Hello, I've never posted here, but I've read the rules and the FAQ and whatnot so hopefully this isn't out of place.
What I've read so far from Mussolini by Jasper Ridley and The European Dictatorships by Allan Todd, as well as his own autobiography, was that he worked for a socialist newspaper before doing Il Popolo and then from there he seemed to gain followers, then he "documented" and published his war experiences, and stepped into politics upon his return... I feel as though I'm missing something though. What I'm specifically looking for is: what was it about Mussolini that made him so charismatic? How was it that, before he became a dictator, he managed to garner enough support, even from the King himself, to pull off the march on Rome?
If I'm wrong about these details, then, obviously, please correct me. While I'm still interested in how he was viewed in his dictatorial heyday, what I'm specifically looking for was how he gained a sort of celebrity status as a newspaper editor, and with such a loyal following. In short, what made Mussolini so darn charismatic?
Sorry for my English, I am Italian. Mussolini managed to build consensus with the political promises of his party. Those were times of deep crisis in Italy: the government failed to maintain order (in 1919 there was the so called "Biennio Rosso", a riot inspired by the socialist revolution) and Mussolini presented himself as the hero that would bring order and stability back. Even the king admitted that these strong ideals were what the country needed and supported Mussolini. He also made sure to meet the needs of many social groups: young people and students were fascinated by the ideals of patriotism; land owners supported fascism because it was against socialism and therefore against land expropriation; liberals turned a blind eye to the "Squadre Fasciste"'s violent actions (Mussolini's private army- army is not the proper word but I don't know how to translate "milizia", sorry ahah).
He also used the same old tricks to enforce his charisma, tricks that every dictator knew. In posters, in public and in videos he always appeared as a fierce, determined, strong man that served the country and worked hard for his family. He wanted to be the best example for every Italian man to follow. Also the way he delivered his speeches is memorable, because he did everything, in terms of voice and posture, to portray a strong leader.
We should be wary of conflating Mussolini's legacy, in so far as his public image goes, with his original political personality. The image we have of Mussolini, at least at a surface level – that of a man in uniform, belligerent, energetic, in charge, speaking with a careful blend of theatrics, excessive body language and distinctive voice inflections – is a deliberate construction. Part of the legacy of Fascism is the image of its leader, the image Fascism built for its leader.
The idea of a "charismatic leader" is not really that of a man who becomes a leader because of his exceptional charisma, or his ability to establish a direct, immediate relation of identification with the masses – rather that of a man (or more broadly a system) who acknowledges and consciously employs means to develop, and manufacture such relation, in an effort to forge that identification that the system postulates as one of the fundamental reasons of its existence.
Simply put, Mussolini didn't become the leader of Fascism because of his exceptional charisma – he built his persona around the fact that he was the leader of Fascism, hence the leader of the Italian Nation, hence the Duce of the Italian people. And therefore had to have a special, exceptional connection with them. Maintaining this connection was the work of the propaganda machine. And, if we trust Goebbels' judgment in his insistence on having Hitler speak to the people even during the last stages of the War, when the German dictator was arguably far from his best shape, we may conclude that such a connection went beyond the actual “natural” charisma of the leader.
Now, we really must remember that Mussolini wasn't born the Duce of Fascism. This is Mussolini in 1914 around the time of his interventionist turn. He is a guy.
Which isn't to mean that he wasn't competent, or capable of having a certain feel for his public. And he certainly did understand that the images and ideas which populated the collective minds of the masses could be stimulated by irrational elements and suggestions – he had been after all familiar with the works of Bergson, Sorel, and le Bon back in the days of his openings towards revolutionary syndicalism.
Outside of that, there were a few objective elements contributing to Mussolini's popularity: his experience within the Socialist Party (and especially his tenure as Chief Editor of the Avanti!), the public character of his interventionist turn and subsequent service, his return to lead his Popolo d'Italia after the dramatic defeat of Caporetto, his involvement with D'Annunzio's expedition to Fiume (Mussolini did his best to show to the public the good side of his involvement – to the point of cutting the parts of D'Annunzio's letters where the Vate expressed criticism of his inaction), his attempts (reciprocated at least in part) to become a point of reference for the Italian veterans and especially for the assault troops, the Arditi, his ties to the very visible if politically almost irrelevant Futuristi (involved in certain very noticeable public manifestations, such as the violent heckling at Bissolati's La Scala speech on the Dalmatian question).
Outside of this, Mussolini's rise to power didn't rest on his popularity with the public: Mussolini didn't win a landslide election – he was elected to the Italian Parliament in 1921, as one of the candidates running within the old Giolitti's “National Blocks”. At that point, he was already, to an extent, the leader of “political fascism”, a fact sanctioned by the formation of the Partito Nazionale Fascista in November 1921. And this tied his persona to the fascist movement which – after Mussolini serving as a sort of godfather to the foundation of the Fascio Milanese di Combattimento and then of the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento on March 23^rd 1919 and around a year of struggling with poor finances, low membership and wretched electoral results – had begun to gain traction due to their involvement with the conflict between land workers and land owners and thanks to the large financial support of the agrarian groups. By then, around the time when the fasci crossed the 200,000 members mark, Mussolini – in part due to his relative distance from the actual violence of the squads – could present himself as both a recognizable leader of the movement here he is, around 1921 during an agrarian meeting with another gerarca, Roberto Farinacci, and as the most “palatable” one for the establishment. The man who offered the best chance of controlling and restraining, or rather channeling, the fascist violence, working towards a new social pacification, and – for the fascist themselves – the best shot at an actual position of political power.
In this pattern – and the subsequent rise to power through the political crisis of the last liberal governments – you'll find large evidence of Mussolini's political skill, and his ability to play on two tables: on one being the man who could offer the system a way to control the movement, and on the other being the man who could offer the movement a way to gain control of the system. But little to none of his personal charisma – the King for instance didn't like Mussolini (simply put, he came to later show admiration for his “great mind”, but like many men who had received a traditional military upbringing, Victor Emmanuel III couldn't stand the sight of civilians in uniform) but he chose him because he saw no viable political alternative. And to an extent, Mussolini's early years of government, in continuation of the previous months, were rather modest and unassuming (this is an official portrait from the time).
It was only with the turn of January 1925, after the crisis following the murder of Giacomo Matteotti – and to a larger extent, with the plebiscite of 1929 that the public image of Mussolini came to coincide with the one we are most familiar with. His leadership, his charisma, his stature as a living embodiment of a “people on the march”. You may give a peek at this video with a few images of one of Mussolini's last public appearances in 1945.
There is no doubt that Mussolini was able to establish some special connection with his people – a connection that, together with his public image, has vastly outlived him – but that wasn't really the first origin of his power, rather an expression of the way he chose to structure and develop his power, a consequence of the forms chosen for the public expression of such power, a derivation perhaps of some natural inclination of the Italian masses (as more than a few observers have suggested). And behind Mussolini's image on the podium, there isn't just a guy, but a system of relations and structures of power, of conflicts and struggles, of resolutions and compromises, and Mussolini's own ability to tie them together, to hold them, to evade and escape those which could not be solved, until he couldn't really any longer.
Hoping to give you something more on Mussolini's early experiences as a public figure, I have added below a few excerpts from previous contributions. They add more details that may interest you, but they are not really necessary to integrate the answer above.
