Narrating the crisis and legitimizing the use of emergency legislation: political crime as a premise of the authoritarian state

Abstract

During the liberal era, from unification to the rise of fascism, many governments experimented with emergency legislation to control public order or repress the mobilization of opposing political groups. With the approval of the new penal code, political crimes remained an ill-defined offense. Consequently, Crispi and Di Rudinì implemented a state of siege on two separate occasions to condemn any attempt to spread values ​​and principles contrary to the old constitutional foundations of the Albertine Statute.