Blasco Sciarrino | Central European University (original) (raw)

Conferences by Blasco Sciarrino

University of Padua Conference "The Global Impact of the March on Rome", 2022

In the interwar era, numerous Romanian Great War veterans sought to undermine their country’s par... more In the interwar era, numerous Romanian Great War veterans sought to undermine their country’s parliamentary institutions, pursuing this goal with varying degrees of intensity. Importantly, the March on Rome prompted many of these ex-combatants to radicalize, acting as a model for their anti-democratic activities.

In studying the Blackshirts’ seizure of power, anti-liberal Romanian returnees viewed this paramilitary mobilization as an insurrection undertaken primarily by combat survivors, who through their uprising had established a dictatorship that accommodated their needs and values. Such an interpretation of the March consequently galvanized these observers into attempting to impose an authoritarian regime upon their own country, in the hope the latter would reverse the varied shortcomings they ascribed to the local liberal order – such as neglected claims to social care or a severe abuse of national interests.

My proposed contribution investigates the concrete ways Mussolini’s takeover of the Italian state encouraged Romanian ex-enlistees to embrace authoritarian principles and practices, and how the ‘example’ set by this armed uprising helped destabilize Romanian democracy. First of all, this inquiry surveys the role transnational veterans’ networks and forums played in disseminating, within Romania, an influential political narrative which portrayed the March on Rome as a successful uprising enacted by ex-soldiers.

Additionally, my analysis looks at how this narrative came to prominently affect former fighters who led or militated in a plethora of far-right organizations – such as the Legion of the Archangel Michael, the Romanian National Fasces, the National Military Front and the Front of the Fire Generation – and the mainstream People’s Party, led by General Alexandru Averescu. Specifically, my research shows that veterans operating in all these groups became more militant, in their beliefs and public undertakings, as accounts of the March strengthened their illiberal tendencies, furthermore convincing them to take up paramilitary tactics or organizational features.

Moreover, my study highlights that extremist ex-servicemen who were inspired by the Italian Fascists’ coup d’état helped undermine their own kingdom’s parliamentary rule. While governments eventually neutralized them, by deploying coercion and catering to some of the disgruntled former soldiers’ demands for social assistance, they nevertheless contributed to the political climate that allowed King Carol II to establish his own dictatorship in 1938, as their propaganda reinforced authoritarian trends within public opinion, and their paramilitary activities helped foster widespread political instability.
Ultimately, this investigation, centering on a novel case study and drawing on a wealth of hitherto unused primary sources, makes several stimulating observations on political radicalism in post-war Europe. It underscores that even dischargees living in polities that had emerged victorious and stable from the first global conflict tended to align with subversive organizations, in considerable numbers. Additionally, it shows that fascist ideas and tactics circulating at the transnational level tended to influence not only far-right political actors, but also more moderate ones, as attested by the case of Averescu’s People’s Party.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Annual Conference of the Irish Association for Russian, Central and East European Studies "Populism and Illiberalism in East, Central and Southeast Europe," 2022

In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Euro... more In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Europe, recent academic studies stress that ideological and organizational models provided by fascist regimes encouraged ex-servicemen in other countries across this continent to support their own nations’ right-wing groups and ideas. Aiming to buttress these novel theoretical perspectives, my contribution analyzes the relevance of foreign political trends for the radicalization of Romanian ex-combatants, investigating how the latter ex-enlistees were inspired, in their anti-democratic undertakings, by political myths that originated in Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, and pointing out how such myths came to be disseminated in their nation.

My inquiry focuses on how Italian and German notions of ‘trenchocracy’ - in other words, the political narrative positing that Great War returnees had the right to overthrow parliamentary elites and establish dictatorships – prompted Romanian extremist ex-soldiers’ organizations, such as the Romanian National Fasces and the Front of the Fire Generation, to attempt to undermine their country’s liberal order. At the same time, this analysis indicates that said groups failed to significantly affect their state, as the latter preserved its monopoly of violence and managed to satisfy some of the former fighters’ claims to benefits. Ultimately, my investigation suggests that political narratives shaped European veterans’ public activism, furthermore proposing that such narratives often transcended national boundaries. Moreover, running counter to established theoretical paradigms, it points out that even veterans who lived in victorious countries tended to espouse authoritarian principles and practices.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Fifth COMFAS Convention, 2022

My proposed contribution investigates the ways First World War veterans’ associations contributed... more My proposed contribution investigates the ways First World War veterans’ associations contributed to marginalizing the Italian Jewish community, in the later phases of Mussolini’s regime and under the Italian Social Republic. Specifically, it looks at how these associations manipulated and distorted the public memory of the Great War, and other major events in Italy’s national history, to argue that Jews were acting as dangerous foreign fifth columns. It suggests that ex-servicemen’s groups disseminated a public narrative according to which these citizens were conspiring to undermine their country’s political and territorial sovereignty, alternatively to affirm the geopolitical interests of Western ‘plutocracies’ or to assist communist penetration.
This study analyzes the principal goals, assumptions and tactics of the Fascist veterans’ anti- Semitic politics of memory. It shows that ex-combatants pursued these politics in the attempt to create ‘New Men’ who were loyal to Mussolini, to cement the partnership between their nation and Nazi Germany and to help Italians accept Fascism’s severance of Italy’s traditional diplomatic alliances. Those former fighters who disseminated such narratives under the RSI also did so due to extreme fears of national defeat and decline.
To promote such aims, former soldiers claimed Italian Jews were customarily lacking in martial qualities, engaged in treacherous activities, acting in the service of foreign powers and bent on wrecking Italy’s military endeavors. These invented ‘traditions’ were propagated through a variety of press articles and public speeches and ceremonies, allowing ex-enlistees to present other Italians with purported examples of disloyal behavior they were supposed to learn to shun, and to delegitimize Italy’s traditional international allies, by portraying them as polities involved in an international Jewish plot against this country. As a result, Fascist combat survivors contributed to discriminating and persecuting Italian Jews, especially by questioning their patriotic credentials, including their major contribution to their fatherland’s war effort in 1915-1918.
Focusing on the public undertakings of returnees’ associations’ leaders and activists, and making use of hitherto under-investigated primary sources, such as ex-militaries’ periodicals, this analysis indicates that First World War soldiers played a relevant role in the adoption of intolerant political mindsets, on behalf of sectors of Italian society, and underscores that Fascism’s anti-Semitic turn was pursued with a view to revolutionizing the political and moral customs of Italians.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Rethinking War Conference, University of Pittsburgh, 2022

In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Euro... more In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Europe, recent academic studies stress that ideological and organizational models provided by fascist regimes encouraged ex-servicemen in other countries across this continent to support their own nations’ right-wing groups and ideas. Aiming to buttress these novel theoretical perspectives, my contribution analyzes the relevance of foreign political trends for the radicalization of Romanian ex-combatants, investigating how the latter ex-enlistees were inspired, in their anti-democratic undertakings, by political myths that originated in Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, and pointing out how such myths came to be disseminated in their nation.

