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ABSTRACT
The Neapolitan artisan pizza, certified by the EU as TSG and surrounded by the aura of “Art of Neapolitan ‘Pizzaiuolo’” ratified by UNESCO, is now spreading throughout local, national and global markets. This article focuses on three of the intertwined and interacting processes that, since the 1990s, have been changing the field of the Neapolitan artisan pizza. We define them as: Heritagization; McDonaldization; and Knowledge creation. These three processes contribute in a complex way to the construction of a new social object, which we labeled as “Verace Glocal Pizza”, contextualizing it in the globalization dynamics.
Disclosure statement
There are no financial conflicts of interest to disclose.
Notes
1. Verace is a vernacular Neapolitan word meaning “real, genuine, original”.
2. Star and Griesemer focus on collective work across worlds with different and divergent viewpoints and agendas. They emphasize the ways in which “‘boundary objects’” enable cooperation and mutual benefits. However, Isto Huvila (Citation2011) argues that we can’t consider the creation of “boundary objects” as politically neutral or necessarily consensual, but as an expression of hegemony. According to Latour, instead, the construction of networks and obligatory passage points puts some actors at a disadvantage compared to others. However, he does not entertain the idea of fixed frames of reference or the notion of foundations: “if differences exist it is because they are generated in the relations that produce them” (Law Citation2000, 4; see also Latour Citation2005, 147). In sum, scholarship in these traditions either ignores or rejects the idea of structural bases for conflict and the idea that the capacities of actors are often shaped by structures that exist prior to the entrance of particular actors on the scene.
3. Pierre Bourdieu’s scholarship carry out in an integrative way on the social theoretical traditions associated with Emile Durkheim, Karl Marx, and Max Weber (see Brubaker Citation1985; Calhoun, LiPuma, and Postone Citation1993; Swartz Citation1997; Vandenberghe Citation1999; Wacquant Citation1992). Inequality and power imbalances associated with different locations in social structure animate Bourdieu’s work, which is macro-sociological in its orientation and takes seriously the constraining character of social structure.
4. This trio of qualifiers comes back systematically when Morin explicates what is a “complex relation”, no longer institute a linear logic, but a complex dia-logic, i.e., the symbiotic unity of “two logics which simultaneously nourish each other, compete against each other, live off each other, oppose and combat each other to death” (Morin Citation1977, 77). The dialogic does not put aside the idea of dialectic, which anyway Morin considers as a mere phenomenal expression of the deeper dialogic principle which link the notions of order and disorder within the “tetralogical loop”: “an irreversibly spiraloid circuit” (Morin Citation1977, 69) linking disorder to order and organization, and vice versa.
5. We investigated written texts produced by organizations, institutions or corporations, as well as other sources like newspapers and magazines, articles and interviews. All these different types of documents were found on the Web, and links are provided in the footnotes. The analytic procedure consisted of finding, selecting, appraising and synthesizing the data contained in the documents and organizing them into major themes and interpretive categories.
6. The first pizzeria in Germany, opened in Würzburg in 1952 – Le Sabbie di Capri – is targeted to American soldiers (Hierholzer Citation2009, 56).
7. See, for example, this blog about Neapolitan artisan pizza in the world: https://pizzadixit.com/.
8. Unfortunately, there are no aggregated data available on the international turnover of Neapolitan artisan pizza. However, a survey of the Confederazione Nazionale dell’Artigianato e della Piccola e Media Impresa (National Confederation of Craftsmanship and Small and Medium Enterprises) – released in January 2020 – reports an Italian turnover of 15 billion and an economic movement of more than 30 billion. The growth of the sector in Italy is constant: since 2015 the number of pizzerias has increased from 125,300 to 127 thousand. https://www.cna.it/pizza-un-business-che-lievita-anno-per-anno/.
9. The sector’s new dimensions require supply chains guaranteeing greater quantities of food and non-food products linked to the production of Neapolitan TSG pizza. Also notable is the increasingly pressing attention to the quality and origin of the products and their certification. In fact, partnership systems have been created between quality “guarantors” and suppliers. Examples are the Register of Approved Suppliers of the “Vera Pizza Napoletana”(https://www.pizzanapoletana.org/it/fornitori), and the suppliers’ mentions of mini-chain Sorbillo (https://www.sorbillo.it/qualita-degli-ingredienti). See also Gatto (Citation2019) on the relationship between the MITW franchising and the suppliers.
10. The term “heritagization” has appeared in the English-language literature especially referring to the UNESCO campaign for the conservation of intangible cultural heritage, precisely called “Intangible Cultural Heritage” (Bortolotto Citation2009). In French, Spanish, Catalan and Italian literature, instead, the common term is “patrimonialization” (etymology: Fr: patrimoine: Span, It: patrimonio), which refers to what is owned rather than what is transmitted, inherited. So, it is worth pointing out that heritage and “patrimony” imply a different focus on the “transmission” of tradition rather than on its “possession”.
11. Austin (Citation1970), 242.
13. Pulcinella was a character of the Commedia dell’Arte, a theatrical form from the 17th century in which the characters sketched stereotypes of habitants from various regions throughout Italy. Indeed, Pulcinella was the stereotypical mask of Naples. Constantly on Neapolitan stages until the 20th century, and in Neapolitan puppetry still today, this mask is now among the most well-known icons of Naples.
