Contexts and debates: Conference report: Joint panels of the 'Italian Politics Specialist Group' with the 'French Politics and Policy Specialist Group' and panels of the 'Italian Politics Specialist Group' at the 53rd Annual Conference of the Political Studies Association ('Democracy and Diversity'), 15-17 April 2003, University of Leicester

Mussolini was the prototype of twentieth‐century charismatic dictators. His personal charisma antedated the founding of Fascism and the formal construction of collective charisma through the movement and the personality cult. First forged in the socialist movement, Mussolini's charisma assumed a new guise when he became a supporter of Italy's intervention in the First World War. He acquired an aura for the third time as Fascist leader. There were always tensions between the Duce and Fascism as the latter embodied the collective charisma of a movement. Nevertheless, Fascist ideology and culture incorporated the idea of the charismatic leader as a focus and source of authority on the model of the Catholic Church. Although it was difficult by the 1930s to distinguish between the believer's exaltation and courtly adulation, Mussolini exercised a personal charisma for many Fascists even after his death.