Conclusion

Antifascism manifested itself in many colours. First emerging as a reality and as a concept in Italy in the course of the 1920s, the limited reach of the sole actually existing case (Italy) ensured that, for some years, antifascism—and fascism!—remained a rather marginal phenomenon for observers outside of the confines of the Italian state. In the words of an astute contemporaneous analyst, the Austrian social democrat Adolf Sturmthal: ‘As long as Fascism was considered a purely Italian development, foreign Socialists were inclined to regard the Black Shirts in much the same way as curious spectators look at strange animals in a zoological garden: as interesting specimens, but hardly beasts that might affect one’s own life. To study them might satisfy human curiosity but would bring little practical knowledge’....