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ABSTRACT
This article analyses the case of Italy and how the memory of World War II came to provide the ground for political legitimacy and the ideological foundations of post-war democracy. It focuses on the topos of the Resistance against Fascism as a ‘second Risorgimento’, e.g. a national and patriotic war of liberation supported by the entire populace. The article argues that the process of memory formation of the Resistance as a ‘second Risorgimento’ during the period of transition from Fascism to democracy shares the defining features of a rite of passage in the sense originally introduced by Arnold Van Gennep. The article develops a conceptual approach that brings together social science approaches to liminality, transition, and memory studies. Advancing a processual approach to memory formation, the article thus offers an alternative to the still dominant functionalist-presentist approaches to memory, heavily influenced by Durkheim society since the pioneering work of Halbwachs.
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Notes
1 See for example, Cooke Citation2012; Citation2011; Fogu Citation2006, 151–3; Pezzino Citation2005; Poggiolini Citation2002; Traniello Citation1997; Ciuffoletti Citation1995. On how public memory manipulated events of war and Resistance into ‘political apologue’ creating a system of myths and a ‘tension’ between fact and myth see also Portelli Citation2012. The expression ‘public use of history’ was introduced by Jürgen Habermas in the late 1980s in the context of the Historikerstreit, a debate about the singularity of the Holocaust and the impact of remembrance of the Nazi past on national identity in the Federal Republic of Germany.
2 This is why, as Alon Confino argues, Henry Rousso’s acclaimed study of the memory of Vichy in post-1945 French society fails to ‘give a sense of how the Vichy memory made a difference in people’s lives, and how it was enacted on the local and private level’. Moreover, Confino continues, Rousso also fails to explore how ‘the memory constructed by the powerful’ was ‘received’ by the people; Confino Citation1997, 1394; Rousso Citation1991. Likewise, the problem with memory reduced to politics and political uses, as in Robert Gildea’s analysis of the ‘past’ in French history as constructed by politicians and intellectuals, is that ‘it becomes an illustrative reflection of political development and often is relativized to ideology’; Confino Citation1997, 1393; Gildea Citation1994.
3 For works that raise conceptual problems relevant to this article see, among others, Kattago Citation2012; Bell Citation2008; Misztal Citation2004; Olick Citation2003; Kansteiner Citation2002; Crane Citation1997; Sierp Citation2014. For the transformation of memory into a leading historical concept see Confino Citation2012.
4 In The Politics of Regret, this approach is summed up in a chapter titled ‘Figuration of Memory: A Process-Relational Methodology, Illustrated on the German Case’ (85-118).
5 For the high number of partisan formations with names inspired by the Risorgimento see the report of January 1944 in Istituto Gramsci [hereinafter: IG], Fondo Brigate Garibaldi, 05076. One of the communist brigades, operating in the central region of Umbria (east of Rome) took the name of ‘Risorgimento Brigade’. But also Catholic bands, especially in the Veneto region, took names inspired by the Risorgimento (Giuntella Citation1981, 119).
6 See the letter Lussu sent to the Action Party’s southern centre in Le formazioni Citation1985, 46–8.
7 As Filippo Jacini put it, at the beginning of 1945 the liberals were committed to restore ‘the liberal State which governed first Piedmont and then united Italy in its not inglorious path’; Filippo Jacini, ‘Lettera del PLI’, Libertà (February 1945), now in Jacini Citation1946; see also Croce Citation1944.
8 For the concerns of the socialists see the document on the ‘problems’ of ‘anti-fascist unity’ published by party’s newspaper Avanti!, Rome edition, May 6, 1944. For the position of the republicans see La Voce Repubblicana Citation1944; see also Giovana 1964, 214-6; Battaglia Citation1946, 181.
9 See also the poster produced by the republic of Salò ‘Mazzini-Garibaldi-Crispi-Mussolini’; www.manifestipolitici.it (last accessed: December 25, 2020); Isnenghi Citation1986; Pala Citation2010. Appeals to the Risorgimento and to Garibaldi and Mazzini, are widely present in booklets, posters, and leaflets produced by the republic of Salò and stored in Archivio Micheletti, Brescia, Fondo RSI.
10 The Italian term Patria is more similar to the Latin/Roman res publica (meaning the political constitution, laws, culture a way of life) than to the Greek πατρίδα (‘native /ancestral land’), translated in English variously as ‘fatherland’ and/or ‘motherland’. As any translation would be inaccurate, we prefer to keep here and hereinafter the original Italian term.
