in-europe-and-elections/

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Book Reviews

Mark Pitchford, The Conservative Party and the Extreme Right 1945-1975 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, (2011) ISBN: 978-0719083631 (hbk) The way mainstream parties handle the threat posed by smaller, more radical rivals on their flanks is now attracting considerable interest from academics – and with good reason. A quick glance around Europe shows that disillusioned voters are increasingly willing to take a punt on newcomers, some of which gain sufficient support to damage bigger, older parties and may even force them to invite them into or to support the governments they form.

Much of the literature on this phenomenon, however, is relatively abstract and based either on quantitative data or else on inevitably short case studies. Mark Pitchford’s work, as well as being solidly and satisfyingly rooted in the words and deeds of real people, subjects his particular case to a detailed examination spanning three decades. The result is a book that can usefully be read both by historians interested in the British Conservative Party and the UK’s extreme fringes and by political scientists seeking to better understand the more general issues outlined above.

Admittedly, the British case is somewhat unusual in the sense that the threat from the far right has, at least in electoral terms, traditionally been utterly negligible. Indeed, even if it were greater, the country’s electoral system would almost certainly ensure that, in contrast to the situation pertaining in many countries in continental Europe, votes would not be translated into seats and therefore into a parliamentary presence that may result in government participation. On the other hand, for those who believe that UKIP shows all the signs of becoming a populist radical right alternative capable of garnering up to ten percent of the vote in a general election, and badly wounding the Tories in the process, it may be worth reconsidering the tendency to leave the UK out of comparative studies of the phenomenon or else to limit its inclusion to a brief discussion of the BNP. Whatever, Pitchford’s account of how the Conservatives reacted to the presence of various far right groupings and parties on its fringes for thirty years after the Second World War is worth a look because it represents a serious attempt to really get inside a party by trawling through its archives. Of course the decision to map the scale and scope of its response in that way has some downsides. The book is heavily weighted towards the organisational aspect of the Party’s activity on this score, meaning that it can’t do much more than assume (as opposed to adducing actual evidence) that its leadership ‘reached right’ in policy terms in order consciously to deny space to potential competitors or to buy off dissent from within its own ranks. In some ways this is a pity because that same assumption is made by much of the recent political science literature on the topic and is rarely subjected to a rigourous historical analysis. In fact, in the case of the Conservatives’ immigration policy in the post-war period, for example, one would be hard pressed to argue radical right competition had much to do with it until after 2010 (or perhaps 2005) when the threat from UKIP suddenly became more serious; far more crucial in the Party’s periodic decisions to pursue a more restrictive course was the need to respond to rising public concerns about rising numbers coming in and/or to steal a march on its Labour rival.

When it comes to the Party’s organisational response, however, Pitchford is very much master of his material, giving chapter and verse on how the Party used its contacts

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across the country to monitor and evaluate the activity of fringe groups which might appeal to some of its more right-wing supporters and even (the Monday Club being the best example) capture the imagination of its activists. Its response could then be calibrated, depending in part on the nature of the group involved, with the biggest distinction made being that between those which (like the League of Empire Loyalists and the National Front) exhibited anti-Semitic and even neo-Nazi tendencies, which were shut out completely, and those on what Pitchford calls the ‘freedom right’, which (like Aims of Industry) were dedicated to fighting the good fight against state socialism and therefore tolerated or even abetted. What created a dilemma, of course, were groups which fell somewhere between these two stools or else oscillated between them, on occasion (like the Monday Club) having a fair claim to represent the views of ordinary party members on issues like immigration or foreign and commonwealth relations, in which case the Party’s attitude was ambivalent, sometimes wary or even hostile, other times more tolerant.

Perhaps because Pitchford’s book lies firmly within the historical tradition, these differences and shifts, while prefigured in its introduction and touched on again in its Conclusion, have to be gleaned from the narrative which makes up the main body – something that will perhaps disappoint political scientists who might have preferred the author to set up a series of hypotheses about how and under what circumstances the Tories reacted to different types of radical right groupings before going on to test them using a series of case studies representing each type. Historians, on the other hand, while happier with the approach taken, may be slightly disconcerted by the author’s decision not to include detailed references to particular files in the Conservative Party Archive. Both sets of scholars will also think it a pity that the author stops his story in 1975 rather than 1979, although this, too, might have had something to do with the reluctance of the Party to fully release some of the material on this sensitive topic. Those caveats aside, Pitchford has produced a fascinating book that students of both the centre-right and far-right will both enjoy and profit from reading.

