Catholic Civil Servants and Social Services: State and Subsidiarity in Italy and France, 1945–1958

Abstract

After World War ii, in France and in Italy, a new generation of civil servants in charge of public assistance policies – all coming from Catholic movements – sought to transform the ways in which roles and responsibilities were allocated between State, local councils, private actors, and families. This article focuses on the Italian Amministrazione per gli aiuti internazionali, established in 1945 and headed by deputy Lodovico Montini (brother of the future pope Paul vi), and on the French Direction de la population at the Ministère de la Santé et de la population, created in 1946 and managed by Emmanuel Rain. The analysis will contribute to an explanation of how public assistance, which was deemed to disappear in the face of the emergence of social security, underwent an expansion and how a new welfare regime characterized by a novel form of mixed economy emerged.