Abstract On 12 November 1989, three days after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Achille Occhetto, the Secretary of the Italian Communist Party (PCI), announced that the Party needed to transform itself, implicitly including changing its name. His announcement launched a 15-month-long process that culminated in the dissolution of the PCI and the rise of a new political organisation, which became a member of the Socialist International. Drawing on the individual and collective memories of former Turinese PCI officials, this essay examines the complex, tortuous abandonment of the communist reference and the disintegration of the political community surrounding the Party. Because of their highly varied reactions, the dissolution of the PCI caused fragmentation of the subsequent careers and paths of former Party ‘comrades’. To this day, the 1989 turning point continues to inspire highly diverse memories among former Italian communists.
{"title":"Mourning the demise of the Italian Communist Party: Turinese memories of the PCI","authors":"Alexandre Chabert","doi":"10.1017/mit.2023.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2023.4","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract On 12 November 1989, three days after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Achille Occhetto, the Secretary of the Italian Communist Party (PCI), announced that the Party needed to transform itself, implicitly including changing its name. His announcement launched a 15-month-long process that culminated in the dissolution of the PCI and the rise of a new political organisation, which became a member of the Socialist International. Drawing on the individual and collective memories of former Turinese PCI officials, this essay examines the complex, tortuous abandonment of the communist reference and the disintegration of the political community surrounding the Party. Because of their highly varied reactions, the dissolution of the PCI caused fragmentation of the subsequent careers and paths of former Party ‘comrades’. To this day, the 1989 turning point continues to inspire highly diverse memories among former Italian communists.","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"127 - 143"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48744899","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
as the head of the family and on how the totalitarian state shaped his role within the family and society. It offers a detailed progression on how the role of the father changed within the Fascist state and how it was influenced by Catholicism, connecting the elements explored in the first part of the book. Salvante’s work offers a well-researched and structured analysis of paternity in Fascist Italy that would have benefited from an expansion of some sections that lack the depth that characterises most of her research. Perhaps this has more to do with the structure chosen than the research itself, with some sections resembling paragraphs whose inclusion in the table of contents creates expectations that are not fully met. This flaw is, however, compensated for by the solid research and archive material that provide new insights on the evolution of the roles of men and paternity in Fascist Italy, whose impact in shaping modern Italy is still visible today.
{"title":"Mussolini in Myth and Memory: The First Totalitarian Dictator by Paul Corner, Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press, 2022, 192 pp., £20.00 (hardback), ISBN 9780192866646","authors":"Amy King","doi":"10.1017/mit.2023.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2023.1","url":null,"abstract":"as the head of the family and on how the totalitarian state shaped his role within the family and society. It offers a detailed progression on how the role of the father changed within the Fascist state and how it was influenced by Catholicism, connecting the elements explored in the first part of the book. Salvante’s work offers a well-researched and structured analysis of paternity in Fascist Italy that would have benefited from an expansion of some sections that lack the depth that characterises most of her research. Perhaps this has more to do with the structure chosen than the research itself, with some sections resembling paragraphs whose inclusion in the table of contents creates expectations that are not fully met. This flaw is, however, compensated for by the solid research and archive material that provide new insights on the evolution of the roles of men and paternity in Fascist Italy, whose impact in shaping modern Italy is still visible today.","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"271 - 272"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-02-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44514799","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"16 ottobre 1943 by Giacomo Debenedetti, Milan, La nave di Teseo, 2021, 112 pp., €12.00 (paperback with flaps), ISBN 978-88-346-0464-9","authors":"Benedetta Luciana Sara Carnaghi","doi":"10.1017/mit.2023.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2023.2","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"272 - 274"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-02-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42429176","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Calabrese’s examination of these changes highlights that, ‘with more cash circulating, wages increased ..., a largely barter economy shifted to one relying on cash, making the region more capitalistic’ (p. 46). Alongside the emotional cost of migration, remittances from abroad and the fact that, in the absence of their husbands, the wife was commonly the acting head of the household, enabled women to take on ‘a greater legal and economic role’ (p. 51) in their everyday activities, even whilst the law formally continued to limit their agency within precise boundaries. Calabrese also pays significant attention to Church, state, and community. Her analysis of the role and mechanisms of the state in Basilicata demonstrates not only its proximity to the individual, but also that women knew how to engage with it. Indeed, documents demonstrate that ‘women turned to state officials when in need’ (p. xxx) and that the state worked effectively to address their concerns and to ensure spouses abided by their duties to the extent that was possible. Furthermore, the region of Basilicata was made up of small communities in which the Church played a crucial role: on the one hand, it helped shape a sense of community and promoted mutual support; on the other, it kept a watchful eye over the behaviour of the individual. This was particularly relevant in a society like Basilicata’s, ‘an honor culture centered around the values and actions that guided a person to behave in a certain way in order to earn respect and status in the community’ (p. 112). Calabrese powerfully reinforces this point in her examinations of cases of prostitution, infidelity, unwanted pregnancy, abortion, infant abandonment and infanticide, demonstrating that honour and issues revolving around its preservation were complex and multifaceted. The book additionally dedicates a chapter to the female migrants who made up some 20 per cent of all emigrants, and also covers the issue of illegal emigration – compelling evidence itself of the needs and desperation of so many. Italian Women in Basilicata provides a significant contribution to scholarship, revealing how migration changed gender roles and stereotypes and moulded society. In addition, Calabrese’s use of archival sources such as records of requests by women (in the form of, for example, passport applications and petitions to find relatives abroad), court records from the Corte d’Assise, and government bulletins, statistics, newspapers and secondary sources, makes this a strong and convincing study.
