Italy is experiencing the so-called “economic boom”: the post-war reconstruction , the end of poverty and the change from being an agricultural country to an industrial one. Italy is now part of the “western” side of the world with the Atlantic Pact and NATO. As a result of this international easening, even the internal political situation is changing: the Christian democrats lose their egemony to leave some room to the socialist party. Although deep social differences are still a problem to be faced (northern and southern Italy being at two opposite ends of the economic development; the wild pouring of people in the areas of the “industrial triangle; the abandonment of the countryside and still large pockes of poverty and backwardness) the development of a culture of consumism and education spread in the country a feeling of optimism. War seems now far, even if Italy does not seem to have made a critical analysis of its fascist past or of its responsibilities with regards to the war as well as the persecution of the Jews throughout Europe.