WI: Colonial Empire of the Papal States?

[whitecrow]

So lets say Italian peninsula is united by the Papal States rather than the Kingdom of Sardinia/Italy. Do you think there would be any push in this Papal Italy to obtain a colonial empire (Libya, other parts of Africa, etc) like there was in OTL Italy?

Also, as an aside, does anyone know of any Catholic figures who were pro-unification and could have, in an ATL, been elected as pope instead of the anti-unification Pius IX?

 

[Falecius]

1) Pius IX was not "anti-unification", not in principle at least. I think that he would have gladly accepted the "presidency" of something like an Italian equivalent of the German Confederation.
Overall, I see this as the closest an Italian unification under a Papal States leadership. An unitary Italian state under the Pope is ASB with a recognizable 19th century.
2) Generally speaking, such a Confederation is very unlikely to go for colonies. The most plausibible way to get them, I suppose, is if the Concert agrees to a trusteeship to the Papacy in some otherwise contentious or problematic territory. War with the Ottomans to get real estate is out of question in this context, but an internationally granted protectorate over, say, Somalia or Tunisia is not impossible.
3) Such a configuration is likely to become inherently unstable in a few decades anyway.

 

[Falecius]

My main point is that a Papal States led Italian "Unification" is probably going to be so different from the OTL's unification that your question about colonies is almost impossible to answer. Anyway, I tend to think that the Papacy will have very little interest in any colony whatsoever.

 

[birdboy2000]

Could it be dragged into a colony without a particularly high level of interest? I'm thinking perhaps some catholic country (probably in Latin America, although you might be able to pull it off elsewhere) offers to place themselves under papal sovereignty, because it needs help to stop the anti-clerical revolutionaries, or dissuade a hungry and significantly more liberal or outright non-catholic attacker - and a Pope who feels obligated to accept.

 

[BBadolato]

I don't think we have a Papal State colonial empire unless Spain and probably the HRE are screwed somewhere down the line or butterflied away, and the Papacy decides to become aggressive in expanding more into Italy. Granted it would require large changes and might make a completely different Papal State than what we know and possibly lead to a much different Catholicism.

 

[Hurrah!Praga!]

You could see the Papal States grabbing a colonial empire similar to OTL Italy - one founded to stay competitive within the European balance of power. Of course, you'd need a sufficiently realpolitik minded pope [or several realpolitik minded popes to lead the unification in the first place] but any state existing in Italy's geographical constraints will have the same forces acting on it that OTL Italy did. Spreading Christianity could also act as a powerful motivator in grabbing colonies, especially in Muslim Africa.

 

[Spelf]

Not to derail the thread, but could a strong federal Italian state work, under a "dual Constitutional Monarchy", where the Pope is the head of the national state, and various Kings rule under him?

 

[flyguy117]

Not to derail the thread, but could a strong federal Italian state work, under a "dual Constitutional Monarchy", where the Pope is the head of the national state, and various Kings rule under him?

Well yes. In OTL the was the Neo-Guelphism movement which proposed that very idea. There was also the league of Italian states which was a customs union between some of the Italian states. It fell apart due to the revolutions of 1848.

To get a Papal lead Italy, you need to make the 1848 revolution ether not happen in Rome or make them less severe. The "Roman republic" really turned Pius IX against Italian unification.