Fascist Era Research Articles

政治的・宗教的文脈における「ドイツ宗教学」の展開(ファシズム期の宗教と宗教学 : イタリア、ドイツ、日本における,自由テーマパネル, 第六十四回学術大会紀要)

政治的・宗教的文脈における「ドイツ宗教学」の展開(ファシズム期の宗教と宗教学 : イタリア、ドイツ、日本における,自由テーマパネル, 第六十四回学術大会紀要)

‘Gypsies’ in Fascist Italy: from expelled foreigners to dangerous Italians

Italian research on the persecution of Rom and Sinti under Fascism is still incomplete (in terms of exploitation of the archival sources) and marginal (in terms of the national academic context). This article analyses new sources for the development and application of anti-Gypsy policy during the Fascist era. The central focus is on developments in the new border provinces of Venezia Giulia and Venezia Tridentina, acquired from the Habsburg Empire at the end of the First World War. As a result of the transfer of sovereignty over the resident populations, the nationality status of ‘Gypsies’ had to be addressed, while the significant presence of Rom and Sinti communities in those territories challenged the symbolic meaning they had for the Fascist regime. The outcome was that Fascism marked ‘Gypsies’ as both ‘undesirable foreigners’ and ‘dangerous Italians’, thereby creating a dual rationale for placing them in police confinement and interning them after Italy’s entrance into the war. An approach that combines archival research and field work with Sinti and Rom reveals the transformations, continuities and contradictions in the categorization of ‘Gypsies’. This article thus presents a case study of the place of social and geographical margins in the construction of the nation state.

イタリア農村と移民 : 南仏への移民と「亡命者」(2008年度シンポジウム 20世紀世界の農業と移動-移民・入植・難民-)

イタリア農村と移民 : 南仏への移民と「亡命者」(2008年度シンポジウム 20世紀世界の農業と移動-移民・入植・難民-)

Between Occultism and Nazism: Anthroposophy and the Politics of Race in the Fascist Era, written by Peter Staudenmaier

Between Occultism and Nazism: Anthroposophy and the Politics of Race in the Fascist Era, written by Peter Staudenmaier

White collars and labour history: the contractual regime in Italy from the Liberal to the Fascist era, 1919–1945

This article aims to re-examine the history of non-manual labour, beginning with an analysis of the evolution of general norms governing the contracts of private sector workers in Italy, from the post-First World War period up until the creation of the fascist corporate system in the 1930s. The starting point is the 1919 law that defined the specific characteristics of white-collar workers, expressed as a bond of trust and delegation on the part of employers, from whom legally established and binding guarantees were issued. These guarantees included the offer of permanent employment and the right to compensation should said employment be terminated. This law was reformed during the fascist era, but continued to influence the collective labour agreements stipulated by unions under the regime, contributing to the sustained social status of white-collar workers, particularly in comparison to manual labourers. This article will highlight the difficulties in applying these standards, and the legal and union disputes they generated, exploring an area rarely discussed by historians, while also, as a case study, scrutinizing the more advanced situation of employees in the banking sector – a sector which, from a regulatory and contractual point of view, represented the white-collar élite, as it would continue to do for a long time after the Second World War.

The Corporatist Wave Corporatism and the Diffusion of 'Organic Representation' in European Dictatorships

The paper examines the role of corporatism as a set of authoritarian institutions that spread across inter-war Europe and which was an agent for the institutional consolidation of fascist era dictatorships. Institutionalized, in many cases in the wake of polarized democratizations, inter-war dictatorships tended to choose corporatism both as a process for the repression and co-optation of the labour movement, interest groups and of elites through ‘organic’ legislatures. Powerful processes of institutional transfers were a hallmark of inter-war dictatorships and we argue corporatism was at the forefront of this process of cross-national diffusion of authoritarian institutions.