My inquiry focuses on how Italian and German notions of ‘trenchocracy’ - in other words, the political narrative positing that Great War returnees had the right to overthrow parliamentary elites and establish dictatorships – prompted Romanian extremist ex-soldiers’ organizations, such as the Romanian National Fasces and the Front of the Fire Generation, to attempt to undermine their country’s liberal order. At the same time, this analysis indicates that said groups failed to significantly affect their state, as the latter preserved its monopoly of violence and managed to satisfy some of the former fighters’ claims to benefits. Ultimately, my investigation suggests that political narratives shaped European veterans’ public activism, furthermore proposing that such narratives often transcended national boundaries. Moreover, running counter to established theoretical paradigms, it points out that even veterans who lived in victorious countries tended to espouse authoritarian principles and practices.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

72rd Conference of the International Commission for the History of Representative and Parliamentary Institutions (ICHRPI), Athens, 2021

After the First World War, numerous Romanian ex-combatants came to expect various material and sy... more After the First World War, numerous Romanian ex-combatants came to expect various material and symbolic rewards from their state, having fought for the latter. Consequently, in the interwar era the political stability of the Romanian nation-state ended up depending, to a relevant degree, on this state’s effectiveness in acknowledging the veterans’ claims to benefits.

In the first decade after 1918, Romania’s parliament played a relevant role in the political stabilization of the war returnees and the endurance of democratic institutions, as the main parliamentary parties at the time helped develop comprehensive veterans’ policies, thereby preserving the support of many ex-combatants and preventing extremist anti-parliamentary organizations from gaining a strong following among the latter.

In analyzing this dynamic, my proposed contribution surveys the ways parliamentary parties, in addition to the governments of this era, approached the former fighters’ requests, and how they created links to the ex-soldiers’ community by satisfying the latter’s aspirations. Additionally, in assessing the factors leading the parliamentary parties to achieve this policy success, my analysis points to the existence of a consensus, among these parties, on the need to reward ex-combatants, which stemmed from shared ideological beliefs and facilitated political cooperation toward satisfying the veterans.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

“Dal Regno d’Italia alla proclamazione della Repubblica: eventi e protagonisti,” Centro Papa Luciani, Santa Giustina (Belluno), 2021

In Italy, many nationalist Great War veterans came to support the Fascist movement and, subsequen... more In Italy, many nationalist Great War veterans came to support the Fascist movement and, subsequently, Mussolini's regime. While several scholars have investigated the dynamics of this political alliance, the main factors leading to this convergence still require comprehensive academic scrutiny. My contribution suggests that the policies which the Italian state enacted to reintegrate veterans, in the aftermath of the Great War, played a relevant role in the 'fascistisation' of a wide sector of the war returnees' community. Specifically, as, during the war, numerous nationalist soldiers had developed a strong sense of entitlement based on their military service, after 1918, many of these ex-servicemen, compelled by their expectations, attempted to exact material and symbolic rewards from the state. Importantly, nationalist ex-soldiers often backed those institutions and political organisations which promised to satisfy their sense of entitlement.
Crucially, the Italian liberal regime failed to provide the nationalist war participants with the special socio-economic status they sought, as governments and leftist and centrist mass parties often to acknowledge their claims to benefits and to engage with their official representatives. The shortcomings of the liberal state's policies for veterans estranged many nationalist ex-combatants from mainstream political actors, prompting former militaries to join or to sympathise with the budding Fascist movement, which promised to afford them the rewards they sought. Beginning in its early years, Mussolini's dictatorship also capitalised on the nationalist veterans unfulfilled claims to benefits, as it granted them many of their requests and hence secured the loyalty of numerous ex-combatants, a success which helped the regime entrench its rule.
To investigate these issues, my contribution details and compares the policies enacted by the liberal and early-Fascist regimes, while also analysing the ways the associations which represented the interests of the nationalist ex-servicemen reacted to state provisions.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

"Faces of War" International Conference, London Centre for Interdisciplinary Research, 2021

During the Second World War, Mussolini’s Fascist dictatorship strove to mobilise the Italian nati... more During the Second World War, Mussolini’s Fascist dictatorship strove to mobilise the Italian nation for war. The associations of First World War veterans played a relevant role in this strategy, by producing and disseminating political propaganda.
My proposed contribution studies the ways in which these associations’ propaganda evoked the First World War and thematically related developments, in the service of Fascism. Specifically, it critically examines the major instances in which ex-combatants employed Italy’s past to promote the regime’s war effort:
• Lending authoritativeness to the dictatorship, by highlighting the military and political accomplishments which were achieved by the Fascists in the course of the First World War and the post-war years preceding Mussolini’s seizure of power.
• Strengthening Italy’s alliance with the Axis, by highlighting historical parallels between Italy and Germany, in terms of martial traditions and military developments, taking place before and during the First World War.
• Providing Italians with martial role models, by commemorating soldiers who had fallen in the course of the First World War.
My enquiry shows that ex-combatants, by publicly recalling – and often exaggerating or distorting – past events, helped the regime come closer to various among its goals – such as motivating Italian soldiers to fight and developing diplomatic ties to Nazi Germany (by facilitating contacts between organisations of Italian and German former fighters). Furthermore, it highlights that the First World War remained a crucial symbolic resource for Fascism until the latter’s downfall.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

ASMI Postgraduate Symposium, 2020

During the Great War, many nationalist Italian soldiers developed a strong sense of entitlement b... more During the Great War, many nationalist Italian soldiers developed a strong sense of entitlement based on their military service. After the war, numerous among these ex-servicemen attempted to exact material and symbolic rewards from the Italian state, motivated by these expectations. However, between 1919 and 1922, the liberal governments and non-Fascist mass parties often failed to acknowledge these ex-combatants’ claims. Consequently, various veterans, estranged from these political actors, joined or sympathized with the budding Fascist movement, which promised to grant them the benefits they sought and, at times, helped them achieve their goals at the local level. After 1922, the political convergence between Fascism and many ex-fighters was further cemented by Mussolini’s regime, which bestowed several privileges on the veterans who accepted its rule. By affording these rewards, the Fascist dictatorship managed to secure the long-term loyalty of a large number of ex-combatants, a success which helped it entrench its rule over Italy. Studying the ways in which Fascism campaigned among nationalist veterans by catering to the latter’s sense of entitlement provides an innovative perspective on the strong connection which this political force managed to establish with many former fighters. Furthermore, this analysis contributes to comprehensively assessing the factors which caused the political radicalization of numerous veterans. To analyse these issues, my contribution focuses on the associations which represented the interests of the nationalist ex-servicemen, outlining these organizations’ goals and strategies, in addition to their interactions with prominent political actors.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Third ComFas Convention "Fascism and the Right", 2020

Between 1938 and 1944, the kingdom of Romania underwent domination by the authoritarian regimes o... more Between 1938 and 1944, the kingdom of Romania underwent domination by the authoritarian regimes of King Carol II, the Legion of the Archangel Michael and Marshal Ion Antonescu.
In these years, the associations representing the interests of the kingdom’s Great War veterans came to acquiesce to country’s far-Right rulers. Crucially, however, they cooperated with these regimes in a selective manner, generally collaborating with dictatorial institutions, while refraining from supporting the Legion.
My proposed contribution investigates these political dynamics, thereby contributing to understanding and assessing the appeal of fascism and the radical Right for the Romanian ex-servicemen of the Great War. First of all, it points out that, on the whole, the ex- combatants allowed themselves to be co-opted by the dictators mainly for pragmatic reasons, specifically to receive economic and symbolic benefits from them. In exchange for the rewards they sought, they helped these regimes acquire public legitimacy, for instance by taking part in their collective ceremonies.
On the other hand, my analysis claims that the Legion failed to attract significant support from the veterans as, essentially, it did not cater significantly to the latter’s claims to benefits.
By making these observations, my study claims that a sense of entitlement from wartime military service prominently affected the public loyalties of most Romanian ex-servicemen. Additionally, my investigation suggests that the radical-Right governments of King Carol and Marshal Antonescu proved more capable of securing the support of the ex-servicemen than the Legion, as they catered more extensively to the combatants’ sense of entitlement.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Second Convention of the International Association for Comparative Fascist Studies "Fascism and Violence", 2019