Professor Tim Bale

Queen Mary, University of London

Stephen Grundle, Christopher Duggan and Giuliana Pieri (eds) The Cult of the Duce: Mussolini and the Italians (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2013) ISBN: 978 07190 8896 4 (hbk) This collection of engaging essays sets out to provide ‘the first multifaceted analysis of the genesis, functioning and decline of the personality cult’ surrounding Benito Mussolini (p. 1).

What underpins this collection is the premise that the cult of Mussolini was central to how the Fascist regime came about, offering a focal point for the integration of Italians into a ‘system of regimented consensus’ (p. 1). The editors (Stephen Grundle, Christopher Duggan, Giuliana Pieri) locate this work in a body of scholarship that finds fault with those historians, such as Emilio Gentile and Roger Griffin, who give primacy to the place of Fascist ideology (qua political religion) in a society that was only ever partially ‘Fascistised’. For the editors of this volume it was Mussolini’s cult of personality that provided the cohesion to a Fascist movement characterised by much ideological eclecticism (“everyone was a Fascist in their own way”). The editors describe the regime as a form of ‘politicised spectacular modernism’, whereby the cult of personality became a central receptacle for political anti-

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modernism, avant-garde artistic practices, technological modernisation, celebrity and consumerism.

Four themes of this volume merit special mention: first, in providing a unifying national symbol to a recently established Italian nation-state that had been experiencing institutional crisis, Mussolini’s cult fulfilled important political and historical functions.

Second, the cult was malleable and how it manifested itself varied according to context, whether in the capital city of Rome, locally, or in colonial settings. Third, Mussolini’s cult should not be understood simply as a by-product of a system of rule but in terms of a much broader cultural phenomenon that encompassed modernist artistic currents (notably Futurism). Fourth, the Mussolini cult continued to capture the Italian popular imagination after 1945, experiencing a revival in recent years. Several factors have been important here, such as the advent of the digital age, which has offered a wider platform for dissemination and commercialisation (in 2010 it was reported that a Mussolini iPhone app had become the second-most downloaded item in Italy). Mussolini’s gradual rehabilitation is also, of course, tied to political developments - a rehabilitation to a large extent cultivated by Berlusconi and his associates.

Mussolini’s cult of personality has offered, the editors insist, the original template from which successive dictators from Hitler to Saddam Hussein have all borrowed. For that reason, this is an important subject that merits attention not only from historians of Italy or Western Europe, but from all those that are eager to understand ‘the ways in which undemocratic regimes of whatever ideological bent can establish legitimacy within a national culture and the manner in which political systems with a personalised focus can connect with people in a myriad of ways and on many different levels’ (p. 6).

The first part of the volume concerns the origins of the personality cult. For Duggan, the Mussolini cult filled the vacuum left by the failure of the liberal state to develop the monarchy into a potent symbol of national unity (chapter one). Yet it was also, his second chapter reveals, a reaction to the Matteotti crisis of 1924. Much of the momentum behind it, Duggan suggests, came not from Mussolini but from leading party figures. As for the myth that Mussolini was a ‘man of providence’, subject to divine protection, this idea spread rapidly between 1925 and 1926 in tandem with four botched assassination attempts. At that moment, Mussolini’s cult of personality interconnected with religious faith, with senior clergy (including the Pope) declaring that Mussolini was being protected by God. The next chapter, by Simona Storchi, considers the instrumental part played by Margherita Sarfatti’s best-selling biography of Mussolini, Dux. This hagiography (running to no fewer than 17 Italian editions between 1926 and 1938) portrayed Mussolini as a brilliant charismatic leader, endowed with the power to unify the Italian people, a born leader – the ‘plebeian aristocrat’ of Roman lineage. Daniela Baratieri then reflects on the deliberate silencing of Ida Dalser, Mussolini’s ex-lover, with whom Mussolini supposedly fathered a child (Benito Albino) in 1915. Both Dalser, and her son, who both represented a challenge to Mussolini’s public persona, were confined to psychiatric institutions. Stephen Grundle moves us on with a chapter that considers the development (and management) of Mussolini’s public image, discussing his clothing – the transition from dandyism and the unconventional (the bowler hat and spats) to the martial; the deployment of publicity stunts (‘pseudoevents’, such as skiing or topless harvesting); and increasing commercialisation (eight million postcards of Mussolini circulated during the regime; a soap bar in the shape of Mussolini’s head was already being sold in 1922).

