Problems of Government
The Fascist Dictatorship in Italy. By Gaetano Salvemini. Vol. I. Origins and Practices. With an Introduction by THE thoughtful writer calling' himself "Al. Carthill " has attracted attention because he is not afraid to go back to
first principles before he argues about details. His new book, a shrewd analysis of Parliamentary government of the English type, is particularly valuable for this reason. It might almost be a commentary on the Prime Minister's remark, in his speech of Saturday last, that our task nowadays is not so much to "make the world safe for democracy," in the rotund phrase of the late President Wilson, as to make democracy safe for the world. One has to be very blind or obstinate not to recognize that the English Parliamentary system is not working quite as well as it used to do in our own favoured country, and that in foreign countries which have borrowed it from us it works badly or has failed altogether.
Mr. • ." Carthill " maintains, not without lesion, that a Parliamentary State depends for smooth running upon a sound party system ; if there are more than two parties and none haA a safe Majority—as in England in 1923-24 and as always happens in France or Germany—then strong and efficient government is rendered unlikely and dubious coalitimis May hold office. He dislikes large Cabinets because he thinks that they can have no real unity and because the power is actually vested in an inner Cabinet which is shielded from responsi- bility instead of publicly assuming it. He would have a Cabinet of Five, as Charles the Second did. Again, he "is distrustful of universal suffrage, not so much because he would belittle the average voter's intelligence as because he' fears the mass party. When you have millions of Conservatives, Liberals, or Socialists, you either get' a mechanized party, well organized and carefully drilled in voting at the word of command, or you have a fortuitous 'concourse of political atonis which may be stampeded this 'way 'or that by the viiiee of the wizard. However, Mr. " Carthill " veryldndly admits that tampering with the Suffrage is not . practical Politics. As for the citizen in our much regulated State, "To possess a vote gives him at least the illusion of liberty, and he who believes himself to be free is free in fact." The reformer should devote his time in the first place to 'reforming and improving himself, and thereafter to organizing and enlighten- ing the democracy.
We would emphasize Mr. " Carthill's " refusal to assume that foreign nations which have tried and given -up our special kind of democratic government are necessarily composed of knaves or fools. When he says that we are "generally hated abroad," he exaggerates ; but it is true that, like our American friends, we are far too ready to criticize other 'nations' methods 'without first trying to understand their difficulties. Mr. " Carthill " refers to Italy as dense in point. Here we think he is mistaken, whether In supposing that the -British public dislikes Fascism or in thinking that the Italians hate England. On the contrary, though the Socialists and some Liberals, who never tire of praising Communist Russia for what its leaders say it is going to do hereafter, perhaps at the Greek Kalends, are equally diligent in denouncing Signor -Mussolini, most English men and women gladly recognize the vast improvement in Italy's moral and material condition which the Fascist regime has brought about, and 'are prepared to consider this "peculiar brand of Caesarism " on its merits. Mr. " Carthill " aptly reminds us that the Italian people was the first in modern times to develop the city-state as a self- governing community, and that it has shaken off foreign rule and built up a united country in the last two generations. Consequently its 'new constitutional experiment deserves respectful consideration.
These elementary truths should be remembered by the 'English readers of Professor Salvemini's elaborate indictment of Fascism, the first part of which is now published with an introduction by Professor Ramsay Muir, who regards Fascism as, the negation of Law and Liberty. An historian by pro- fession, the author, Marshals his facts in a lucid and orderly narrative with the object of showing that the Bolshevik danger was past in the summer of 1922, when the Fascists marched on Rome, and that a coalition of Socialists and Radicals might have been formed then to continue the Par- liamentary tradition. Furthermore, the Professor gives a detailed account of the death of the Socialist deputy Matteotti at the hands of some Fascists in 1924, and he holds Signor. Mussolini responsible for the tragedy. When we meet American friends who judge Mr. Baldwin by what they reads in the articles contributed by Mr. Lloyd George or Mr. Ramsay MacDonald to the American Press, we naturally wonder at their misconceptions of the English political situation. We should be reluctant, therefore, to condemn Signor Mussolini on the case presented by a bitter political opponent. Viewing the Italian question dispassionately, we have always wondered that the Fascist revolution was carried out with so little loss of life or destruction of property, con- sidering that the Italians are an emotional people, and that arms of all kinds were in the possession of thousands of civilians. It would seem a reasonable inference that the nation as a whole welcomed the change from instability and uncertainty to order and security. Whether the change could have been effected more peacefully, whether the new regime could have disciplined its supporters more quickly and pre- vented attacks on political opponents, we do not know. In England we are very tolerant of opinions nowadays. Mr. A. J. Cook and Mr. Pollitt are free to denounce the British Con- stitution and the Churches and the employers to their hearts' content, though Shelley could not a century ago. But such toleration is practised in very few countries. While it seems a pity that Professor Salvemini could not retain his chair at Florence without subscribing to the Fascist programme, the Italian Government and people may well construe more strictly the right of a teacher to spread what they regard as subversive doctrines among the youth of Italy.
Mr. Leonard Woolf's new book may serve as an example of the freedom of discussion in which we take pride. For Mr. Woolf seems to have a grudge against Great Britain and all other Western countries which have had the enterprise to colonize and develop hitherto untouched natural resources in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere. He can see nothing good in "Imperialism," which he uses as a term of abuse, and he cannot be fair even to our own Colonial Office and our settlers. Thus in two consecutive sentences he remarks : "Everyone since the War has heard how the Germans treated their African subjects. Everyone ought to have heard how the British Government has treated the natives of Kenya• Colony." The implied accusation here is wholly groundless. Elsewhere he speaks of the "dishonest application of the mandate system in the Near East by France and Britain," although it should be clear that the mandate system is a great advance on the old method of annexation and that it is working well. Mr. Woolf discusses the negro problem in the United States as "The Increase of Imperialism," contrasting the situation of the coloured minority there with that of the European minority in South Africa and predicting disaster in both cases. He would have the League of Nations assume a greater responsibility for tropical dependencies with the motto : "Africa for the Africans." But Mr. Woolf is too pre- judiced a controversialist to inspire sympathy for his recom-: mendations, even if they were less vaguely phrased. For our part we are sure that our colonial officials and our settlers are trying to deal fairly by the natives, who have, on the whole, benefited enormously by the coming of that European civiliza- tion which Mr. Woolf detests like the plague.
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