Legacies of Fascism: architecture, heritage and memory in contemporary Italy

Abstract

This article examines how Italy has dealt with the physical remains of the Fascist regime, as a window onto Italian attitudes to the past. Theventennioleft indelible marks on Italy’s cities in the form of urban projects, individual buildings, monuments, plaques and street names. In effect, the survival of physical traces contrasts with the hazy memories of Fascism that exist within the Italian collective consciousness. Conspicuous, yet mostly ignored, Italy’s Fascist heritage is hidden in plain sight. However, from the 1990s, buildings associated with the regime have sparked a number of debates regarding the public memory of Fascism. Although these debates present an opportunity to re-examine history, they may also be symptomatic of a crisis in the Italian polity and of attempts to rehabilitate Fascism through historical revisionism.