Saturday, April 16, 2016
Assembly C (DoubleTree by Hilton Philadelphia Center City)
After 1945, following almost twenty years of fascist policies to achieve the Italianization of the Adriatic border, thousands of Italian citizens were forced to escape from Yugoslav violence in the Istrian region. What was later referred to as the Istrian exodus fits within the broader phenomenon of post-war resettlement. During this time, countries who fell victim to Nazi-fascism expelled minorities who ethnically identified with or had politically supported former occupying forces during the war. Since the late 1990s scholars of Modern Italy have increasingly studied the Istrian Diaspora and have striven to historicize a phenomenon that was object of widespread political manipulation. This paper aims to contribute to the scholarly debate over the Istrian émigrés and, relying on a wide set of recently released archival sources, discusses the Italian government’s response to the massive wave of Istrian immigration between 1947 and 1956. It suggests that, amidst the debate over the “Trieste question,” a wide network of actors exploited the fate of the Istrian émigrés in order to advance their political objectives. As a result, the émigrés’ depiction as either fascist perpetrators or innocent victims of Tito’s partisans was used to publicly condone the inefficiency of the central government or enhance the criticisms of its main detractors. Thus, while the Istrian case exposes the complexity of state’s responses to mass immigration, it also advances scholarly understanding of its lasting impact on both the émigrés’ lives and their trust toward state institutions.