With regard to Italian Fascism, the motivations which prompted non-Fascist First World War vetera... more With regard to Italian Fascism, the motivations which prompted non-Fascist First World War veterans to support this movement’s political violence, in the first half of the 1920s, remain an understudied topic.
In my contribution, I study the factors which compelled various nationalist war veterans to provide conditional support to Fascist paramilitary activities. To investigate this issue, I focus on the interactions which took place between Fascist combat groups and various associations of ex-combatants, between 1919 and 1926.
I contend that sympathizers within these associations initially supported Fascist violence to promote their own political goals. Mainly, they wished to use this violence to exact material and symbolic rewards for their wartime military service, from the liberal State. Therefore, they accepted paramilitarism to pressure the State in granting them the benefits they felt entitled to, in addition to removing competing veterans’ associations, of a Catholic or socialist variety.
After the March on Rome, the Fascist paramilitaries forcefully subordinated these sympathizers to Mussolini’s government. Consequently, the nationalist veterans obtained many of the rewards they sought from the Fascist regime, but lost their organizational autonomy to the dictatorship.
Ultimately, my contribution points out how Italian Fascists used violence as an effective mean of campaigning for the support nationalist ex-servicemen. It highlights how these sympathizers’ interest in violence stemmed mainly from the liberal State’s shortcomings with regard to rewarding Italian veterans, in addition to upholding its monopoly of coercion.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

42nd Annual conference of the Irish Association for Russian, Central and East European Studies "State and Non-state Actors in Eastern and Central Europe", 2019

In tackling the issue of the political radicalization of European Great War Veterans in the inter... more In tackling the issue of the political radicalization of European Great War Veterans in the interwar period, recent studies emphasize how State policymaking was a crucial factor for the outcomes of these extremist trends. Aiming to confirm the validity of these new approaches, I analyze the case study of victor Romanian Great War combatants, between the two World Wars. Specifically, I study how the Romanian State was capable of integrating, to a relevant degree, the majority of these veterans into the post-war national polity and social order. The main factors of this accomplishment rested, I contend, on the State’s preservation of its monopoly of violence and its implementation of a radical agrarian reform which addressed the basic material concerns of the majority of the ex-servicemen. Additional moderating influences which I take in account include the general consensus, across the Romanian political spectrum, on values such as nationalism, and the ways civil society supported ex-servicemen with regard to the latter’s material needs, therefore compensating for the shortcomings of the State’s welfare policies. Together, these factors prevented various former fighters from joining radical-Right movements, like the Iron Guard. In analyzing my topic, I focus chiefly on the relationship between the State and the main veterans’ associations. This focus allows for a comprehensive analysis of the State’s strategies for co-opting relevant segments of the ex-servicemen’s community. To investigate this relationship, I rely mainly on police reports and veterans’ periodicals. Ultimately, my contribution provides relevant insights concerning the relationship between State and non-State actors in interwar Central and Eastern Europe, especially with regard to the development of bottom-up and top-down authoritarian political trends. Moreover, my contribution highlights the salience of post-war factors, rather than long-term influences and wartime events, for the outcomes of radicalizing processes.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Central and Eastern Europe in Transition, 2019

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

1918 and the Remaking of Central-Eastern Europe, 2018

In the interwar era, Great War veterans from the former Entente countries mobilized together to p... more In the interwar era, Great War veterans from the former Entente countries mobilized together to preserve order and stability across the continent. Romanian veterans played a relevant role within this mobilization. Between the early 1920s and the late 1930s, they helped stabilize Europe’s territorial arrangements and attempted to educate youth according to pacifist and patriotic values.
My proposed contribution will focus on Romanian veterans’ transnational activism. Specifically, I will look at the activities undertaken by these veterans within the international organizations known as the Federation International des Anciens Combattants (FIDAC) and the Confederation International des Associations des Mutilees et Anciens Combattants (CIAMAC).
I will analyze how Romanian veterans lobbied, within FIDAC and CIAMAC, for the preservation of international peace and the development of ties of solidarity between former servicemen from all Europe - especially those in the successor States of Central Europe. I will make the case that, by undertaking these activities, these veterans helped create a pan-European ‘culture of victory,’ which stabilized the continent, to a degree, before 1939. Specifically, due to this culture of victory, European veterans developed new political loyalties which were congruent with the post-war continental order. This culture, in particular, helped integrate veterans in the new nation-States of Central Europe.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

ComFas Convention “Comparative Fascist Studies and the transnational Turn”, 2018

After the Great War, Romania underwent various processes of fascistization which culminated durin... more After the Great War, Romania underwent various processes of fascistization which culminated during the regimes of King Carol II and Marshal Antonescu.
In my contribution, I look at Romanian Great War veterans’ involvement with these political trends, between the end of the First World War and Romania’s entry into the Second one. Specifically, I focus on the stance taken by war veterans towards, on one hand, foreign fascist regimes and, on the other, the fascistized authoritarian regimes at home. Consequently, I take in account how these veterans consented or opposed the fascistization of the Romanian political system. In other words, I consider how former servicemen reacted to transnational fascist political “commodities” (Aristotle Kallis) and local radical organizations and ideologies.
In analyzing the relationship between former servicemen and fascistizing trends, I focus on the transnational veterans’ networks through which Romanian, Italian and German old soldiers interacted, including the pan-European forum known as the Federation Interallié des Anciens Combattants. Additionally, at the national level I analyze the activities and statements of various Romanian veterans’ associations, such as the Uniunea Nationala a Fostilor Luptatori and the Uniunea a Ofiterilor de Rezerva, and political parties affiliated with former servicemen, like the Partidul Popurului and the Partidul a Luptatorilor. Finally, I consider the beliefs and actions of politically prominent Romanian veterans, chiefly General Alexandru Averescu and Marshal Ion Antonescu.
Ultimately, I make the case that Romanian veterans played a role in the fascistization of the local political system. However, their contribution to these trends was less conspicuous than in the majority of European case studies, due to their relative integration within the Romanian polity.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

CEU Doctoral Conference: Enchantments, Disenchantments, Re-enchantments | Center for Religious Studies, 2017