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The second part of the book examines how the Mussolini cult was experienced across different settings. Sofa Serenelli looks at Mussolini’s birthplace, Predappio, as a site of Fascist pilgrimage. Predappio (now a site of neo-fascist pilgrimage) was, to all intents and purposes, a ‘new town’ that the regime constructed in order to satisfy the demand for mass pilgrimages to Mussolini’s place of birth. Stephen Grundle then considers encounters with Mussolini’s cult in the regions, offering case studies of Milan (Mussolini as modern political leader), Emilia-Romagna (the man of the people), Bari (man of power) and Sardinia (the demi-god). For Grundle, Mussolini’s frequent appearances in the regions gave Italians a sense of direct contact with their leader. Giuseppe Finaldi’s chapter turns to manifestations of the cult in Libya and Ethiopia. In Libya, the catechumens of the cult were the Ventimila (the “20,000”) – those Italian peasant migrants who worked the farms constructed by the regime (many remaining Fascists until the 1960s). In Ethiopia, meanwhile, the image of Mussolini that was projected was intended to ‘shock and awe Ethiopians into submission’ (p.

153). Rather than offering more geographical context, Duggan’s contribution to this section assesses the ways in which the cult of the Duce was internalised. Drawing upon evidence supplied in the form of diaries and private correspondence to the Duce (an estimated 1,500 private letters were sent to him every day), Duggan emphasises Mussolini’s ‘accessibility’; his elevation above the fray of corrupt party bureaucracy; his insulation from the wartime disasters of 1940-41; and the religious scaffolding constructed around him which ‘dovetailed with deep-rooted Catholic templates’ (p. 142). For Duggan, Mussolini became an ‘emotional linchpin’ for the regime precisely because Fascism was so ideologically hollow.

The third part of the book concerns itself with iconography, with chapters on portraits (Giuliana Pieri); photographic images (Alessandra Antola); a case study of the equestrian statue of Mussolini at the Bologna Littorale Stadium (Simona Storchi); and architecture and monuments in ‘Mussolini’s Rome’ (Eugene Pooley). Unlike other dictatorships, where the iconography of the dictator tended to be ‘realist’ and therefore instantly recognisable, in Fascist Italy, Mussolini’s image was manipulated to a far greater extent, incorporating a complex medley of styles, ranging from the traditional, and classical through to the modern and avant-garde. The result was, according to Pieri, ‘a composite myth’ that ‘blended past and present, secular and religious ideas of palingenesis, imperial rhetoric, medieval and Renaissance imagery in a concerted effort to create a wide cultural and historical basis to the power of the dictator’ (p. 174).

The final (and shortest) part of the volume examines the post-war legacy. Pieri first considers the destiny of Fascist art and artefacts. To begin with, after the initial iconoclastic wave, surviving images were withdrawn from public display and, until the 1990s, art historians resisted the idea that the regime actively intervened in the arts. More recently, however, there has been a resurgent interest in the visual symbols of the regime, which Pieri ascribes to a loosening of Italy’s post-war anti-fascist culture, and changing artistic practice where postmodernism encouraged ‘revisitations of the past and eclectic appropriations’ (p. 236). Stephen Grundle then offers some valuable thoughts on how postwar political leaders in Italy deliberately projected themselves in soft and reassuring ways in order to distance themselves from Mussolini’s leadership style. He concludes that unlike Hitler, Mussolini has not become ‘an all-purpose signifier of evil or a Chaplinesque clown available as a comic template’ (p. 253). Mussolini still retains historical charisma (just ask Paolo di Canio). The final chapter by Vanessa Roghi examines representations of Mussolini in Italian visual broadcasting (surprisingly, it was 1994 before the hanging bodies of Benito Mussolini and Claretta Petacci appeared on Italian TV for the first time). For Roghi, the effect of Mussolini’s presence on Italian television has been to almost detach him completely from Fascism and the result ‘overall has been one of distortion, in which the details of the Duce’s private life can be used to justify and excuse his conduct’ (p. 267).

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The book ends with an afterword from Mussolini biographer, Richard Bosworth.

Briefly turning his sights on Gentile and Griffin, Bosworth maintains that contemporary theorising around Fascism ‘needs to be conditioned by an admission of the surviving authority of the Church’ for ‘If Mussolini was really the high priest or prophet of Fascist religion, then should he have not dealt with the Catholic Church?’ (p. 272 & p. 275). The danger, however, is that in emphasising the personality cult around Mussolini we ‘deideologise’ Fascism (something that Bosworth rather ironically identifies as happening today with popular nostalgia towards the Fascist dictatorship). So even if the Mussolini cult was complex and multifaceted, and did resonate widely with the Italian public, as the contributors to this volume reveal to their credit, let us guard against reducing Italian Fascism to a personality cult.

