Giovanni Giolitti (27 October 1842 – 17 July 1928) was Prime Minister of Italy from 15 May 1892 to 15 December 1893 (succeeding Antonio Starabba and preceding Francesco Crispi), from 3 November 1903 to 12 March 1905 (succeeding Giuseppe Zanardelli and preceding Tommaso Tittoni), from 29 May 1906 to 11 December 1909 (interrupting Sidney Sonnino's terms), from 30 March 1911 to 21 March 1914 (succeeding Luigi Luzzatti and preceding Antonio Salandra), and from 15 June 1920 to 4 July 1921 (succeeding Francesco Saverio Nitti and preceding Ivanoe Bonomi). He was a member of the Italian Liberal Party.
Biography[]
Giovanni Giolitti was born in Mondovi, Kingdom of Sardinia on 27 October 1842, and he graduated from the University of Turin in 1860 with a law degree. He became a civil servant and served, amongst others, in the legislative high court until he entered the Chamber of Deputies as a liberal in 1882. He served as Minister of the Treasury from 189 to 1990, and he won teh 1892 elections to become Prime Minister, only to resign over a banking scandal. As Minister of the Interior from 1902 to 1903, he emerged as the main force behind a "new liberalism" which attempted to adapt classical liberal traditions to the changed social conditions of early twentieth-century Italy, when the consequences of industrialization were beginning to make themselves felt in many northern cities. Thus, he was responsible for an increase in the parliamentary franchise, and the acceptance of the bargaining powers of trade unions. He also launched Italy's entry into the high noon of imperialism through the conquest of Libya in 1911. He opposed Italy's entry into World War I, and afterwards called for a complete overhaul of the Italian state. During his fifth ministry he resolved the Fiume affair and the workers' occupation of factories in 1920, and he supported Benedetto Croce's attempts at educational reform. However, he was unable to stop the escalating violence between the Blackshirts and socialist and communist bands. To provide himself with a new mandate, he called new elections in May 1921, wihch he lost. He tolerated the fascist movement at first, but became increasingly critical of Mussolini after the murder of Giacomo Matteotti.