{"title":"La paternità nell'Italia fascista. Simboli, esperienze e norme, 1922–1943 by Martina Salvante, Rome, Viella, 2020, 256 pp., €27.00 (paperback), ISBN 978-88-3313-265-5","authors":"Manuela Di Franco","doi":"10.1017/mit.2022.61","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2022.61","url":null,"abstract":"Calabrese’s examination of these changes highlights that, ‘with more cash circulating, wages increased ..., a largely barter economy shifted to one relying on cash, making the region more capitalistic’ (p. 46). Alongside the emotional cost of migration, remittances from abroad and the fact that, in the absence of their husbands, the wife was commonly the acting head of the household, enabled women to take on ‘a greater legal and economic role’ (p. 51) in their everyday activities, even whilst the law formally continued to limit their agency within precise boundaries. Calabrese also pays significant attention to Church, state, and community. Her analysis of the role and mechanisms of the state in Basilicata demonstrates not only its proximity to the individual, but also that women knew how to engage with it. Indeed, documents demonstrate that ‘women turned to state officials when in need’ (p. xxx) and that the state worked effectively to address their concerns and to ensure spouses abided by their duties to the extent that was possible. Furthermore, the region of Basilicata was made up of small communities in which the Church played a crucial role: on the one hand, it helped shape a sense of community and promoted mutual support; on the other, it kept a watchful eye over the behaviour of the individual. This was particularly relevant in a society like Basilicata’s, ‘an honor culture centered around the values and actions that guided a person to behave in a certain way in order to earn respect and status in the community’ (p. 112). Calabrese powerfully reinforces this point in her examinations of cases of prostitution, infidelity, unwanted pregnancy, abortion, infant abandonment and infanticide, demonstrating that honour and issues revolving around its preservation were complex and multifaceted. The book additionally dedicates a chapter to the female migrants who made up some 20 per cent of all emigrants, and also covers the issue of illegal emigration – compelling evidence itself of the needs and desperation of so many. Italian Women in Basilicata provides a significant contribution to scholarship, revealing how migration changed gender roles and stereotypes and moulded society. In addition, Calabrese’s use of archival sources such as records of requests by women (in the form of, for example, passport applications and petitions to find relatives abroad), court records from the Corte d’Assise, and government bulletins, statistics, newspapers and secondary sources, makes this a strong and convincing study.","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"269 - 271"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-01-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42564659","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Victoria Calabrese ’ s Italian Women in Basilicata: Staying Behind but Moving Forward during the Age of Mass Emigration, 1876 – 1914 offers a new perspective on the region of Basilicata during the great wave of emigration from Italy. Studies on migration have tended to focus on migrants themselves (often men) and their impact on their destinations, and have only more recently started to consider migration as a non-linear phenomenon that needs to include connections and continuity. In this context, Calabrese ’ s book breaks new ground and approaches migration from a long-neglected perspective: the everyday struggle for a living for the women and the families left behind. Calabrese focuses on Basilicata, countering the narrative that has seen it perceived by outsiders as ‘ dark, unknown and desolate ’ , and arguing instead that ‘ there were … connections with the outside world, despite physical limitations ’ (p. xxiv). The
{"title":"Italian Women in Basilicata: Staying Behind but Moving Forward during the Age of Mass Emigration, 1876–1914 by Victoria Calabrese, Lanham, Lexington Books, 2022, 212 pp., $95.00 (paperback), ISBN 978-1-7936-0778-2","authors":"Sara Delmedico","doi":"10.1017/mit.2022.60","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2022.60","url":null,"abstract":"Victoria Calabrese ’ s Italian Women in Basilicata: Staying Behind but Moving Forward during the Age of Mass Emigration, 1876 – 1914 offers a new perspective on the region of Basilicata during the great wave of emigration from Italy. Studies on migration have tended to focus on migrants themselves (often men) and their impact on their destinations, and have only more recently started to consider migration as a non-linear phenomenon that needs to include connections and continuity. In this context, Calabrese ’ s book breaks new ground and approaches migration from a long-neglected perspective: the everyday struggle for a living for the women and the families left behind. Calabrese focuses on Basilicata, countering the narrative that has seen it perceived by outsiders as ‘ dark, unknown and desolate ’ , and arguing instead that ‘ there were … connections with the outside world, despite physical limitations ’ (p. xxiv). The","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"268 - 269"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-01-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45794004","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract In today's Europe, commemorations can be times at which to affirm international reconciliation, based notably on the knowledge produced by historians who are becoming progressively cosmopolitan. However, commemorations are also used by national-populist political parties for electoral purposes and can lead to tensions with neighbouring states. This was the case in Trieste in September 2019, when the city council executive (controlled by a right-wing national-populist coalition) decided to erect a statue of Gabriele D'Annunzio, 100 years after he had occupied the nearby city of Fiume (now Rijeka) in Croatia. This commemoration led to a series of debates among historians, especially in Italy. Based on a critical discourse analysis and an interdiscursive approach to narratives produced by historians for colleagues and for the broader society, the current research investigates the use of cosmopolitanism in the field of history when in parallel a commemoration is coordinated by national-populist forces in a public space.