Debating upon the nature of fascism, certain scholars have proposed that this kind of movement sh... more Debating upon the nature of fascism, certain scholars have proposed that this kind of movement should be considered a political religion, which arose in modern secularized – i.e. disenchanted – communities to fill a ‘void’ of beliefs within said societies, by attempting to engineer a process of ‘re-enchantment’ based on the “sacralization” of nation and race.
My proposed contribution focuses on the academic discussions surrounding this interpretation. In addressing them, it problematizes the rigid division between the concepts of secularism and enchantment, in addition to questioning the degree to which interwar Europe underwent a process of secularization.
My analysis focuses on Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, as they are the two most developed cases of fascist mobilization and regime-building. They thus represent the most suitable case studies for a comprehensive assessment of fascism as a political phenomenon.
I mainly consider the following questions: whether fascists strove to create a political religion and whether their followers adhered to fascism in view of its appeal as a ‘new sect’. To adequately tackle these issues, I debate whether the religious ‘tone’ of fascism is ascribable to a new political style or to a sacralization of politics and whether, in turn, this sacralization was conceived by fascists as a core element of their totalitarian political project. I look in detail at the relationship between fascist regimes and established churches, in addition to the religious views of Italian and German fascist leaders and activists. I also analyze the meaning ascribed by these actors to their collective rituals and their views on totalitarianism.
In drawing my conclusions, I consider transcendent and functional understandings of organized religion. I make the case that fascism can be considered a political religion if contemplated from a functional perspective, in the Durkheimian sense. It should, nonetheless, be understood as a political ideology, operating through ‘religious politics’ – i.e. the rationalization of secular policies in ostensibly religious terms - if observed from a transcendent point of view on religion. Ultimately, I contend that, while fascist leaders consciously attempted to create a political religion, popular consent for fascism did not depend primarily on accepting this new faith.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

A Century of Radical Right Extremism: New Approaches, 2019

In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Euro... more In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Europe, recent studies stress how the ideological and organizational models provided by fascist regimes encouraged European ex-servicemen to radicalize towards their own countries’ far Rights.

Aiming to contribute to these new approaches, I analyze the relevance of foreign political trends for the radicalization of Romanian ex-combatants, between the two World Wars. Specifically, I focus on various fascist and far-right groups in which veterans were prominent, such as the Romanian National Fasces and the Romanian National Socialist Party.

I look at how these organizations were inspired in their radical activism, to a relevant degree, by the examples provided by Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany. I focus especially on how foreign fascist political myths influenced Romanian former fighters: chiefly, I consider Mussolini’s notion of ‘trenchocracy’, in other words the assumption that Great War veterans, having allegedly interiorized the political values of self-abnegation and assertiveness as a result of their combat experiences, had the right to overthrow parliamentarian elites in their own countries and build dictatorships.

Finally, I explain why these extremist organizations failed to significantly affect Romanian politics. In doing so, I focus mainly on the Romanian State’s resilient monopoly of violence, in addition to its ability to significantly satisfy some among the local veterans’ material demands.

Ultimately, my contribution points out the relevance of transnational entanglements, for the development of the radical Right’s ideological tenets and organizational practices. Moreover, it helps locate the main catalysts for the political radicalization of war veterans in the period after the Great War, rather than interpreting this extremism as the outcome of wartime combat experiences, with their allegedly-desensitizing effect over various ex-combatants’ moral values and political beliefs.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Articles by Blasco Sciarrino

WARFUN Diaries, 2023

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

European History Quarterly, 2022

This article proposes that, between the two World Wars, the political loyalties of numerous Roman... more This article proposes that, between the two World Wars, the political loyalties of numerous Romanian First World War veterans were significantly affected by these ex-servicemen's sense of entitlement from military service. Having fought to protect their nation in the course of the conflict, many ex-combatants believed they deserved to be granted a variety of economic and symbolic rewards by the Romanian kingdom, in many cases allying themselves with political forces which promised to award them these benefits. To see their rights recognized, they also created a social movement, through which they lobbied state institutions. As, in the early 1930s, state veterans' policies experienced several shortcomings as the result of the Great Depression, sizeable segments of the former soldiers' movement began supporting a plethora of far-right movements and associations. Importantly, these extremist organizations secured the backing of various ex-servicemen mainly by promising to protect and increase the latter's benefits. Notably, in developing ties to discontented ex-combatants, the right was inspired in some instances by foreign authoritarian political models. However, in the middle of the decade, as governments managed to some extent to restore and even improve the ex-servicemen's special economic status, fascist and radical-right groups ceased to expand their reach within the ex-combatants' movement. Consequently, old soldiers did not play a significant role in the eventual collapse of Romanian democracy. By indicating that the former fighters’ sense of entitlement acted as a prominent radicalizing influence over many of them, this article provides an innovative perspective on the extremist political trends which affected numerous ex-servicemen in interwar Europe. Furthermore, by highlighting that Romanian radical veterans were at times inspired by developments occurring beyond their country's borders, the article helps confirm that transnational factors played a role in the anti-parliamentary activism of European former soldiers.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Journal of the Institute of Croatian History, 2018

This article details the aims, dynamics and outcomes of the transnational mobiliza- tion which Ro... more This article details the aims, dynamics and outcomes of the transnational mobiliza- tion which Romanian Great War veterans undertook in the interwar era. In order to comprehensively analyse this case study the article focuses on the role that Romanian former fighters played within the international forums known as FIDAC (Fédération Interalliée des Anciens Combattants) and CIAMAC (Conférence Internationale des Associations des Mutilés de guerre et Anciens Combattants). At the same time, the ways in which local and national factors affected these veterans’ transnational activities are explored. The author also deals with the problem of how veterans from former Entente countries were bound by a shared “culture of victory”, thereby pri- oritizing, among their goals, the preservation of the Versailles and Trianon systems.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Fascism: Journal of Comparative Fascist Studies, 2017

This article aims to further problematize the relationship between patterns of demobilization , f... more This article aims to further problematize the relationship between patterns of demobilization , fascism and veterans' activism, on several interrelated counts. We argue that the relationship between fascism and war veterans was not a fixed nexus, but the outcome of a complex political constellation of socioeconomic and political factors that necessitates a case-by-case in-depth discussion. Also, we argue that these factors were both national and transnational in nature. Finally, we contend that researchers need to employ a synchronic as well as a diachronic perspective, thus accounting for various stages and forms of mobilization of war veterans over time. To substantiate these claims, the current article focuses on a relevant but largely neglected case study: the demobilization of soldiers and war veterans' political activism in interwar Romania. It is argued that, contrary to assumptions in historiography, demobilization in Romania was initially successful. Veterans' mobilization to fascism intensified only in mid-to late 1930s, stimulated by the Great Depression, leading to a growing ideological polarization and the political ascension of the fascist Legion of 'Archangel Michael'. To better grasp the specificities of this case study, the concluding section of the article compares it to patterns of veterans' activism in postwar Italy.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

University of Padua Conference "The Global Impact of the March on Rome", 2022

In the interwar era, numerous Romanian Great War veterans sought to undermine their country’s par... more In the interwar era, numerous Romanian Great War veterans sought to undermine their country’s parliamentary institutions, pursuing this goal with varying degrees of intensity. Importantly, the March on Rome prompted many of these ex-combatants to radicalize, acting as a model for their anti-democratic activities.

In studying the Blackshirts’ seizure of power, anti-liberal Romanian returnees viewed this paramilitary mobilization as an insurrection undertaken primarily by combat survivors, who through their uprising had established a dictatorship that accommodated their needs and values. Such an interpretation of the March consequently galvanized these observers into attempting to impose an authoritarian regime upon their own country, in the hope the latter would reverse the varied shortcomings they ascribed to the local liberal order – such as neglected claims to social care or a severe abuse of national interests.

