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‘With Rome and with Moscow’: Italian Catholic Communism and Anti-Fascist Exile

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 October 2016

CLAUDIA BALDOLI
CLAUDIA BALDOLI*
Affiliation:
School of History, Classics and Archaeology, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU (UK); claudia.baldoli@ncl.ac.uk
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Abstract

This article aims to explore the interplay between religion and political radicalism in Europe by focusing on the case of Italian ‘White Leagues’ (Catholic trade unions) in the interwar period. Interest in this movement stems partly from the opinion that the understanding of politics in early twentieth-century Europe has often been distorted by the historiographical focus on the political polarisation between communism and fascism, which has led to the neglect of the complex ideological area in between. The article will focus in particular on the main organiser of the peasant ‘White’ unions in Italy, Guido Miglioli. He developed a network of political contacts across Europe with the aim of resuscitating the anti-fascist struggle in Italy and launching a campaign for the liberation of the peasantry. This was to be achieved through a European peasant International that would draw from the Soviet example while maintaining its Christian roots.

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Contemporary European History , Volume 25 , Special Issue 4: Transnational Anti-Fascism: Agents, Networks, Circulations , November 2016 , pp. 619 - 643
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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References

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102 Informer's report to the ministry of interior, 3 Sept. 1938, CPC 1385, f. 1097 (2), ACS. However, Sturzo continued to oppose such unity between Catholics and communists, as he also demonstrated with regards to the Spanish Civil War: despite his excellent connections with Spanish liberal Catholics who fought for the Republic, he believed that the Church should only be concerned with ‘innocent victims on both sides’: Alfonso Botti, ed., Luigi Sturzo e gli amici spagnoli. Carteggi (1924–1951) (Soveria Mannelli: Rubbettino, 2012), 7–8.

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106 Political police report from Paris to the Italian ministry of interior, 21 Dec. 1938, MI, DGPS, DPP, b. 24, f. 3, ACS.

107 Political police report from Lyon to the Italian ministry of interior, 19 Apr. 1938, ibid.

108 Schor, Écrir en exil, 206–8; Palmier, Weimar in Exile, 312–4.

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111 Reports of 12 Oct. and 16 June 1933, and of 16 Oct. 1939, Terre 7 NN/3151, f. 39.001, SHD.

112 See Bayerlein, Bernhard H. with Leonhard, Wolfgang, Der Verräter, Stalin, Bist Du! Vom Ende der linken Solidarität. Sowjetunion, Komintern und kommunistische Parteien im Zweiten Weltkrieg 1939–1941 (Berlin: Aufbau-Verlag, 2008)Google Scholar.

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114 Note by the Prefect of Paris, 7 Nov. 1939, ibid.

115 Informers’ reports to the Italian ministry of interior, 8 Nov. and 16 Dec. 1939, CPC 1385, f. 1097 (2), ACS.

116 Special police officer Julliard, Lyon to the prefect of Rhône, 23 Dec. 1939, F/7/14748, AN.

117 ‘Un appel de l'Union populaire italienne aux 850,000 Italiens de France’, Epoque, 14 May 1940.

118 L'Unione, 18–25 Feb. 1940.

119 ‘Plus que jamais contre la collusion communiste-hitlérienne’, L'Unione, 24–31 Mar. 1940. See also Cocchi, Amitié franco-italienne (Paris: Comité d'amitié franco-italienne, 1939), which includes letters of support to Cocchi and the Union by leaders of the PCF, Maurice Thorez, of the Christian Democratic party, ‘La Jeune République’ Philippe Serre, and of the Socialist party, Jean Zyromski (27–8).

120 Letter dated early Dec. 1940 and published in Bellò, Carlo and Zanibelli, Amos, eds., Guido Miglioli. Documenti inediti: 1940–1945 (Rome: Cinque Lune, 1980), 37–8Google Scholar.

121 Con Roma e con Mosca, 227.

122 Antonio Giolitti, Di guerra e di pace. Diario partigiano (1944–1945), Rosa Giolitti and Mariuccia Salvati, eds. (Rome: Donzelli, 2015), 73

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125 See, among many works on the subject, Gentile, Emilio, Politics as Religion (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006)Google Scholar. The debate generated by the concept has even led to the foundation of a dedicated academic journal, Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions published by Taylor & Francis.