15. According to Foucault (Discipline and Punish, 1975), “normalization” consists of constructing a standard of conduct and then rewarding or punishing individuals for having conformed to it or not. It is one of the tactics for exercising social control with the minimum expenditure of force, which Foucault calls “disciplinary power”.
20. The Coldiretti (Confederazione Nazionale Coltivatori Diretti – National Confederation of Direct Farmers) is the largest association representing and assisting Italian agricultural operators.
24. For typical Neapolitan side dishes, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neapolitan_cuisine#Side-dishes.
25. http://www.sebeto.com/pizzaecontorni/. For a short account of the history of the Pizza e Contorni chain, see an interview with Franco Manna, founder and manager of the group: https://www.ilroma.net/rubrica/i-personaggi-del-roma/il-biologo-che-ha-cambiato-la-ristorazione Currently, Pizza e Contorni counts only one pizzeria, located in Naples.
26. Anema e Cozze is a pun originating from the title of a famous Neapolitan song, Anema e Core (Soul and Heart), written by Salve D’Esposito and Tito Manlio in 1950.
27. https://www.foodserviceweb.it/2018/11/12/sebeto-crescere-con-creativita-e-rigore-gestionale/ At the end of 2019 Sebeto, controlled by OpCapita, sold the Ham Holy Burger chain in order to better focusing on the Rossopomodoro brand and the pizza business. The buyers were two of the founders of Rossopomodoro, Franco Manna and Giuseppe “Pippo” Montella.
29. This document dated 2010 depicts the group’s shareholding structure http://www.sebeto.com/userfiles/file/2011%20presentazioneOK_eng_SINTETICA.pdf.
30. Since 2011, over 70% of the group’s capital has been owned by the English fund Change Capital Partners. In 2018, OpCapita – a European private equity fund manager – acquired the shares of Sebeto Group Spa held by Change Capital (https://uk.reuters.com/article/sebeto-ma-opcapita/private-equity-opcapita-buys-owner-of-rossopomodoro-pizza-chain-idUKL5N1QR40Z).
32. http://www.challengenetwork.it/eng/cliente/rossopomodoro/rossopomodoro-logo/ The logo of Rossosapore is very similar: http://www.rossosapore.it/.
34. http://www.pizzanelmondo.org/en/neapolitan-pizzaiuoli-in-the-unesco-heritage/; http://www.iitaly.org/magazine/events/reports/article/art-making-napolitan-pizza.
43. https://www.lucianopignataro.it/a/napoli-21-dicembre-rossopomodoro-alluniversita-federico-ii/99098/ Rossopomodoro claims the exclusive use, in all its restaurants, of the flour brand Farine Caputo, tomatoes from the Agro Nocerino Sarnese PDO, cultivated and canned by Strianese, bronze drawn pasta made in Pastificio Afeltra, buffalo mozzarella Campana PDO, and Gargiulo Extra Virgin Olive Oil, from Sorrento’s olives.
44. de Souza Santos includes “the conversion of subsistence agriculture into agriculture for export” (De Sousa Santos Citation2006, 397) among the examples of localized globalism.
45. The Sebeto group is not the only one claiming to offer the “real and traditional” Neapolitan pizza in the global markets. The chain Fratelli La Bufala (La Bufala Brothers) joined the Sebeto group in 2003, but left it almost immediately. Now the chain is owned by the company A Cento Spa, which also owns other food brands, such as Vulkania, Mamma Oliva and Sorelle Capitone. In 2018, the group had 66 restaurants, of which 55 in Italy and 11 abroad; about 30 restaurants are company-operated while the others are franchised. https://fratellilabufala.com/en/.
51. Rindell calls “image heritage” the consumer images generated by relevant past experience, which are a direct and influential input into real‐time corporate image formation (“image-in-use”). Rindell’s study focused on the corporate image of non-food retailers. So we operate here a conceptual generalization.
52. The choice of Japan as first country where jumpstarting the project follows a consolidated tradition of high standard customers, pizza makers and product, due also to the phenomenon of Neapolitan pizzaiuoli migration (see Ceccarini Citation2011).
55. The founder, namely Michele, wanted Neapolitan pizza only in these tastes, without any addition of what he called papocchie (vernacular Neapolitan word meaning: jumbles, hodgepodges, junk foods), which alter the taste and the veracity.
62. For this License the theoretical knowledge required would be substantial. For example, according to the bill 2334 of 2016, in order to obtain the PEP, the aspiring pizza maker must attend a course of at least 150 hours (70 hours of practice in the laboratory and 80 hours of theory: 25 hours of foreign language; 30 hours of food science; 25 hours of hygiene and food administration). He then has to attend an internship, lasting between 80 and 100 working days. At the end of the course and of the stage, the aspiring pizza maker must take a final exam, consisting of a theoretical and a practical test. (http://www.senato.it/leg/17/BGT/Schede/Ddliter/46756.htm).
66. https://issuu.com/pizzaepastaitaliana/docs/pep_jan18_web_ok, pp. 20–29.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Marialuisa Stazio
Marialuisa Stazio works and teaches at the Department of Political Sciences of the University of Naples Federico II. Since her graduation thesis she has been dealing with cultural industries and their systemic development and with the processes of valorization of consumption processes in the cultural field. In the last ten years she has focused on the phenomena of intersection between global and local in the processes of globalization/localization. Among these, she has recently focused on the widespread model of the “Italian Restaurant”, which is influenced by the interweaving of tourist and migratory flows from and to Italy, and by the processes and practices of ethnicization and self-ethnicization that cross them.