{"title":"The scientific discourse circulated during a national-populist commemoration: Dannunzian Fiume and the ‘Italo-cosmopolitan’ field of history","authors":"Christian Lamour","doi":"10.1017/mit.2022.54","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2022.54","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract In today's Europe, commemorations can be times at which to affirm international reconciliation, based notably on the knowledge produced by historians who are becoming progressively cosmopolitan. However, commemorations are also used by national-populist political parties for electoral purposes and can lead to tensions with neighbouring states. This was the case in Trieste in September 2019, when the city council executive (controlled by a right-wing national-populist coalition) decided to erect a statue of Gabriele D'Annunzio, 100 years after he had occupied the nearby city of Fiume (now Rijeka) in Croatia. This commemoration led to a series of debates among historians, especially in Italy. Based on a critical discourse analysis and an interdiscursive approach to narratives produced by historians for colleagues and for the broader society, the current research investigates the use of cosmopolitanism in the field of history when in parallel a commemoration is coordinated by national-populist forces in a public space.","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"35 - 50"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45544186","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The centenary of the March on Rome has prompted Modern Italy's Contexts and Debates section to focus on the public uses of history in reference to interwar Fascism. We are looking into the ‘Past, Present, and Future of the Italian Memory of Fascism’, to borrow the title of Guido Bartolini's interviews that were published in our issue 27 (4), 2022. While commemorations and anniversaries shouldn't inherently influence academic research agendas, a broader understanding of public memory can help us to understand the current political mood in Italy. For example, it can explain why the centennial and other comparable ‘fascist’ anniversaries now have little meaning for most of the Italian public and are scarcely addressed by politicians. Indeed, most Italians seems to suffer from political amnesia. The condition is so serious that not even a dramatic occurrence such as the victory of the proudly post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia party at the election of September 2022 has proved able to cure it. Happening just a few days before the centenary of the March on Rome, the electoral results were surely expected to elicit a strong reaction by left-wing politicians and intellectuals – perhaps a mass demonstration, like the one that took place in Milan on 25 April 1994, in the aftermath of the first victory of Silvio Berlusconi's right-wing coalition, when another post-fascist party, Alleanza Nazionale, took power. Yet nothing of that sort has happened in 2022. Why?
{"title":"A discussion on Nel cantiere della memoria. Fascismo, Resistenza, Shoah, Foibe, by Filippo Focardi, Rome, Viella, 2020. With Valeria Galimi, Philip Cooke and Filippo Focardi","authors":"Andrea Mammone","doi":"10.1017/mit.2022.59","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2022.59","url":null,"abstract":"The centenary of the March on Rome has prompted Modern Italy's Contexts and Debates section to focus on the public uses of history in reference to interwar Fascism. We are looking into the ‘Past, Present, and Future of the Italian Memory of Fascism’, to borrow the title of Guido Bartolini's interviews that were published in our issue 27 (4), 2022. While commemorations and anniversaries shouldn't inherently influence academic research agendas, a broader understanding of public memory can help us to understand the current political mood in Italy. For example, it can explain why the centennial and other comparable ‘fascist’ anniversaries now have little meaning for most of the Italian public and are scarcely addressed by politicians. Indeed, most Italians seems to suffer from political amnesia. The condition is so serious that not even a dramatic occurrence such as the victory of the proudly post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia party at the election of September 2022 has proved able to cure it. Happening just a few days before the centenary of the March on Rome, the electoral results were surely expected to elicit a strong reaction by left-wing politicians and intellectuals – perhaps a mass demonstration, like the one that took place in Milan on 25 April 1994, in the aftermath of the first victory of Silvio Berlusconi's right-wing coalition, when another post-fascist party, Alleanza Nazionale, took power. Yet nothing of that sort has happened in 2022. Why?","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"66 - 76"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48325872","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Garibaldi in South America: An Exploration by Richard Bourne, London, Hurst, 2020, xx + 240 pp., £25.00 (hardback), ISBN 978-1787383135","authors":"Alessandro Bonvini","doi":"10.1017/mit.2022.52","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/mit.2022.52","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":18688,"journal":{"name":"Modern Italy","volume":"28 1","pages":"185 - 186"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-12-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43105457","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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