Italy In The New International Order 1917 1922

This edited collection offers the first systematic account in English of Italy’s international position from Caporetto – a major turning-point in Italy’s participation in the First World War – to the end of the liberal regime in Italy in 1922. It shows that after the ‘Great War’, not only did Italy establish itself as a regional power but also achieved its post-unification ambition to be recognised, at least from a formal viewpoint, as a great power. This subject is addressed through multiple perspectives, covering Italy’s relations and mutual perceptions vis-à-vis the Allies, the vanquished nations, and the ‘New Europe’. Fourteen contributions by leading historians reappraise Italy’s role in the construction of the post-war international order, drawing on extensive multi-archival and multi-national research, combining for the first time documents from American, Austrian, British, French, German, Italian, Russian and former Yugoslav archives.

This volume reinterprets the peace settlements after 1918 as a site of remarkable innovations in the making of international order.

Reassesses British and Italian grand strategies from 1914 to 1920: including the war, the peace conference and the Fiume crisis.

This is a study of the early writings of Virginio Gayda (1885-1944), a talented but amoral Italian journalist whose career spanned two world wars. A keen observer, prolific writer and propagandist during his stint as the newspaper La Stampa’s special correspondent in Habsburg Vienna, Gayda lent his considerable skills to promote an aggressive foreign policy. No one did more than he to poison relations between the Italian and Yugoslav peoples. His is the story of a respected journalist who chose an ultranationalist path to fascism and international fame. Not uninfluenced by rank careerism and material reward he forsook his roots to embrace the antisemitic “race” laws of 1938 and Italy’s disastrous partnership with Nazi Germany.

This book examines the historical process that led to the foundation of the Italian Republic and its constitution, viewed through the personal experiences and political reflections of Adriano Olivetti (between 1919 and 1960), general manager and president of the well-known typewriter manufacturer “Ing. C. Olivetti & C.” An unbroken line of reasoning linked his maturing political reflections during the two post-war periods. The historical context of the 1950s did not prove to be very propitious, but the guidelines dispersed throughout the Italian cultural and political world from the movement that Olivetti founded were certainly seminal – generating a legacy of ideas that has only in part been recognized. What makes this study distinctive is the original approach to reading the history of Italy through Adriano Olivetti’s eyes and thoughts, far from the more common Christian Democratic or Communist perspective of those years. It is simply another view of what the Italian Republic could be and was not.

The Paris Peace Conference had significant ramifications across Europe, felt by the Great Powers, but also by small states struggling for their recognition and independence, setting the stage for the Second World War. Despite the importance of this conference, many perspectives from European historians remain inaccessible to international audiences because they have not yet been published in English. This has led to a marginalization of voices from some of the countries which have been the most affected by the fallout from the conference. This book remedies this by providing access to the latest research on the topic, based on primary sources and critical analyses of existing publications.

By shedding light on an often-overlooked aspect of Fascism and Nazism, this book examines the ambitious plans for a new European order conceived by Italian intellectuals, historians, geographers, politicians, and even student representative of the Fascist University Groups (GUF). Through expert reconstruction of the debate on this envisaged order’s development, Monica Fioravanzo opens a window into the theoretical arena that shaped relationships between German, Italy and the other Axis nations and provides insight into how the project was anticipated to unite the Fascist regime in Italy and the Nazi Reich.

Offering a fresh take on a crucial phase of European history, this book explores the years between the 1980s and 1990s when the European Union took shape. Whilst contributing to existing literature on the Maastricht Treaty and European integration at the end of the twentieth century, the book also brings those debates into the twenty-first century and makes connections with longer-term issues. The transformation of the European political climate in the wake of the global financial crisis in 2008, and the watershed Brexit vote in 2016, has made it all the more urgent to reconsider the way scholars and opinion-makers have looked at European integration in the past. Drawing from recently released archival documents, the authors analyse European cooperation as part of the broader international history in which it unfolded, taking into account the changes in the Cold War order and the advance of a new phase of globalisation. Comparing and contrasting the debates, objectives and achievements of the 1980s and 1990s with the current political landscape of the European Union, this book proposes a novel interpretation of the choices that were made during the Maastricht years, and of their longer-term consequences.