Influence of consumerism on the policy of Fascist Italy
https://doi.org/10.28995/2073-6339-2025-2-132-146
Abstract
The article explores the relationship between the fascist policy and the growing process of society consumerization in the period between the two wars in Italy. The paper examines the conflict between the aims of the regime that focused on masculinity, militancy and self-sacrifice, and the consumer world concentrated on comfort, pleasure and the feminization of advertising. The state actively contributed to the development of modernization, where the delay in granting suffrage led to a civil war, dictatorship and foreign occupation, and where there was an attempt on the part of the regime, that had proclaimed its commitment to transform the consciousness, values and character of the country’s citizens, to raise a new Italian. There also was a sacralization of some political institutions, and that sacralization started being intertwined with the cult of consumption. Besides, there emerged the trend towards the commercialization of the socio-political religion. During the elitist consumerism of the interwar period, the foundations of the advertising industry were laid and the new consumer practices and values were formed, which later became an integral part of the Italian way of life. Advertising images are evidence that fascism and the industry interests often, but not always, coincided. As part of the analysis of communication, image innovation and lifestyle in Fascist Italy, the data in the article provide insight into the extra-temporal value and the not-always-obvious unrelatedness of advertising and the dictatorial regime.
About the Author
E. N. YakutinaRussian Federation
Elena N. Yakutina, Cand. of Sci. (History
5, Unosti St., Moscow, 111395
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Review
For citations:
Yakutina E.N. Influence of consumerism on the policy of Fascist Italy. RSUH/RGGU Bulletin Series "Political Science. History. International Relations". 2025;(2):132-146. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.28995/2073-6339-2025-2-132-146