Professor Nigel Copsey

Teesside University

Nir Arielli, Fascist Italy and the Middle East, 1933-40 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), ISBN 978-0230231603 (hbk) Arielli has produced a detailed and serious archive-based academic study of the Italian Fascist regime’s policy and diplomacy in the Middle East during the period 1933-1940. The book meticulously reconstructs the events that preceded Italy’s entry into Second World War, exploring the strategies adopted by Mussolini in North Africa and in the Middle East.

The author expresses very clearly in the introduction his ambition to counterbalance a common interpretation of Italy’s foreign policy during the 1930s. Referring particularly to Renzo De Felice and Italian historians, Arielli moves from the theory that Mussolini’s choices in the Middle East were dictated by opportunistic and instrumental motives, seeking only to obtain some concessions from Britain and France. On the contrary, Arielli’s interpretation is that the Italian Fascist regime had a clear hegemonic strategy in the Mediterranean and Middle East, based on both imperialistic ambitions and ideological convictions such as nationalism, the myth of Rome and vitality. The author therefore places himself within a wider scholarly historiography, represented by British and North American historians, who share the hegemonic theory. While arguing that Mussolini during the 1930s pursued the goal of bringing the Mediterranean and Middle East into an Italian sphere of influence, Arielli examines how changing circumstances and interconnected ideological, political, strategic and even religious interests influenced Mussolini’s moves in the area. Consequently, the overall strategy of il Duce shows both contradictions and sudden shifts.

Arielli focuses on three main forces that in his opinion shaped Italian policy in the Middle East: firstly, ideological elements linked to nationalistic and imperialistic ambitions; secondly, traditional foreign policy considerations, especially with regard to the French and the British powers; and thirdly, colonial interests, given the fact that the Middle East bordered with Italian colonies. Arielli succeeds in showing the tense interrelation among these three dimensions, at least until the Second World War when the desire for territorial expansion overshadowed all other considerations.

In Chapter I, Arielli sets out to present Italian policy in the Middle East from 1870 until 1934, considering the Italian leadership’s attitude towards both Islam and Zionism. The

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author examines the rise of a pro-Muslim policy and of political contacts with Muslim leaders as important innovations during the Fascist era. While underlining the aspects of realpolitik, Arielli also gives a good insight into the cultural and propagandistic elements that backed Italy’s involvement in this region. Propaganda efforts focused on presenting Rome as a bridge between the West and the East. However, in spite of the appeal Fascism exercised in certain circles, Arielli argues that Mussolini was not able to win over Arab scepticism towards a newcomer with colonial ambitions.

In Chapter II, Arielli moves on to describe the diplomatic initiatives of the Fascist regime in the Middle East during the period 1935-June 1936, after the invasion of Ethiopia.

The author focuses on the new anti-British line, the second important innovation of Fascist policy in the Mediterranean, and provides some interesting interpretations of the vast material we have at our disposal in archives and in secondary literature. We learn about different strategies adopted in countries like Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Yemen, crucial for Italian supply and communication routes with Eritrea, compared with strategies adopted in other countries – Syria and Lebanon – where Italy intensified anti-British propaganda.

Chapter III is, in my opinion, the most exciting part of the book. Here the author gives a detailed and informative account of the image of Mussolini as the “Protector of Islam” during the period June 1936-March 1938. Arielli convincingly argues that it was especially during this time that Mussolini managed to balance opposite ambitions: to press Britain to recognize the Italian Impero; to expand Italian influence in the Middle East; to promote new colonial ventures in the region. The author describes the Italian different approaches during those two years, from military preparations (in case of war against France and Britain in the Mediterranean) to propaganda war against Britain, from political and commercial penetration into the region to pro-Muslim policy and support for Arab nationalism. In his revisionist policy in the Middle East, Mussolini was reassured by Hitler of the German non-interventionist line in the Mediterranean.

At this point of the narration, Chapter IV provides an interesting deep examination of one aspect of Fascist policy in the Middle East: the Italian approach to the Arab-Jewish struggle in Palestine. We notice a change in methodology, switching from the use of secondary literature in the previous chapters to extensive use of primary sources in this chapter. This is a most interesting empirical study of the Italian involvement in Palestine in the period 1936-1939, where the author presents original and new material on the financial and military support from the Fascist regime to the Arab rebels, in order to destabilise London’s position in the area. Moreover, Arielli is able to give us a vivid picture of a power challenging the British hegemony and consequently attracting support locally, while at the same time meeting scepticism from other Arab leaders.