My proposed contribution investigates the concrete ways Mussolini’s takeover of the Italian state encouraged Romanian ex-enlistees to embrace authoritarian principles and practices, and how the ‘example’ set by this armed uprising helped destabilize Romanian democracy. First of all, this inquiry surveys the role transnational veterans’ networks and forums played in disseminating, within Romania, an influential political narrative which portrayed the March on Rome as a successful uprising enacted by ex-soldiers.

Additionally, my analysis looks at how this narrative came to prominently affect former fighters who led or militated in a plethora of far-right organizations – such as the Legion of the Archangel Michael, the Romanian National Fasces, the National Military Front and the Front of the Fire Generation – and the mainstream People’s Party, led by General Alexandru Averescu. Specifically, my research shows that veterans operating in all these groups became more militant, in their beliefs and public undertakings, as accounts of the March strengthened their illiberal tendencies, furthermore convincing them to take up paramilitary tactics or organizational features.

Moreover, my study highlights that extremist ex-servicemen who were inspired by the Italian Fascists’ coup d’état helped undermine their own kingdom’s parliamentary rule. While governments eventually neutralized them, by deploying coercion and catering to some of the disgruntled former soldiers’ demands for social assistance, they nevertheless contributed to the political climate that allowed King Carol II to establish his own dictatorship in 1938, as their propaganda reinforced authoritarian trends within public opinion, and their paramilitary activities helped foster widespread political instability.
Ultimately, this investigation, centering on a novel case study and drawing on a wealth of hitherto unused primary sources, makes several stimulating observations on political radicalism in post-war Europe. It underscores that even dischargees living in polities that had emerged victorious and stable from the first global conflict tended to align with subversive organizations, in considerable numbers. Additionally, it shows that fascist ideas and tactics circulating at the transnational level tended to influence not only far-right political actors, but also more moderate ones, as attested by the case of Averescu’s People’s Party.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Annual Conference of the Irish Association for Russian, Central and East European Studies "Populism and Illiberalism in East, Central and Southeast Europe," 2022

In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Euro... more In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Europe, recent academic studies stress that ideological and organizational models provided by fascist regimes encouraged ex-servicemen in other countries across this continent to support their own nations’ right-wing groups and ideas. Aiming to buttress these novel theoretical perspectives, my contribution analyzes the relevance of foreign political trends for the radicalization of Romanian ex-combatants, investigating how the latter ex-enlistees were inspired, in their anti-democratic undertakings, by political myths that originated in Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, and pointing out how such myths came to be disseminated in their nation.

My inquiry focuses on how Italian and German notions of ‘trenchocracy’ - in other words, the political narrative positing that Great War returnees had the right to overthrow parliamentary elites and establish dictatorships – prompted Romanian extremist ex-soldiers’ organizations, such as the Romanian National Fasces and the Front of the Fire Generation, to attempt to undermine their country’s liberal order. At the same time, this analysis indicates that said groups failed to significantly affect their state, as the latter preserved its monopoly of violence and managed to satisfy some of the former fighters’ claims to benefits. Ultimately, my investigation suggests that political narratives shaped European veterans’ public activism, furthermore proposing that such narratives often transcended national boundaries. Moreover, running counter to established theoretical paradigms, it points out that even veterans who lived in victorious countries tended to espouse authoritarian principles and practices.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Fifth COMFAS Convention, 2022

My proposed contribution investigates the ways First World War veterans’ associations contributed... more My proposed contribution investigates the ways First World War veterans’ associations contributed to marginalizing the Italian Jewish community, in the later phases of Mussolini’s regime and under the Italian Social Republic. Specifically, it looks at how these associations manipulated and distorted the public memory of the Great War, and other major events in Italy’s national history, to argue that Jews were acting as dangerous foreign fifth columns. It suggests that ex-servicemen’s groups disseminated a public narrative according to which these citizens were conspiring to undermine their country’s political and territorial sovereignty, alternatively to affirm the geopolitical interests of Western ‘plutocracies’ or to assist communist penetration.
This study analyzes the principal goals, assumptions and tactics of the Fascist veterans’ anti- Semitic politics of memory. It shows that ex-combatants pursued these politics in the attempt to create ‘New Men’ who were loyal to Mussolini, to cement the partnership between their nation and Nazi Germany and to help Italians accept Fascism’s severance of Italy’s traditional diplomatic alliances. Those former fighters who disseminated such narratives under the RSI also did so due to extreme fears of national defeat and decline.
To promote such aims, former soldiers claimed Italian Jews were customarily lacking in martial qualities, engaged in treacherous activities, acting in the service of foreign powers and bent on wrecking Italy’s military endeavors. These invented ‘traditions’ were propagated through a variety of press articles and public speeches and ceremonies, allowing ex-enlistees to present other Italians with purported examples of disloyal behavior they were supposed to learn to shun, and to delegitimize Italy’s traditional international allies, by portraying them as polities involved in an international Jewish plot against this country. As a result, Fascist combat survivors contributed to discriminating and persecuting Italian Jews, especially by questioning their patriotic credentials, including their major contribution to their fatherland’s war effort in 1915-1918.
Focusing on the public undertakings of returnees’ associations’ leaders and activists, and making use of hitherto under-investigated primary sources, such as ex-militaries’ periodicals, this analysis indicates that First World War soldiers played a relevant role in the adoption of intolerant political mindsets, on behalf of sectors of Italian society, and underscores that Fascism’s anti-Semitic turn was pursued with a view to revolutionizing the political and moral customs of Italians.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Rethinking War Conference, University of Pittsburgh, 2022

In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Euro... more In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Europe, recent academic studies stress that ideological and organizational models provided by fascist regimes encouraged ex-servicemen in other countries across this continent to support their own nations’ right-wing groups and ideas. Aiming to buttress these novel theoretical perspectives, my contribution analyzes the relevance of foreign political trends for the radicalization of Romanian ex-combatants, investigating how the latter ex-enlistees were inspired, in their anti-democratic undertakings, by political myths that originated in Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, and pointing out how such myths came to be disseminated in their nation.

My inquiry focuses on how Italian and German notions of ‘trenchocracy’ - in other words, the political narrative positing that Great War returnees had the right to overthrow parliamentary elites and establish dictatorships – prompted Romanian extremist ex-soldiers’ organizations, such as the Romanian National Fasces and the Front of the Fire Generation, to attempt to undermine their country’s liberal order. At the same time, this analysis indicates that said groups failed to significantly affect their state, as the latter preserved its monopoly of violence and managed to satisfy some of the former fighters’ claims to benefits. Ultimately, my investigation suggests that political narratives shaped European veterans’ public activism, furthermore proposing that such narratives often transcended national boundaries. Moreover, running counter to established theoretical paradigms, it points out that even veterans who lived in victorious countries tended to espouse authoritarian principles and practices.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

72rd Conference of the International Commission for the History of Representative and Parliamentary Institutions (ICHRPI), Athens, 2021

After the First World War, numerous Romanian ex-combatants came to expect various material and sy... more After the First World War, numerous Romanian ex-combatants came to expect various material and symbolic rewards from their state, having fought for the latter. Consequently, in the interwar era the political stability of the Romanian nation-state ended up depending, to a relevant degree, on this state’s effectiveness in acknowledging the veterans’ claims to benefits.

In the first decade after 1918, Romania’s parliament played a relevant role in the political stabilization of the war returnees and the endurance of democratic institutions, as the main parliamentary parties at the time helped develop comprehensive veterans’ policies, thereby preserving the support of many ex-combatants and preventing extremist anti-parliamentary organizations from gaining a strong following among the latter.

