War, civil war, liberation. Tuscany facing the crisis of the fascist regime and of the Italian national state 1943-1944

How did Tuscany experience the Second World War, the civil war and the Resistance against Nazi-Fascist occupation? How did it contribute to the rebuilding of the national state after the crisis caused by Fascism? This essay copes with such issues by examining how the war influenced popular consent to the regime in the region, what was the impact of German occupation and to what extent the forces of the neo-Fascist Repubblica Sociale Italiana persecuted opponents and population in order to establish their "new" political order. The A. highlights a number of regional peculiarities in the context of the war ravaging the peninsula, since Tuscany was soon to become the rear of the battlefront, what would obviously step up the events of occupation and Resistance. The essay points out also the rootedness of the partisan movement in both the countryside and the urban population and the leading role of the National Liberation Committee, largely due to the shared and strong options for self-government and insurrection. These experiences disclosed a prospect of social and cultural liberation and proved crucial, regardless of the greater or lesser extent of consensus, for the smashing of the traditional moderate equilibrium and the forging of a new regional identity.

Keywords: Second World War, Tuscany, anti-Fascist Resistance, partisan movement, German occupation, civil war

Serneri Simone Neri, Guerra, guerra civile, liberazione La Toscana nella crisi del fascismo e dello Stato nazionale 1943-1944 in "ITALIA CONTEMPORANEA" 265/2011, pp 535-551, DOI: 10.3280/IC2011-265001