In Chapter V, which is devoted to Italian policies between April 1938 and May 1940, Arielli goes on to analyse the difficult balance between the three core elements of Italy’s policy in the Middle East. At this point, colonial, racial and expansionist interests started to dominate over tactical considerations. While Mussolini focused increasingly on developments in Europe, his attention moved away from the Middle East. In spite of the recognition of the Impero by Britain and several Arab countries, Arielli makes us aware of the fact that Mussolini lost the capability of winning any gain from his policy in the Middle East. Instead, military preparations for war became impellent. As far as the implementation of anti-Jewish and racial legislation implemented in the Italian colonies is concerned, Arielli concludes that for the most part it harmed the so far previously good relations with Arab countries. After

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the conquest of Albania in April 1939, the strategy of friendship with the Middle East completely lost its meaning.

Chapter VI is again a fascinating description of Mussolini’s ambitions and optimism during the period June-October 1940, when il Duce hoped to enlarge his empire at the expense of both France and Britain. Arielli guides the reader into a new and exiting scenario for Italian policy in the Middle East after entry into the Second World War: the ItalianGerman-Arab triangle. We read the last page of Arielli’s book with a strong desire to read further.

This book is not only well written and rationally structured but it is also based on a vast literature, even if there isn’t always a balance between primary and secondary sources.

Fascist policies in the Middle East have in general received less attention than other topics regarding the Mussolinean regime. Therefore, Arielli’s monograph is a useful and valuable contribution to the historiography of the Fascist dictatorship. Nonetheless, it also has a clear appeal to any scholar of contemporary international relations in the Middle East and to the general reader in that it provides important insights into the policy and diplomacy of great powers in the Mediterranean area. Finally, in a scholarly landscape dominated by the studies of Emilio Gentile and Roger Griffin and by their interpretation of fascism only in terms of totalitarianism, the empirical approach of Arielli, so concentrated on Italy’s pragmatic geopolitical interests, brings us back to ground.

Professor Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

University of Oslo

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Publications Alert

Ahmed, A. (2013) Democracy and the Politics of Electoral System Choice: Engineering Electoral Dominance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Armiero, M. & von Hardenberg, W. G. (2013) Green Rhetoric in Blackshirts: Italian Fascism and the Environment. Environment and History, 19, 283-311.

Augusteijn, J., Dassen, P. & Janse, M. (2013) Political Religion beyond Totalitarianism The Sacralization of Politics in the Age of Democracy, Basingstoke: Palgrave.

Ben-Yehuda, N. (2013) Atrocity, Deviance and Submarine Warfare: Norms and Practices during the World Wars, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.

Blanco, J. A. (2013) PCE and PSOE in (the) Transition. Intellectuals, Rank-and-File Members and Media Facing the Left-Wing Ideological Evolution. Ayer, 167-196.

Bosch, A. (2013) Between Democracy and Neutrality: The US and the Spanish Civil War. Ayer, 167187.

Brown, T. S. (2013) The Sixties in the City: Avant-gardes and Urban Rebels in New York, London, and West Berlin. Journal of Social History, 46, 817-842.

Caren, N., Jowers, K. & Gaby, S. (2012) A Social Movement Online Community: Stormfront and the White Nationalist. Media, Movements, and Political Change, 33, 163-193.

Casquete, J. (2013) One "small" World, another "big" World: The Gender Discourse of National Socialism. Revista De Estudios Politicos, 165-201.

Clark, R. (2013) Collective Singing in Romanian Fascism. Cultural & Social History, 10, 251-271.

Cohen, R. A. (2013) The Hojjatiyeh Society in Iran: Ideology and Practice from the 1950s to the Present, New York: Palgrave.

Dahlstrom, C. & Esaiasson, P. (2013) The Immigration Issue and Anti-immigrant Party Success in Sweden 1970-2006: A Deviant Case Analysis. Party Politics, 19, 343-364. de Molina, A. H. G., Markoff, J. & Gil-Bermejo, I. V. (2013) Democratization in the Spanish Countryside in the early Twentieth Century: A little-known Story. Ayer, 21-42.

Dee, D. (2013) 'There is no Discrimination here, but the Committee never elects Jews': Antisemitism in British golf, 1894-1970. Patterns of Prejudice, 47, 117-138.