In analyzing this dynamic, my proposed contribution surveys the ways parliamentary parties, in addition to the governments of this era, approached the former fighters’ requests, and how they created links to the ex-soldiers’ community by satisfying the latter’s aspirations. Additionally, in assessing the factors leading the parliamentary parties to achieve this policy success, my analysis points to the existence of a consensus, among these parties, on the need to reward ex-combatants, which stemmed from shared ideological beliefs and facilitated political cooperation toward satisfying the veterans.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

“Dal Regno d’Italia alla proclamazione della Repubblica: eventi e protagonisti,” Centro Papa Luciani, Santa Giustina (Belluno), 2021

In Italy, many nationalist Great War veterans came to support the Fascist movement and, subsequen... more In Italy, many nationalist Great War veterans came to support the Fascist movement and, subsequently, Mussolini's regime. While several scholars have investigated the dynamics of this political alliance, the main factors leading to this convergence still require comprehensive academic scrutiny. My contribution suggests that the policies which the Italian state enacted to reintegrate veterans, in the aftermath of the Great War, played a relevant role in the 'fascistisation' of a wide sector of the war returnees' community. Specifically, as, during the war, numerous nationalist soldiers had developed a strong sense of entitlement based on their military service, after 1918, many of these ex-servicemen, compelled by their expectations, attempted to exact material and symbolic rewards from the state. Importantly, nationalist ex-soldiers often backed those institutions and political organisations which promised to satisfy their sense of entitlement.
Crucially, the Italian liberal regime failed to provide the nationalist war participants with the special socio-economic status they sought, as governments and leftist and centrist mass parties often to acknowledge their claims to benefits and to engage with their official representatives. The shortcomings of the liberal state's policies for veterans estranged many nationalist ex-combatants from mainstream political actors, prompting former militaries to join or to sympathise with the budding Fascist movement, which promised to afford them the rewards they sought. Beginning in its early years, Mussolini's dictatorship also capitalised on the nationalist veterans unfulfilled claims to benefits, as it granted them many of their requests and hence secured the loyalty of numerous ex-combatants, a success which helped the regime entrench its rule.
To investigate these issues, my contribution details and compares the policies enacted by the liberal and early-Fascist regimes, while also analysing the ways the associations which represented the interests of the nationalist ex-servicemen reacted to state provisions.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

"Faces of War" International Conference, London Centre for Interdisciplinary Research, 2021

During the Second World War, Mussolini’s Fascist dictatorship strove to mobilise the Italian nati... more During the Second World War, Mussolini’s Fascist dictatorship strove to mobilise the Italian nation for war. The associations of First World War veterans played a relevant role in this strategy, by producing and disseminating political propaganda.
My proposed contribution studies the ways in which these associations’ propaganda evoked the First World War and thematically related developments, in the service of Fascism. Specifically, it critically examines the major instances in which ex-combatants employed Italy’s past to promote the regime’s war effort:
• Lending authoritativeness to the dictatorship, by highlighting the military and political accomplishments which were achieved by the Fascists in the course of the First World War and the post-war years preceding Mussolini’s seizure of power.
• Strengthening Italy’s alliance with the Axis, by highlighting historical parallels between Italy and Germany, in terms of martial traditions and military developments, taking place before and during the First World War.
• Providing Italians with martial role models, by commemorating soldiers who had fallen in the course of the First World War.
My enquiry shows that ex-combatants, by publicly recalling – and often exaggerating or distorting – past events, helped the regime come closer to various among its goals – such as motivating Italian soldiers to fight and developing diplomatic ties to Nazi Germany (by facilitating contacts between organisations of Italian and German former fighters). Furthermore, it highlights that the First World War remained a crucial symbolic resource for Fascism until the latter’s downfall.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

ASMI Postgraduate Symposium, 2020

During the Great War, many nationalist Italian soldiers developed a strong sense of entitlement b... more During the Great War, many nationalist Italian soldiers developed a strong sense of entitlement based on their military service. After the war, numerous among these ex-servicemen attempted to exact material and symbolic rewards from the Italian state, motivated by these expectations. However, between 1919 and 1922, the liberal governments and non-Fascist mass parties often failed to acknowledge these ex-combatants’ claims. Consequently, various veterans, estranged from these political actors, joined or sympathized with the budding Fascist movement, which promised to grant them the benefits they sought and, at times, helped them achieve their goals at the local level. After 1922, the political convergence between Fascism and many ex-fighters was further cemented by Mussolini’s regime, which bestowed several privileges on the veterans who accepted its rule. By affording these rewards, the Fascist dictatorship managed to secure the long-term loyalty of a large number of ex-combatants, a success which helped it entrench its rule over Italy. Studying the ways in which Fascism campaigned among nationalist veterans by catering to the latter’s sense of entitlement provides an innovative perspective on the strong connection which this political force managed to establish with many former fighters. Furthermore, this analysis contributes to comprehensively assessing the factors which caused the political radicalization of numerous veterans. To analyse these issues, my contribution focuses on the associations which represented the interests of the nationalist ex-servicemen, outlining these organizations’ goals and strategies, in addition to their interactions with prominent political actors.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Third ComFas Convention "Fascism and the Right", 2020

Between 1938 and 1944, the kingdom of Romania underwent domination by the authoritarian regimes o... more Between 1938 and 1944, the kingdom of Romania underwent domination by the authoritarian regimes of King Carol II, the Legion of the Archangel Michael and Marshal Ion Antonescu.
In these years, the associations representing the interests of the kingdom’s Great War veterans came to acquiesce to country’s far-Right rulers. Crucially, however, they cooperated with these regimes in a selective manner, generally collaborating with dictatorial institutions, while refraining from supporting the Legion.
My proposed contribution investigates these political dynamics, thereby contributing to understanding and assessing the appeal of fascism and the radical Right for the Romanian ex-servicemen of the Great War. First of all, it points out that, on the whole, the ex- combatants allowed themselves to be co-opted by the dictators mainly for pragmatic reasons, specifically to receive economic and symbolic benefits from them. In exchange for the rewards they sought, they helped these regimes acquire public legitimacy, for instance by taking part in their collective ceremonies.
On the other hand, my analysis claims that the Legion failed to attract significant support from the veterans as, essentially, it did not cater significantly to the latter’s claims to benefits.
By making these observations, my study claims that a sense of entitlement from wartime military service prominently affected the public loyalties of most Romanian ex-servicemen. Additionally, my investigation suggests that the radical-Right governments of King Carol and Marshal Antonescu proved more capable of securing the support of the ex-servicemen than the Legion, as they catered more extensively to the combatants’ sense of entitlement.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Second Convention of the International Association for Comparative Fascist Studies "Fascism and Violence", 2019