Between Occultism and Nazism: Anthroposophy and the Politics of Race in the Fascist Era, written by Peter Staudenmaier

Between Occultism and Nazism: Anthroposophy and the Politics of Race in the Fascist Era, written by Peter Staudenmaier

Introduction: Portuguese and Brazilian Authoritarian States and Corporatism: Political Change and Institutional Practice

Portuguese Studies vol. 32 no. 2 (2016), 125–27© Modern Humanities Research Association 2016 Introduction Portuguese and Brazilian Authoritarian States and Corporatism: Political Change and Institutional Practice Paula Borges Santos and Luciano Aronne de Abreu At a time when studies of the historical experiences of corporativism in the inter-war period have seen new developments in the academic world, both in Portugal and in Brazil, in differing fields such as History, Sociology and Political Science, this volume of Portuguese Studies brings together six articles which aim to explore some of the less-visited aspects of the origins and establishment of corporative projects in the course of the dictatorships in those two countries. Setting out from the observation that, in both cases, we witnessed the institutionalization of state corporativisms — that is, corporative projects in which the principal stimulus and initiatives were made by governmental authorities — academic analysis has been directed to two areas of discussion: on the one hand the ideological and juridical foundations of the two corporative ideologies, and on the other hand the problem of the nature, the functioning and the functionality of some of its institutions. This analytical position has in turn three aspects. Firstly, there is a need to rethink critically the descriptions contained in the main studies of historical corporativisms in Portugal and Brazil, and of their political and institutional dynamics. In effect, while these studies benefitted from being widely published and discussed, the truth is that later researches served largely to confirm the theses contained in them and to deepen certain elements. Frequently this led to the repetition of the results first presented, to the detriment of a sustained tendency towards new approaches. Hence there remain lacunae in our knowledge which deserve to be diagnosed and overcome. The choice of topics in this volume meets this concern. Secondly, there is an interest in overcoming a certain tension that arises in studies of the historical experiences of corporativism, namely of the association popularly made between this phenomenon (either as a doctrine or in its various manifestations) and the regimes of the so-called ‘fascist era’. To this end, it is necessary to avoid some of the generalizations made about the assimilation of the corporative ideal by succeeding regimes, which are common in the more ideological readings of the past, and to take care to deconstruct official and Authoritarian States and Corporatism 126 propagandistic discourses made by governments. In the same way, explanations of corporative processes made by their own doctrinal chiefs are to be rejected. We should be cautious, too, of reading historical reality through critiques of the systems, such as were made by opposition currents, or by those who, despite belonging to the establishment of these regimes, became disillusioned. The third aspect arises from the need to question the usefulness of the customary definition of political corporativism, in so far as it dogmatically states that corporative systems were based on the exclusion of any idea of representation by way of individual suffrage. As a reading of the articles gathered here will demonstrate, historical reality in Portugal and Brazil was more complex than that. There were compromises, adaptations of organicist and liberal ideas (in turn diffused by different means and assimilated in very different forms amongst the supporters of corporative projects), and above all neither country witnessed a total rejection of traditions of civil rights. The chronological boundaries to this volume, while not being identical for every article, cover the corporative projects in Portugal and Brazil from their first establishment up to their demise. In this way they capture both the continuities and the changes in their juridical and political foundations during the lifecycle of the institutions created and established in those countries. For Portugal this goes back to the period of the First Republic to explain how some organicist ideas from that time were spread and gained support from the political class of the time. Despite falling outside the periodization of the authoritarian state, a study of this period is fundamental to an understanding of how far criticism of the principles on which the democratic and liberal state were based had already advanced before the consolidation of the dictatorship. While the present volume provides heuristic...

Fascismo e classicità: il recupero iconografico delle opere d'arte non romane a fini propagandistici nell'Italia mussoliniana.

The paper demonstrates the importance of the Classical iconography, except the Ancient Roman one, in the Fascist propaganda. It starts considering how the Fascism has also taken inspiration from Ancient Greek artistic examples, often transforming and misinterpreting their original meaning. I especially focus my attention on the famous ancient masterpieces of the Nike of Samotracia, the Doryphoros and the Discobolus, that compared in various propaganda publications. In the second part of the article, I examine how Italian Renaissance's iconographies were recovered in order to sponsorize social policies, concerning family and health, also promoting the superiority of the Aryan race ideology. Finally I dedicate a short paragraph to the XVII century's Classicism and its revival in the Fascist Era, through the rediscovery of Guido Reni's paintings in Fascist propaganda publications.