Della Casa, A. (2012) Joseph de Maistre's two Modernities: Isaiah Berlin and the Interpretation of Fascism. Studi Storici, 53, 905-928.

Dillon, C. (2013) 'Tolerance means Weakness': The Dachau Concentration Camp S.S., Militarism and Masculinity. Historical Research, 86, 373-389.

Geerling, W., Magee, G. B. & Brooks, R. (2013) Faces of Opposition: Juvenile Resistance, High Treason, and the People's Court in Nazi Germany. Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 44, 209-234.

Ginsborg, P. (2013) Civil Society in Contemporary Italy: Theory, History and Practice. Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 18, 283-295.

Goeschel, C. (2013) The Criminal Underworld in Weimar and Nazi Berlin. History Workshop Journal, 58-80.

Gransow, V. & Hohlfeld, R. (2013) Between Darwin and Marx. The Reception of Evolution Theory in German and Austrian Social Democracy before 1933/34.

Zeitschrift Fur Geschichtswissenschaft, 61, 370-372.

Hollander, P. (2013) Righteous Political Violence and Contemporary Western Intellectuals. Terrorism and Political Violence, 25, 518-530.

Jakubec, P. (2013) On the Question of Recognition of the Slovak State (Slovak Republic) by the Kingdom of Norway, 1939-1940. Historicky Casopis, 61, 121-141.

Jarvis, L. & Lister, M. (2013) Disconnected Citizenship? The Impacts of Anti-terrorism Policy on Citizenship in the UK. Political Studies, 61, 656-675.

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e-Extreme

Volume 14, No. 3, September 2013

Katsari, C. (2013) Inter-War Ideology in Nelly's's Nudes: Nationalism, Fascism and the Classical Tradition. Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 31, 1-27.

Larsen, D. (2013) Abandoning Democracy: Woodrow Wilson and Promoting German Democracy, 1918-1919. Diplomatic History, 37, 476-508.

Massetti, E. & Schakel, A. H. (2013) Ideology Matters: Why Decentralisation has a differentiated effect on Regionalist Parties' Fortunes in Western Democracies. European Journal of Political Research, 52, 797-821.

Michels, T. (2013) Two Faces of Labor Anticommunism. Journal of the Historical Society, 13, 149155.

Neviaski, A. (2013) Nazi Infiltration in the French Foreign Legion. Historia, 62-66.

Passarelli, G. (2013) Extreme Right Parties in Western Europe: The Case of the Italian Northern League. Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 18, 53-71.

Prazmowska, A. (2013) The Polish Underground Resistance During the Second World War: A Study in Political Disunity During Occupation. European History Quarterly, 43, 464-488.

Reichardt, S. (2013) Violence and Community: A Micro-Study on Nazi Storm Troopers. Central European History, 46, 275-297.

Roodhouse, M. (2013) 'Fish-and-Chip Intelligence': Henry Durant and the British Institute of Public Opinion, 1936-63. Twentieth Century British History, 24, 224-248.

Rose, P. L. (2013) Renan versus Gobineau: Semitism and Antisemitism, Ancient Races and Modern Liberal Nations. History of European Ideas, 39, 528-540.

Seidler, M. (2013) The Beauty and the Beast: Jean-Paul Sartre and the Baader-Meinhof Gang.

Terrorism and Political Violence, 25, 597-605.

Simi, P., Bubolz, B. F. & Hardman, A. (2013) Military Experience, Identity Discrepancies, and Far Right Terrorism: An Exploratory Analysis. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 36, 654-671.

Spies, D. (2013) Explaining Working-class Support for Extreme Right Parties: A Party Competition Approach. Acta Politica, 48, 296-325.

Varley, K. (2013) Vichy and the Complexities of Collaborating with Fascist Italy: French Policy and Perceptions between June 1940 and March 1942. Modern & Contemporary France, 21, 317333.

Veugelers, J. (2013) Neo-fascist or Revolutionary Leftist: Family Politics and Social Movement Choice in postwar Italy. International Sociology, 28/4, 429-447.

Vielhaber, D. (2013) The Stasi-Meinhof Complex? Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 36, 533-546.

Villis, T. (2013) British Catholics and Fascism Religious Identity and Political Extremism Between the Wars, New York: Palgrave.

Zatkuliak, J. (2013) Alexander Dubcek's Views on the Constitutional Development of Czechoslovakia in the period 1989-1992. Historicky Casopis, 61, 85-120.

ECPR Standing Group on Extremism and Democracy Convenors: David Art (David.Art@tufts.edu); Elisabeth Carter (e.carter@keele.ac.uk)

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