With regard to Italian Fascism, the motivations which prompted non-Fascist First World War vetera... more With regard to Italian Fascism, the motivations which prompted non-Fascist First World War veterans to support this movement’s political violence, in the first half of the 1920s, remain an understudied topic.
In my contribution, I study the factors which compelled various nationalist war veterans to provide conditional support to Fascist paramilitary activities. To investigate this issue, I focus on the interactions which took place between Fascist combat groups and various associations of ex-combatants, between 1919 and 1926.
I contend that sympathizers within these associations initially supported Fascist violence to promote their own political goals. Mainly, they wished to use this violence to exact material and symbolic rewards for their wartime military service, from the liberal State. Therefore, they accepted paramilitarism to pressure the State in granting them the benefits they felt entitled to, in addition to removing competing veterans’ associations, of a Catholic or socialist variety.
After the March on Rome, the Fascist paramilitaries forcefully subordinated these sympathizers to Mussolini’s government. Consequently, the nationalist veterans obtained many of the rewards they sought from the Fascist regime, but lost their organizational autonomy to the dictatorship.
Ultimately, my contribution points out how Italian Fascists used violence as an effective mean of campaigning for the support nationalist ex-servicemen. It highlights how these sympathizers’ interest in violence stemmed mainly from the liberal State’s shortcomings with regard to rewarding Italian veterans, in addition to upholding its monopoly of coercion.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

42nd Annual conference of the Irish Association for Russian, Central and East European Studies "State and Non-state Actors in Eastern and Central Europe", 2019

In tackling the issue of the political radicalization of European Great War Veterans in the inter... more In tackling the issue of the political radicalization of European Great War Veterans in the interwar period, recent studies emphasize how State policymaking was a crucial factor for the outcomes of these extremist trends. Aiming to confirm the validity of these new approaches, I analyze the case study of victor Romanian Great War combatants, between the two World Wars. Specifically, I study how the Romanian State was capable of integrating, to a relevant degree, the majority of these veterans into the post-war national polity and social order. The main factors of this accomplishment rested, I contend, on the State’s preservation of its monopoly of violence and its implementation of a radical agrarian reform which addressed the basic material concerns of the majority of the ex-servicemen. Additional moderating influences which I take in account include the general consensus, across the Romanian political spectrum, on values such as nationalism, and the ways civil society supported ex-servicemen with regard to the latter’s material needs, therefore compensating for the shortcomings of the State’s welfare policies. Together, these factors prevented various former fighters from joining radical-Right movements, like the Iron Guard. In analyzing my topic, I focus chiefly on the relationship between the State and the main veterans’ associations. This focus allows for a comprehensive analysis of the State’s strategies for co-opting relevant segments of the ex-servicemen’s community. To investigate this relationship, I rely mainly on police reports and veterans’ periodicals. Ultimately, my contribution provides relevant insights concerning the relationship between State and non-State actors in interwar Central and Eastern Europe, especially with regard to the development of bottom-up and top-down authoritarian political trends. Moreover, my contribution highlights the salience of post-war factors, rather than long-term influences and wartime events, for the outcomes of radicalizing processes.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Central and Eastern Europe in Transition, 2019

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

1918 and the Remaking of Central-Eastern Europe, 2018

In the interwar era, Great War veterans from the former Entente countries mobilized together to p... more In the interwar era, Great War veterans from the former Entente countries mobilized together to preserve order and stability across the continent. Romanian veterans played a relevant role within this mobilization. Between the early 1920s and the late 1930s, they helped stabilize Europe’s territorial arrangements and attempted to educate youth according to pacifist and patriotic values.
My proposed contribution will focus on Romanian veterans’ transnational activism. Specifically, I will look at the activities undertaken by these veterans within the international organizations known as the Federation International des Anciens Combattants (FIDAC) and the Confederation International des Associations des Mutilees et Anciens Combattants (CIAMAC).
I will analyze how Romanian veterans lobbied, within FIDAC and CIAMAC, for the preservation of international peace and the development of ties of solidarity between former servicemen from all Europe - especially those in the successor States of Central Europe. I will make the case that, by undertaking these activities, these veterans helped create a pan-European ‘culture of victory,’ which stabilized the continent, to a degree, before 1939. Specifically, due to this culture of victory, European veterans developed new political loyalties which were congruent with the post-war continental order. This culture, in particular, helped integrate veterans in the new nation-States of Central Europe.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

ComFas Convention “Comparative Fascist Studies and the transnational Turn”, 2018

After the Great War, Romania underwent various processes of fascistization which culminated durin... more After the Great War, Romania underwent various processes of fascistization which culminated during the regimes of King Carol II and Marshal Antonescu.
In my contribution, I look at Romanian Great War veterans’ involvement with these political trends, between the end of the First World War and Romania’s entry into the Second one. Specifically, I focus on the stance taken by war veterans towards, on one hand, foreign fascist regimes and, on the other, the fascistized authoritarian regimes at home. Consequently, I take in account how these veterans consented or opposed the fascistization of the Romanian political system. In other words, I consider how former servicemen reacted to transnational fascist political “commodities” (Aristotle Kallis) and local radical organizations and ideologies.
In analyzing the relationship between former servicemen and fascistizing trends, I focus on the transnational veterans’ networks through which Romanian, Italian and German old soldiers interacted, including the pan-European forum known as the Federation Interallié des Anciens Combattants. Additionally, at the national level I analyze the activities and statements of various Romanian veterans’ associations, such as the Uniunea Nationala a Fostilor Luptatori and the Uniunea a Ofiterilor de Rezerva, and political parties affiliated with former servicemen, like the Partidul Popurului and the Partidul a Luptatorilor. Finally, I consider the beliefs and actions of politically prominent Romanian veterans, chiefly General Alexandru Averescu and Marshal Ion Antonescu.
Ultimately, I make the case that Romanian veterans played a role in the fascistization of the local political system. However, their contribution to these trends was less conspicuous than in the majority of European case studies, due to their relative integration within the Romanian polity.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

CEU Doctoral Conference: Enchantments, Disenchantments, Re-enchantments | Center for Religious Studies, 2017

Debating upon the nature of fascism, certain scholars have proposed that this kind of movement sh... more Debating upon the nature of fascism, certain scholars have proposed that this kind of movement should be considered a political religion, which arose in modern secularized – i.e. disenchanted – communities to fill a ‘void’ of beliefs within said societies, by attempting to engineer a process of ‘re-enchantment’ based on the “sacralization” of nation and race.
My proposed contribution focuses on the academic discussions surrounding this interpretation. In addressing them, it problematizes the rigid division between the concepts of secularism and enchantment, in addition to questioning the degree to which interwar Europe underwent a process of secularization.
My analysis focuses on Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, as they are the two most developed cases of fascist mobilization and regime-building. They thus represent the most suitable case studies for a comprehensive assessment of fascism as a political phenomenon.
I mainly consider the following questions: whether fascists strove to create a political religion and whether their followers adhered to fascism in view of its appeal as a ‘new sect’. To adequately tackle these issues, I debate whether the religious ‘tone’ of fascism is ascribable to a new political style or to a sacralization of politics and whether, in turn, this sacralization was conceived by fascists as a core element of their totalitarian political project. I look in detail at the relationship between fascist regimes and established churches, in addition to the religious views of Italian and German fascist leaders and activists. I also analyze the meaning ascribed by these actors to their collective rituals and their views on totalitarianism.
In drawing my conclusions, I consider transcendent and functional understandings of organized religion. I make the case that fascism can be considered a political religion if contemplated from a functional perspective, in the Durkheimian sense. It should, nonetheless, be understood as a political ideology, operating through ‘religious politics’ – i.e. the rationalization of secular policies in ostensibly religious terms - if observed from a transcendent point of view on religion. Ultimately, I contend that, while fascist leaders consciously attempted to create a political religion, popular consent for fascism did not depend primarily on accepting this new faith.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

A Century of Radical Right Extremism: New Approaches, 2019

In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Euro... more In analyzing the relationship between Great War veterans and far-right extremism in interwar Europe, recent studies stress how the ideological and organizational models provided by fascist regimes encouraged European ex-servicemen to radicalize towards their own countries’ far Rights.

