The essay explores government-backed attempts to improve maternal-infant health under Fascism in Italy. It argues that women's attempts to turn the fascist politization of motherhood to their own advantage can be viewed as a form of maternalism - one in which mothers expressed their needs through unorganized resistance and by wielding indirect influence on state welfare policies. The author arguees that the government's emphasis on pronatalism created opportunities for some women: it facilitated the emergence of female networks and led to the professionalization of occupations as nursing and social work, while also granting both working and non-working mothers a greater sense of entitlement to assistance. Nevertheless, Fascism's provisions on maternity and infancy helped pave the way for a more modern social welfare system and laid the groundwork for "postwar opportunities and scenarios for a new kind of female citizenship".
