National Content: Italy
The ’48 of the XX century
| Source | Newspaper “La Nazione” |
| Event referred to | March 25th, 1957: birth of the EEC |
| Technological characteristics | Type of file: text Extension: .pdf Dimension of the file: 55 kb Availability proposed: Full availability |
| Description of the source | Kind of source: Front page of a newspaper Origin of the source : Library (Biblioteca Augusta in Perugia) Language: Italian |
| Contextualisation of the source | “La Nazione” is a newspaper politically considered favouring the centre. It is published in Florence. In the time of history during which this issue was published (1957) it expresses pro-government positions, since at that time, starting 1948, the Italian government was made of coalitions of parties led by the Christian Democracy, the first elected party by the people. The issue in question is the one of March 24th, 1957, that is the day before the signing of the Rome treaties, which were the foundation of the ECC. Before the Rome treaties, the six founding countries (Italy, France, Germany, Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg) had already formed a coal, iron and steel community as well as a European commission for atomic cooperation, later rejected by the French parliament. However, in 1955, at the Messina conference, the same six countries underlined the importance of a united Europe, realizing that there was no other political solution for Europe, which was starting to be crushed by the influence of the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, the two protagonists of the Cold War. |
| Interpretation of the source | At the eve of such an event, one that had been long awaited for and prepared, and although there had been moments of crisis and standstill from the six founding countries (Italy, France, Germany, Belgium Holland and Luxembourg), the article expresses optimistic expectations. What prevails in this moment of history is an ethical-political sense for the European unification, which is starting out with an economical unification in order to follow towards a political one. This process is compared to the one of 1848 for its anarchical contents. |
| Original Contents | Alfio Russo, l’autore di questo articolo di fondo de “La Nazione” del 25 marzo 1957, commenta l’imminente firma a Roma, da parte dei rappresentanti di Italia, Germania, Francia, Belgio, Olanda e Lussemburgo, dei trattati costitutivi di CEE ed Euratom. Il governo italiano aveva deciso di portare all’attenzione delle nuove generazioni la solennità del momento dichiarando per qual giorno la chiusura delle scuole. L’autore dell’articolo non dimentica di sottolineare il valore etico e politico di questo evento, proponendo un’analogia con la rivoluzione del 1848: senza armi, senza violenza – dice – dove gli eroi sono tecnici e contabili, non poeti nazionali ma fautori di un progresso basato su spazi geopolitici di scambio e tecnologia. Una rivoluzione senza rivoluzione, una rivoluzione che Comte avrebbe largamente apprezzato, senza sterili poeti o confusi eroi. |
| Original Contents (English Translation) | Alfio Russo, the author of this end page article printed in “La Nazione”, March 25, 1957, comments the imminent signing of the Rome Treaties by the six founding countries (Italy, Germany, Belgium, Holland, France, Luxembourg), which would have occurred in Campidoglio the next day, March 25, 1957.The Government decides to bring to the attention of the new generations the solemnity of this event by declaring this date a day off from school. The editor does not forget to highlight the ethical-political contents of this European event by making an historical analogy with the revolution of 1848: a revolution without weapons, he says, without violence, where the heroes were technicians and accountants, not poets of homelands but of a progress based on geopolitical spaces of exchanges and technology. That is a revolution without a revolution, almost a positive one, one that Comte would have widely appreciated, one without sterile poets and confusing heroes. “This will give the start to a big and peaceful revolution which will complete the national revolutions of the 1800s […] we shall say that this century has its own ’48, one without barricades and without heroes […] a less romantic and more ordinate ’48, one in which the economists are the poets, or perhaps even a few simple accountants, whose researches highlight the risk of isolationism, the misery of autarchies, the impossibility of real and long lasting progress of the people without a larger space.” The treaties are seen as the arrival point of a longer and more patient process of preparation that had began a few years earlier with the establishment of the coal, iron and steel community, as well as the European board for the atomic cooperation. These establishments had been conceived as a defence community, and although the French Parliament did not ratify them some time later, the project was made more concrete during the Messina conference, and saved once and for all from a place of utopia only. The editor underlines the reasons for the disagreements within the six founding countries, particularly the responsibility of France: Germany’s fear that the atomic board could hinder the development of a national nuclear research; the French worry of the competition of the more modern German industries; France and Holland are afraid of the competition from the Italian agricultural world; the French labour unions look with suspicion at the competition of the Italian immigrants on the job market. France is certainly the one that presents more resistance to this process. Its Government needs to overcome the internal opposition of Mendes France, the deputy leading a coalition made of communists, fanatic nationalists members of the right parties as well as that section of the industry and of the agriculture guided by protectionist philosophies. The author, however, finds that two factors of the international policy are dominant and decisive for Europe: the expansion of the markets and of the international relations and the dangerous bipolar powers caused by the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union. Today [1957], he says, only those who have large common spaces at their disposal see the flourishing of political and economical initiatives. Examples are: England with its imperial system, the United States’ strength based on their continental dimension and the respectable military position reached by the Soviet Union. “ The Soviet Union has a space […] no other European nation can take care of itself, therefore it either becomes subjected by someone else or it chooses a protection which will guarantee security and peace while inevitable diminishing its freedom of action. This is the case for the nations located in Western Europe because those in Eastern Europe have already been enslaved by Russia. We all know by now that any politics chosen by one of the European countries cannot ignore Russia or the United States, or it would fail. […]. Do we want to suggest a European nationalism, one to counter the American nationalism, the Slavic nationalism or the African-Asian one? No, not at all. What we are trying to say is that in an era of continental concentrations, facing America and Russia that are not only large nations but also economic empires, a divided Europe, one with patches, one that resembles Arlecchino’s cloak, will only fall. This is why the problem of the Union is so much part of the conscience of the European people.” Alfio Russo does not disregard the problematic relations between the ex-colonialist European countries and Africa and suggests a modern and perhaps democratic solution, which however presents some ambiguities: “The inclusion of the French overseas territories in the common market. This is the boldest and most revolutionary inclusion […] If Europe will not have the strength to maintain its presence in Africa, if it will not have the strength to guide the African revolution it will lose Africa and itself.’ |