Abstract

The essay examines the body of parliamentary speeches by Giacomo Matteotti and identifies recurring themes and a unique style. Particular attention is devoted to Matteotti’s positions on economic issues and education, and his interventions denouncing the general support, even within political institutions, of the rise of Fascism. The interventions are revealing of Matteotti’s leadership stature, his rare technical knowledge, and he braveness of facing difficult situations and even hostility through the use of dialectics. Matteotti’s political positioning emerges as a version of socialism which is explicitly reformist, growingly attentive to socialism’s democratic credentials, and reaffirming of the centrality of Parliament and other political institutions, even in open opposition to members of his political party