“Robbery Made the Kingdom of Italy, Misery Will Unmake It”

Abstract

Abstract This contribution analyses the nineteenth-century debate on one of the most hotly debated topics of Italian history: public debt and taxation. Starting in the 1850s, fiscal policies were weaponised by liberal nationalist elites and their opponents alike to promote their contrary worldviews by arguing over the merits of national unification and a parliamentary system on the basis of their fiscal outcomes. First Piedmont, then unified Italy, were eagerly expected by Catholics and Bourbon legitimists to default on their debts as a result of their moral and fiscal profligacy, while liberals were concerned about popular support for the national cause in a context of rising taxes. Southern Italy in particular was very vocal in denouncing its perceived fiscal mistreatment by the Italian government, an accusation the North rejected by portraying Southerners as unpatriotic tax evaders. Today, these narratives are re-emerging not only in public debates questioning the Risorgimento as the nation’s founding myth but also in the discourse about European integration.