Aiming to contribute to these new approaches, I analyze the relevance of foreign political trends for the radicalization of Romanian ex-combatants, between the two World Wars. Specifically, I focus on various fascist and far-right groups in which veterans were prominent, such as the Romanian National Fasces and the Romanian National Socialist Party.

I look at how these organizations were inspired in their radical activism, to a relevant degree, by the examples provided by Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany. I focus especially on how foreign fascist political myths influenced Romanian former fighters: chiefly, I consider Mussolini’s notion of ‘trenchocracy’, in other words the assumption that Great War veterans, having allegedly interiorized the political values of self-abnegation and assertiveness as a result of their combat experiences, had the right to overthrow parliamentarian elites in their own countries and build dictatorships.

Finally, I explain why these extremist organizations failed to significantly affect Romanian politics. In doing so, I focus mainly on the Romanian State’s resilient monopoly of violence, in addition to its ability to significantly satisfy some among the local veterans’ material demands.

Ultimately, my contribution points out the relevance of transnational entanglements, for the development of the radical Right’s ideological tenets and organizational practices. Moreover, it helps locate the main catalysts for the political radicalization of war veterans in the period after the Great War, rather than interpreting this extremism as the outcome of wartime combat experiences, with their allegedly-desensitizing effect over various ex-combatants’ moral values and political beliefs.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

WARFUN Diaries, 2023

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

European History Quarterly, 2022

This article proposes that, between the two World Wars, the political loyalties of numerous Roman... more This article proposes that, between the two World Wars, the political loyalties of numerous Romanian First World War veterans were significantly affected by these ex-servicemen's sense of entitlement from military service. Having fought to protect their nation in the course of the conflict, many ex-combatants believed they deserved to be granted a variety of economic and symbolic rewards by the Romanian kingdom, in many cases allying themselves with political forces which promised to award them these benefits. To see their rights recognized, they also created a social movement, through which they lobbied state institutions. As, in the early 1930s, state veterans' policies experienced several shortcomings as the result of the Great Depression, sizeable segments of the former soldiers' movement began supporting a plethora of far-right movements and associations. Importantly, these extremist organizations secured the backing of various ex-servicemen mainly by promising to protect and increase the latter's benefits. Notably, in developing ties to discontented ex-combatants, the right was inspired in some instances by foreign authoritarian political models. However, in the middle of the decade, as governments managed to some extent to restore and even improve the ex-servicemen's special economic status, fascist and radical-right groups ceased to expand their reach within the ex-combatants' movement. Consequently, old soldiers did not play a significant role in the eventual collapse of Romanian democracy. By indicating that the former fighters’ sense of entitlement acted as a prominent radicalizing influence over many of them, this article provides an innovative perspective on the extremist political trends which affected numerous ex-servicemen in interwar Europe. Furthermore, by highlighting that Romanian radical veterans were at times inspired by developments occurring beyond their country's borders, the article helps confirm that transnational factors played a role in the anti-parliamentary activism of European former soldiers.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Journal of the Institute of Croatian History, 2018

This article details the aims, dynamics and outcomes of the transnational mobiliza- tion which Ro... more This article details the aims, dynamics and outcomes of the transnational mobiliza- tion which Romanian Great War veterans undertook in the interwar era. In order to comprehensively analyse this case study the article focuses on the role that Romanian former fighters played within the international forums known as FIDAC (Fédération Interalliée des Anciens Combattants) and CIAMAC (Conférence Internationale des Associations des Mutilés de guerre et Anciens Combattants). At the same time, the ways in which local and national factors affected these veterans’ transnational activities are explored. The author also deals with the problem of how veterans from former Entente countries were bound by a shared “culture of victory”, thereby pri- oritizing, among their goals, the preservation of the Versailles and Trianon systems.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Fascism: Journal of Comparative Fascist Studies, 2017

This article aims to further problematize the relationship between patterns of demobilization , f... more This article aims to further problematize the relationship between patterns of demobilization , fascism and veterans' activism, on several interrelated counts. We argue that the relationship between fascism and war veterans was not a fixed nexus, but the outcome of a complex political constellation of socioeconomic and political factors that necessitates a case-by-case in-depth discussion. Also, we argue that these factors were both national and transnational in nature. Finally, we contend that researchers need to employ a synchronic as well as a diachronic perspective, thus accounting for various stages and forms of mobilization of war veterans over time. To substantiate these claims, the current article focuses on a relevant but largely neglected case study: the demobilization of soldiers and war veterans' political activism in interwar Romania. It is argued that, contrary to assumptions in historiography, demobilization in Romania was initially successful. Veterans' mobilization to fascism intensified only in mid-to late 1930s, stimulated by the Great Depression, leading to a growing ideological polarization and the political ascension of the fascist Legion of 'Archangel Michael'. To better grasp the specificities of this case study, the concluding section of the article compares it to patterns of veterans' activism in postwar Italy.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Canadian Slavonic Papers, 2022

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Voegelin View, 2017

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

by Lovro Kralj, Roger Griffin Emeritus Professor in Modern History, Goran Miljan, Tomislav Dulic, Miguel Alonso, David Alegre, Javier Rodrigo, Jakub Drábik, Hrubon Anton, Craig Fowlie, Adrien Nonjon, Marco Bresciani, Gabriela Lima, Gabriela de Lima Grecco, Martin Kristoffer Hamre, Blasco Sciarrino, toni Morant i Ariño, Oula Silvennoinen, and Kari Kallioniemi

Program of ComFas Convention. "Comparative Fascist Studies and the transnational Turn" held at th... more Program of ComFas Convention. "Comparative Fascist Studies and the transnational Turn" held at the Central European University, 27-29 April 2018.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Pre-and Post-Napoleonic Europe revolutions and parliamentary institutions. The case of Greece on the occasion of the bicentenary since the war of independence (1821-2021), 2022

After the First World War, numerous Romanian ex-combatants came to expect various material, symbo... more After the First World War, numerous Romanian ex-combatants came to expect various material, symbolic, and political rewards from their state, having fought for the latter. Consequently, in the interwar era the political stability of the Romanian nation-state ended up depending , to a relevant degree, on this state’s effectiveness in acknowledging the veterans’ claims to benefits. In the first decade after 1918, Romania’s parliament played a relevant role in the political stabilization of the war returnees and the endurance of democratic institutions, as the main parliamentary parties at the time helped develop comprehensive veterans’ policies, thereby preserving the support of many ex-combatants and preventing extremist anti-parliamentary organizations from gaining a strong following among the latter.
In analyzing this dynamic, my proposed contribution surveys the ways parliamentary parties, in addition to the governments of this era, approached the former fighters’ requests, and how they created links to the ex-soldiers’ community by satisfying the latter’s aspirations. Additionally, in assessing the factors leading these parties to achieve this policy success, my analysis points to the existence of a consensus, among them, on the need to reward ex-combatants, which stemmed from shared ideological beliefs and facilitated political cooperation toward satisfying the veterans.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact