Fascist Italy's Version Of The Hitler Youth

April 2024 ยท 2 minute read

Italy has a long history with Roman Catholicism, which is probably unsurprising, given, well, the location of Vatican City. Strangely enough, though, Vatican City was only created in 1929 (via Britannica) in a treaty that went into effect during Benito Mussolini's rule of Italy. While that treaty solved a longstanding problem between Italy and the Papal States, it ultimately caused more headaches for Mussolini when it came to fascist youth groups. After all, half of Italian youths joined fascist groups (via the Journal of Modern Italian Studies), but where was the other half?

According to an article published in The Catholic Historical Review, the Catholic church had long been sponsoring its own youth groups, and part of the aforementioned treaty allowed the church to continue recruiting children into its groups. Obviously, that created competition and that was a clear problem for Mussolini; kids in these Catholic youth groups would ultimately be more loyal to their faith, rather than to the state.

Mussolini tried to force these groups into irrelevant positions, and in the summer of 1931, he even moved to disband all Catholic youth groups. Pope Pius XI spoke out in protest, and tensions began to rise not only between church and state but also between members of these groups themselves as fights would break out on the streets. By September 1931, Mussolini was forced to reinstate his competition; ultimately, he was able to institute some restrictions, but Catholic groups still managed to affect enrollment in organizations like Balilla.

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