Labanca, Nicola. “Colonial rule, colonial repression and war crimes in the Italian colonies”

Historian Nicola Labanca’s article discusses and investigates the complex dynamics and the silence in collective memory and historiography around the war crimes perpetrated by Italian fascist troops during the colonial campaign in Ethiopia from 1935 to 1937 and during the successive occupation period, until 1941.

He shows that the research about the atrocities and crimes against humanity perpetrated during Italian colonialism, such as summary executions, racial segregation, use of chemical weapons, only began recently, after about 20 years of lack of public and national attention. Labanca emphasizes how the issues regarding these events are so intricate that some considerations about colonial crimes are reductive and counter-effective in denouncing and acknowledging them.
Labanca highlights the factors that encouraged the public silence on the colonial crimes. According to him, the lack of juridical regulations on the international/global level play an important role in this dynamic, as often international institutions have disregarded the application of humanitarian laws in the conflicts in Africa. Moreover, Labanca remarks how the social dimension is even more entangled, since it was not easy to distinguish perpetrators and victims. Amongst the Italians, there were anti-fascists that opposed colonialism, while amongst the colonised there were also collaborators. In addition, the category of war crimes can be considered controversial as the oppression took place during different episodes, that is to say, first the conquest, then the following occupation.

For Labanca, considering colonialism as genocide complicates the problem instead of resolving it; if everything is considered a crime, it becomes difficult to differentiate the responsibilities.

Moreover, in the article, Labanca argues that it is necessary to contextualize the Italian colonial experience in a broader context that acknowledges the general European expansion dynamics. Taking a closer look at Italian historical research, it becomes clear that the Italian armed forces, both during the liberal government and the fascist regime, have committed actions that even at the time were legally considered crimes. However, from the perspective of historians, isolating crimes from the wider historical context and the underlying dynamics and developments, is unproductive as it becomes more difficult to explain them.

At the end of the article, Labanca recognises three different types of Italian postcolonial silence: the first is a legal silence during the first Republic, whose government ignored Ethiopia’s request for trials and international justice. The second is the silence in the collective memory, since Italians prefer to identify themselves as victims during the Fascist regime and have, until recently, avoided facing the crimes perpetrated. The third silence is the one in historiography about colonial history: the missed opportunity to investigate what happened generated an underlying complicity with the previous regimes. Although there have been people engaged in denouncing these silences, it has proven to be relatively ineffective.

Author of this entry: Chiara Ausiello.

Labanca, Nicola. “Colonial rule, colonial repression and war crimes in the Italian colonies.” Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 2004, 9.3, p. 300-313.