11 The disdainful expression 'so-called Risorgimento' first appeared in the theses written by Gramsci and Togliatti for the clandestine communist congress held in Lyon (1926).
12 To Togliatti the Risorgimento was an ‘autonomous’ and reactionary ideology built by the Italian bourgeoisie; Ercoli Citation1929; see also the April 1933 letter by Togliatti to Longo in IG, Archivio del Partito Comunista Italiano, 513, mf. 1132 (76-77).
13 Reported in La nostra lotta 1/3-4 (November 1943): 10-1.
14 See Togliatti’s speeches in Rome of July 9, 1944 (Brancaccio Theater) and September 24, 1944 (to the local party’s federation) in Togliatti Citation1984, 55–78 and 79-80. See also Togliatti’s report of March 11-12, 1945; in Longo Citation1945, 440–4.
15 See the ‘Manifesto diretto dal C.L.N. ai soldati italiani’ (June 1944) in Istituto Regionale per la Storia del Movimento di Liberazione nel Friuli e Venezia Giulia, Fondo Pincherle, serie Attività Politica, sottoserie: Consiglio di Zona e PdA, b. 1, f. 1.
16 See Togliatti’s report to the cadres of the communist organization in Naples (April 11; 1944) in Togliatti Citation1984, 5–37.
17 See Togliatti’s speech of December 14, 1944 (Rome, local party’s federation) quoted in Gualtieri Citation1995, 55–6. See also Togliatti quoted in Longo Citation1973, 454–6. On Togliatti’s will to tame the classist and revolutionary impulse of the Resistance see Aga Rossi and Zaslavsky Citation2011, 88-103.
18 Soon after the fall of fascism, Togliatti had formulated more radical views on the Italian situation and endorsed the abdication of the King; see the three letters he wrote to Georgi Dimitrov, the official responsible for Soviet ties with foreign communist parties, in Dagli archivi Citation1988, docs. 1, 2 and 4.
19 Historians have observed that Stalin’s postwar policy never seemed consistently directed at installing communist regimes in Western Europe through revolutionary conquest, for he preferred a ‘divided and docile Europe, rather than a communist one’; Mastny Citation1996, 2. On the ‘national front’ policy see Mark Citation2001.
20 See, for example, Jacopo Citation1936; Berti Citation1937. See also the 1997 interview with the communist partisan commander Giovanni Pesce, quoted in Cenci Citation1999; 330–1.
21 See Il Risveglio Citation1943; Il Popolo Citation1943. See also the poster Agli italiani di libertà in Istituto Nazionale per il Movimento di Liberazione Nazionale, CLNAI, b. 8, f. 9; and the poster put up by Catholic activists in Florence, after the liberation of the city, stored in Istituto per la Resistenza della Toscana; see also Olivelli Citation1944. For an overview on the role of Catholics in the Resistance see Pavone Citation1991, 280–303; De Rosa Citation1997.
22 See Sturzo’s speech at the PPI’s congress of Turin (1923) in Sturzo Citation1973, 238, and Sturzo’s speech in Paris (1925), in Sturzo Citation1957, 206–7.
23 Rodinò’s speech is in Istituto Luigi Sturzo, Archivio della Democrazia Cristiana, Fondo Rodinò, f. 52/2. At the party’s first national congress of July 1944 (Naples), he also spoke of the ‘regeneration of the Italian nation’ in line with an idea of ‘religious democracy’ derived from Mazzini; see also Sala Citation1945; Andreotti Citation1944; Gonella Citation1945.
24 See the official documents conserved in Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Ministero dell’Interno, Direzione Generale di Pubblica Sicurezza [hereinafter: ACS, MI, PS], 1944-1946, b. 181, f. 26; see also l’Unità Citation1946; Corriere d’Informazione Citation1946a, Citation1946b.
25 For the clashes between Catholics and communists and other disturbances in the 1947 and 1948 celebrations see the official documents conserved in ACS, MI, PS, 1947-1948, b. 120 (f. 7223), and b. 237; see also Il Popolo Citation1948b; Corriere della Sera Citation1948. For further details see Cenci Citation1999, 353–5; Ridolfi Citation2003, 210–2; Chiarini Citation2005, 42–8; Schwarz Citation2010, 103–22. In 1948 the government did not allow the use of partisan uniforms and symbols in the celebration (law no. 48 of February 14, 1948).