The ‘indomitable’ Pignatellis

The fall of Fascism generates contrasting feeling in Italy, now liberated by the Allied troops. In this new scenario, the search for new forms of democratic gathering coexists with its opposite: the aim to recreate an experience now historically ended (the Fascist regime). Indeed, many southern Italians still believe in Fascism and, despite Mussolini's execution in Piazzale Loreto, they kindle the hope of a new Fascist era. Arguably, they see the death of Mussolini as an opportunity to refashion the Fascist ideology, by returning to the myths of its origins. They envision a new form of Fascism, free from political contamination and compromise, and a new regime able to realize the programmes that the old regime has failed to realize. Maria and Valerio Pignatelli represent the dream of a Fascist revival, characterized by innovative and original characters. They find many supporters in the southern regions, especially in Calabria, reversing the stereotype of an ‘apolitical’ and passive south. Therefore, the aim of this article is to reconstruct the Fascist revival in post-war southern Italy through the history of its main exponents.

‘Il mito americano’ and Masculinities of the Fascist Era

‘Il mito americano’ and Masculinities of the Fascist Era

Italian policies for the restitution of illicitly trafficked cultural heritage, based on the rule of law and interested cooperation

We are very proud to hold this meeting in Rome today. I want to thank U nidroit for its passionate work—in particular, Ms Schneider, senior officer of the organization, who always gives her passion for such an important cause. Yes, I was the Mayor of Rome during the proceedings and the approbation of the Convention here in Rome. Maybe there is a spirit of Rome allowing the European Union here on the Capitol Hill to adopt the Treaties of Rome in 1957, maybe there was also a spirit of Rome and of the Capitol Hill in 1998 when the Statute of the International Criminal Court was approved here. But, of course, now we face very tough challenges. I will say a few words about Italian policies for the restitution of illicitly trafficked cultural heritage based on the rule of law and international cooperation. I think that these two concepts either work together or do not work at all. We need to fight illicit trafficking and we need cooperation. I believe that the experience of many ministers of culture in the Italian government was inspired by these two goals. I was responsible for some relevant restitutions to our national heritage in the years between 2006 and 2008 when I was minister of culture. However, it was never a personal purpose: it was a cooperation issue, and it was a way of fighting crime against art and cultural heritage, starting with Italy. It was not only an attempt to achieve an important change of policy by big institutions, private museums, and public museums, but it was also our goal to stop illegal activities, local mafias, and local traffickers—what we call tombaroli —from acting in our country. 1 I believe that these are common international goals and not nationalistic goals. For example, if you walk around Rome and you look at obelisks, they are of course stolen artefacts. Even if they are re-baptized artefacts—because when Pope Sixtus V in the sixteenth century decided to put a cross over the obelisks that the Roman Empire had brought from Egypt, he decided to give a new meaning and a new life to each monument. They were also very important as landmarks for people walking in Rome because they were re-erected in front of churches in order to show people where to go at the end of the roads that were built by the Renaissance popes. Yet you will not see the Axum obelisk in Rome any more because our government gave it back to Ethiopia. It was a colonial legacy of the Fascist era. To return it was a controversial decision, but, in the end, our country decided to give back what belonged to another country and that was the fruit of a recent historical colonial experience.

Winx, Orzowei, Pik e altre rappresentazioni della razza. Una prospettiva comparata sui libri per l'infanzia in Italia

Children’s literature seems to occupy a secondary position compared to general literature in terms of relevance for the cultural debate. Actually, being on the margins of ‘serious’ literature allows it to avoid the canonical control over literary appropriateness and to introduce “subversive” elements. As an academic subject, a commercial business and a cultural phenomenon, children’s books move more freely between mass culture, entertainment, and educational environments: they can become the symbol of transnational cultural struggles, as well as unconsciously embodying the functioning of dominant stereotypes and taboos. They can certainly bring to our attention the material factors of their production, distribution and reception, and the ways these are enmeshed in contemporary debates over race and gender. This paper discusses ‘race’ in Italian children’s literature in a comparative perspective, taking into account mainly books and characters, but also cartoons, merchandising, and textbooks. I analyze different processes of racialization: how ‘race’ tends to be suppressed and normalized in commercial products such as The Winx, how it is idealized in works with an educational purpose like the novel Orzowei , by Alberto Manzi, how it is reduced to an easily recognizable stereotype in picturebooks like Pic Badaluk , which borrows the language and images of the colonial fascist era trying to obliterate their implications; and then, how anything that has to do with ‘race’ tends to be identified with social issues and trauma, erasing, for example, the whole post-migrant experience, and limiting access to more interculturally nuanced stories of adventure, experiment and personal growth.

