Jessen & Richter (Eds.) (48 page)

Booths were to be set up in which people could, in secret, select and fold

their chosen ballot paper; there was a receptacle within the booth in which

to discard the paper not selected. Then the voter would have to place the

ballot paper in a box, carefully surveyed by a group of fascist officials be-

hind the tables who made sure that everything proceeded in an orderly

manner. It seemed as though the formal procedures of democratic choice

——————

6 Fear of losing one’s job is cited as one of the principal factors in determining disciplined behavior among labor by Sapelli (1975, 20-1).

P L E B I S C I T E S I N F A S C I S T I T A L Y

183

were being observed. The problem was that, apart from the fact that the

color of the folded ballot paper made the choice obvious, there were two

boxes—one for “Yes” and one for “No”. Identification was immediate,

therefore.7

The instructions to the fascist unions were equally precise. They were

to ensure that the workers arrive all together at the polling stations in a

“perfectly regimented” way (
Corriere della sera
, March 23, 1929). Here, perhaps, there could be some element of festivities, as columns of workers

marched behind a band to the polling station. Whether these workers

would have preferred to use their Sunday (the plebiscite took place on a

Sunday) in a different manner remains an open question. Fascist organiza-

tions were also invited to try to identify those most likely to abstain and to

exert pressure on these people, although what kind of pressure was not

specified.

The results indicate the extent of fascist control (published in
Corriere

della sera
, March 26, 1929). The “Yes” vote obtained 98.3 per cent of the total votes cast, which was more than 88 per cent of the total number of

those registered to vote. Some examples will help to show the degree to

which the fascists seem to have achieved their goal of unanimity. In Reggio

Calabria, of the 97,514 votes cast, only 37 were “No” votes; in Cosenza

(we are still in Calabria), of 157,470 votes cast, 5 were “No” votes; in

Matera (Basilicata), of 29,155 votes cast, there were no “No” votes what-

soever. Perhaps more significant than the “No” votes, which, in the

circumstances, were almost inevitably very few in number, were the absten-

tions—the people who stayed at home despite the pressures of the fascist

organizations. At the national level, about 10.4 per cent of those entitled to

vote decided not to do so. In the large industrial cities, the percentage was

generally much higher: 15 per cent in Turin (almost 42,000 people ab-

stained; put together with the “No” votes, these made up almost 18 per

cent of the electorate), 14.5 per cent in Genoa, 13 per cent in Rome, 14

per cent in Naples (but only 8 per cent in Milan). In the smaller provincial

cities, it was evidently more difficult to be seen not to vote and the

percentage of abstentions falls below the national average: 8.7 per cent in

——————

7 A story told by my father-in-law is instructive. His cousin voted “No” in Florence on the morning of 24 March. Later in the day the (very ingenuous) friends and relations of this cousin were greatly impressed to see him being driven away in a very large black car, accompanied by uniformed fascist officials. (He was held for several hours and then released with a serious warning to watch his step).

184

P A U L C O R N E R

Matera, 6.7 per cent in Cosenza. Very eloquent of the degree of control

the fascists had achieved in the province of Ferrara was the fact that, of

the 79,775 people who voted, only 199 voted “No”, while only 2 per cent

of those entitled to vote chose not to do so.

Image Management and Majority Suggestion

Did the 1929 plebiscite reinforce the regime? In most respects, it was more

a public confirmation of a situation that few had doubted rather than a

novel expression of support for fascism. But there is little reason to ques-

tion the view that sees the plebiscite, coming as it did together with the

Lateran Pacts and the Concordat with the Vatican, as representing a signifi-

cant moment in the stabilization of the regime. In the space of a few days,

Mussolini had shown that he had both God and the Italian people on his

side. Moreover, the effort made to mobilize the vote and to condition the

voters seems to have consolidated the understanding between those groups

who had responsibility for realizing mobilization: fascists, Catholics,

industrialists, landowners and businessmen pulled together in March 1929

in a way that they had not done before. One unexpected result of the

plebiscite may have been that the very fact of organizing it had the effect

of strengthening the organizers (Sapelli 1975: 18–22).

