Giacomo Matteotti has always been an inspiring figure for me. He was the most important Italian socialist leader in the early 1920s and the most vocal opponent of Mussolini in the Italian Parliament. He was kidnapped and killed in Rome by a fascist squad on June 10th 1924, just days after delivering a speech in Parliament that exposed violence and fraud during the 1924 Italian general election. His murder marks a turning point in Italian and European history as it allowed Mussolini to suppress Italian democracy and start his 20-year dictatorship.

I learnt about Matteotti from my socialist parents even before studying history in school, not least because I was born on June 10th, 1984, on the sixtieth anniversary of his murder. To this day, my father keeps a picture of Matteotti in his office. Learning about this brave politician who paid with his life his struggle to defend Italian democracy helped shape my own political identity. This influence defined my activism in defence of democracy and connected me with another Italian socialist, Felice Besostri, who in recent years fought with “Matteottian” spirit to make Italian electoral laws more democratic. He put me in touch with the Matteotti Foundation which works to honour the memory of Matteotti.

Matteotti was a brave politician who, earlier than anyone else, understood the scale of the threat that Mussolini posed for Italy and Europe and who fought so tirelessly and effectively to stop fascism that Mussolini’s regime felt that they had to eliminate him.

Precisely in the attempt to raise the alarm in Europe, on the 23rd of April 1924, Matteotti arrived to London to rally support with the then Labour government against the fascist government in Italy. Less than two months later he would be killed.

In the aftermath of the murder, Mussolini used Matteotti’s violent end to justify the suppression of democracy. The culpability of his secret political police, meanwhile, was covered up. In a farce trial judges loyal to Mussolini acquitted almost all involved in the murder, with only a few perpetrators condemned for minor offences and promptly freed as part of an amnesty.

This further injustice against Matteotti’s legacy prompted Italian antifascists to seek help from the international allies that Matteotti himself had always appealed to in his quest to stop fascism. Two years after the murder, in December 1926, copies of the preliminary inquest on Matteotti’s murder were smuggled to London and were handed in to the LSE by the exiled antifascist intellectual Gaetano Salvemini.

The Matteotti Foundation asked me to study these documents at the LSE. It was the beginning of a fascinating journey, which you can start reading on this article on the Conversation. If you want to read the latest piece of writing of Giacomo Matteotti, published posthumous on English Life in July 1924, click here. If you are interested in the event at LSE where the documents brought by Salvemini were shown to the public, click here. My presentation at the event is here.

Meanwhile, together with many friends within the progressive Italian community in the UK, in early 2024 we launched the Matteotti London Committee 1924 – 2024. Keep reading to learn what this is about!

London March 2024

A hundred years ago next April Italian Socialist MP and leader of the opposition Giacomo Matteotti visited London to rally support among the Labour Party and the Independent Labour Party against the rising fascist regime in Italy. Matteotti had denounced across Europe fascists’ political violence since the elections of 1921 and he had been a vocal opponent of Mussolini in Parliament. He would eventually be kidnapped and killed by a squad of fascists days after exposing violence and fraud during the Italian general elections in 1924. His murder would be a turning point in Italian and European history as Mussolini started his 20 years long dictatorship shortly after taking responsibility for the crime.

Matteotti deserves global recognition for his fierce opposition to fascism and his attempts to foster international solidarity against fascism across Europe. His legacy would last long after his death and would go far beyond the Italian borders. A legacy spanning two decades, with the creation in 1926 of the Matteotti Fund, later the International Solidarity Fund, by the Labour and Socialist International and, in London, the Women’s International Matteotti Committee founded by Sylvia Pankhurst in 1932, and of course in Italy among the partisan brigades named after him in the Italian Resistance that brought about Liberation from Nazifascism. 

A century later, a coalition including the branches of Associazione Nazionale Partigiani d’Italia, INCA CGIL advice bureau, cultural association Manifesto di Londra and the London branch of the Italian political party Partito Democratico have set up the Matteotti London 2024 Committee to promote a series of activities to remember Matteotti, his role in the fight for democracy and his legacy. The aim is preserving the memory of this historical figure but also to reflect on how he set an example for international solidarity against fascism; considering the rise of far right and illiberal parties across and beyond Europe over recent years, Matteotti’s lesson is of great value.

In the spirit of Matteotti’s journey to London a century ago, the Matteotti London 2024 Committee would like to stimulate the debate on the international response to the surge of fascism and the far right among the wider Labour movement and among antifascists. The Committee is confident strong interest in Matteotti’s example abroad will revive official celebrations in Italy too, which have appeared subdued so far, with the Meloni government remaining very coy about remembering fascist crimes and even withholding the funds for the commemorations of the murder.

The calendar of activities will be shared and updated through the next few weeks.

Matteotti London 2024 Committee