Exposure to genocide and the risk of schizophrenia: a population-based study.

No evidence exists on the association between genocide and the incidence of schizophrenia. This study aims to identify critical periods of exposure to genocide on the risk of schizophrenia. This population-based study comprised of all subjects born in European nations where the Holocaust occurred from 1928 to 1945, who immigrated to Israel by 1965 and were indexed in the Population Register (N = 113 932). Subjects were followed for schizophrenia disorder in the National Psychiatric Case Registry from 1950 to 2014. The population was disaggregated to compare groups that immigrated before (indirect exposure: n = 8886, 7.8%) or after (direct exposure: n = 105 046, 92.2%) the Nazi or fascist era of persecutions began. The latter group was further disaggregated to examine likely initial prenatal or postnatal genocide exposures. Cox regression modelling was computed to compare the risk of schizophrenia between the groups, adjusting for confounders. The likely direct group was at a statistically (p < 0.05) greater risk of schizophrenia (hazard ratio = 1.27, 95% confidence interval 1.06-1.51) than the indirect group. Also, the likely combined in utero and postnatal, and late postnatal (over age 2 years) exposure subgroups were statistically at greater risk of schizophrenia than the indirect group (p < 0.05). The likely in utero only and early postnatal (up to age 2 years) exposure subgroups compared with the indirect exposure group did not significantly differ. These results were replicated across three sensitivity analyses. This study showed that genocide exposure elevated the risk of schizophrenia, and identified in utero and postnatal (combined) and late postnatal (age over 2 years) exposures as critical periods of risk.

Camicette Nere: le donne nel Ventennio fascista

Nell’articolo si è realizzata una disamina della condizione delle donne in Italia nel Ventennio fascista, un periodo di profonda regressione per quanto riguarda i loro diritti. In primo luogo ci si è soffermati sulle discriminazioni subite dalle donne in ambito giuridico, lavorativo, sociale e soprattutto politico, con l’ennesima negazione del tanto agognato diritto di voto. Poi si è cercato di narrare la condizione delle donne nel regime fascista attraverso l’analisi delle modalità con le quali veniva descritta la donna nella stampa dell’epoca, specie nei periodici femminili, i quali dovevano contribuire a diffondere l’ideale muliebre che il fascismo voleva realizzare. Diversi furono i giornali fondati in questo periodo, tutti molto utili per comprendere l’immagine della donna nella stampa del Ventennio e quindi, di riflesso, nella società stessa. Infine si è messo in evidenza come il Fascismo avesse finito per relegare le donne ad un unico ruolo: quello di mogli e madri esemplari, ritenendole inferiori rispetto agli uomini e collocandole così in una posizione di profonda subordinazione. Inoltre, per poter meglio inculcare in loro i principi del regime, queste furono inquadrate in diverse organizzazioni di massa, come i Fasci femminili, attraverso i quali attuare una rigida funzione di controllo di ogni dissenso.

From Quill to Mouse: Digitizing the ‘Woman of Letters’ 1861-1922

Abstract: This article describes a project in Italian Digital Women’s Studies, In-visiblewomen.org, which is currently being developed in collaboration with our two universities, and consists of an interpretive, thematic website on the material culture of Italian female intellectuals between 1861 and 1922. We envision In-visiblewomen.org as a tool that allows to investigate women’s agency in promoting social change and the interconnections between women writers’ material culture, their private space, their access to the public sphere and the impact of the new media revolution on women’s social status. Unlike the majority of existing digital projects on women writers, ours is not only a digitized text-bank or a mere collection of bio-bibliographical data. Rather, it will be a multi-layered, interpretive platform stemming from the expert contribution of scholars in the field. Our time boundaries comprise the period between Italian unification (1861) and the beginning of the fascist era (1922). Compared to other historical periods (the Renaissance and the fascist and post-fascist decades, for example) this highly transformative era for women’s cultural production and consumption has inexplicably generated less scholarly attention. Using a commissioned oil painting representing a late nineteenth century woman writer’s virtual study as interface, this project will be the first of its kind in the field of Italian Women Studies. Each object in this ideal study (pen, ink bottle, letters, magazines etc.) will be clickable and will lead to an encyclopedia-type entry. Through the painting, users will be able to access two searchable databases organized hierarchically and interconnected through tagging: a themes database, and an authors database.