Yet, even if the result of the plebiscite was essentially a public ratifica-

tion of an already-existing situation, the force of suggestion of the over-

whelming success of the fascist ticket should not be underestimated. The

1929 plebiscite in particular helped to perform the conjuring trick so essen-

tial for the long-term survival of the regime—the trick of persuading the

population that the objectives of the dictatorship were also the objectives

of the entire nation. To be out of step with this formulation of unanimity

became an increasingly difficult operation because it apparently put the

individual up against most of his or her fellow Italians.8 In this sense, the

plebiscite undoubtedly reinforced fascist politics of inclusion / exclusion.

Given the unanimity of the plebiscite, the drive towards conformity be-

came extremely strong and, by conforming, the individual became in effect

——————

8 On the importance of the concept of unanimity in totalitarian and would-be totalitarian regimes, see Sabrow (2009, 168-83).

P L E B I S C I T E S I N F A S C I S T I T A L Y

185

an accomplice of the regime. All of which was exactly what the plebiscite

had been designed to realize.

Bibliography

Aquarone, Alberto (1965).
L’organizzazione dello stato totalitario
, Turin: Einaudi.

Corner, Paul (1975).
Fascism in Ferrara 1915–1925
. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Klemperer, Victor (1998).
I Shall Bear Witness.
London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.

Sabrow, Martin (2009). Consent in the Communist GDR or How to Interpret Lion

Feuchtwanger’s Blindness in Moscow 1937, in Paul Corner (ed.).
Popular Opin-

ion in Totalitarian Regimes. Fascism, Nazism, Communism
, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Sapelli, Giulio (1975).
Fascismo, grande industria e sindacato. Il caso di Torino 1929–35
, Milano: Feltrinelli.

Works Council Elections in

Czechoslovakia, 1948–1968

Peter Heumos

Outline

Elections to the works council (
závodní rada
) and its successor organization, the works committee of the Revolutionary Trade Union Movement

(
závodní výbor ROH
), in Czechoslovak industry after 1948, had, at first

glance, two things in common with elections to the Czechoslovak National

Assembly. Firstly, there was symbolic coloring. Workers went to the polls

with music playing,1 in a “dignified” and “solemn” atmosphere ensured by

the organizers,2 while speeches were delivered by Party and trade union

officials (and, occasionally, even by literary figures).3 Secondly, works

council elections (which, until 1967, were held annually) met with as much

publicity as did elections to the National Assembly. Usually, the electoral

campaign was launched by a letter of the Central Council of trade unions,

the executive body of the Revolutionary Trade Union Movement (ROH)

which, in 1948, had more than 3.5 million, and in 1968 more than 5.2 mil-

——————

1 Cf. the letter of the workers of the repair workshop of the Czechoslovak State Railways in Chomutov to the Central Council of trade unions of May 27, 1953, in the appendix to this article. Hereafter, Czech and Slovak place-names are used, with the exception of the familiar English name for Praha, “Prague”.

2 Minutes of the meeting of the trade union factory group and the works council of
Kladno
Steel Works
, February 23, 1949. Všeodborový archiv (hereafter referred to as: VOA), Prague. OS Kovo, box 2, no. 8a.—Report of the Kladno district committee of the mine workers’ trade union to the organizational department of the mine workers’ trade union in Prague [November 1959]. VOA, ÚVOS-horníci, 1959, fascicle “Volby 1959–1960”.

3 Report on safeguarding elections of trade union organizations in the
Lenin plants

[=
Škoda Works
] Plzeň, January 18, 1952. Škoda archives, Plzeň, ZVIL 1495, PV 751.—

In May 1953, for example, on the occasion of works council elections, poet and state laureate Marie Majerová made a speech in a mine of the northwest Bohemian lignite coalfield of which she was patroness. Report of the organizational department of the mine workers’ trade union on the election campaign, May 15, 1953. VOA, ÚRO-Org., box 140, no. 478.