ABSTRACT
During its rise to power in the early 1920s Italian fascism attracted the support of several small but politically important groups of conservative Catholics. These Catholics, who were given the name ‘Clerico-Fascists’ by Don Luigi Sturzo, leader of the Catholic Partito Popolare Italiano (PPI),1
played a role in the consolidation of Mussolini’s regime between 1922 and 1925 which was out of all proportion to their numerical strength. In addition, they made an important contribution to the advent of the Conciliazione, the reconciliation between church and state which was finally achieved in 1929.