La grande guerra di Mario Monicelli. La cinematografia italiana di fronte al primo conflitto mondiale (1959)

Mario Monicelli’s La grande guerra is the most well known (and probably most beloved) Italian film on World War One. Released in 1959, and awarded with the Best Film prize at the Venice Film Festival (along with Roberto Rossellini’s Il generale Della Rovere), La grande guerra has greatly contributed in changing the traditional Italian canon of the war epic, both in the movies and in other cultural domains, a canon that dated back to the fascist era. Relying on a vast corpus of war memoirs, and on a huge international film tradition, the director and his screenwriters created the first realistic representation of the experience of the Italian soldiers in the trenches. Monicelli’s choice of mixing tragedy and comedy, in order to tell the story of two yellow heroes, was object of debate, not just among film critics, but more generally in the public sphere. In the context of the Italian economic boom of the sixties, with its deep cultural and political transformations, this debate marked a watershed in the collective memory of the wars fought by the Italians during the first part of the Twentieth century.

The Case of Urbino: Sporting Traditions and Training Schools for Teachers of Physical Education and Sport Sciences

The University of Urbino is composed of 10 different faculties, the youngest of which is the Faculty of Sport Sciences. Local interest in sport games and athleticism dates from early Renaissance, and Urbino's citizens still continue to cultivate the passion for such activities. For many centuries participation in physical exercise had been largely neglected on the national level, but after the Italian unification of 1861 interest in gymnastics experienced remarkable growth due to its function in reforming and uniting the identity of the population. In the fascist era mass sport affirmed and was the pride of Mussolini; two academies were founded for the training of highly specialized male and female teachers of physical education and sports. But after the fall of the regime these activities had a difficult time being accepted. Finally, in the 1960s a number of ISEF schools (Advanced Institute of Physical Education) were founded and among them that of Urbino; later, in 2000, the government gave universities the option of establishing their own schools of sport sciences. Urbino promptly closed its ISEF and opened the Faculty of Sport Sciences. The paper makes frequent references to both the broad framework of national physical education and sport and the more modest reality of Urbino.

“From the (e)migrant to the (im)migrant”: The Italian nation-state and its migration rhetoric and history

In this essay I will analyze the migrant figure from the point of view of the Italian history of nation-state building. In particular, I will consider the plurality of meanings that migration acquires in the context of the relatively short existence of the Italian state, officially unified in 1861, and the role played by the state and local administrations in constructing the migrant both as an internal other (the southerner) and as an external other (non-EU immigrants, refugees, eastern European immigrants). The essay will focus on the connections between Italian national discourse since unification and the process of internal and external othering, highlighting in particular how this process translates into exclusionary practices applied on a local level that are strikingly in continuity with those introduced during the fascist era. I will conclude with comments on the meaning of migrant in the present historical conjuncture characterized by crisis, increase in refugee inflows, and an upsurge of emigrat...

Benedetto Croce and the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn

The relationship between the family of Benedetto Croce and that of Anton Dohrn were always characterized by cordiality and mutual respect. Both houses were international meeting places of artists, intellectuals and scientists. The narrowest and most lasting relationship was that between the philosopher and Reinhard Dohrn, from 1909 to 1965 director of the Zoological Station, a long period, marked, among other things, by the two World Wars. Both events caused major problems in the life of the institution. Starting in the twenties, their relationship continued until 1952, the year of Croce's death. In the years immediately following World War I Croce strove, with his prestige and authority, to preserve the Zoological Station's nature as a private entity, directed by Dohrn. As Minister of Education, on 30 September, 1920, he issued a decree-law which repealed that of 26 May, 1918, which had aimed at the 'Italianisation' of the Zoological Station. Croce instead transformed the Station into a "non-profit organization under the supervision of the Ministry of Education". The new decree sparked a lively debate in the Parliament and in the press, between supporters and opponents of the measure. On 9 December, a major discussion took place in the Senate, published in the same year under the title On the Zoological Station in Naples. The discussion revolved around two fundamental political concepts: is it legitimate to take, for reasons of culture, civilization and the law of war, possession of the "the fruit of the talent of others"? is it legitimate "to replace with a state organization'' what had been created as a private activity, and was the result of the enthusiasm and interest of individuals? Croce's victory, however, was not lasting. During the Fascist era, with the decree of 21 October 1923, the Zoological Station was again transformed into an Italian state body.