RISULTATI RICERCA

Models in Understanding and Planning the City - (Paper first received, April 2009; in final form, July 2009) Abstract The aim of this paper is to present a both chronological and conceptual overview of thirty years of Italian research in the branch of urban modelling within the international context. It frames the Italian contributions within international modelling developments, showing the close interrelations which have been established throughout the period considered. During this brief but creative period we have witnessed substantial shifts in approaches: from a macro perspective to a micro-scale description of urban phenomena; from a static to a dynamic setting; from the role of operational tools in evaluating urban policies to theoretical investigation of urban complexity. The paper is organized around six families of models, which are characterized either by the theories underpinning them or by the formalism used.

Keywords: models, system theory, complexity

JEL Classification codes: C53, C63, O21

Agglomeration, Hierarchy, Urban Rent and the City - (Paper first received, July 2009; in final form, September 2009) The paper fucuses on Italian contributions in the field of urban economics, mainly from a theoretical and empirical point of view. The Italian tradition is characterized by a constant conceptualization effort of the city as a socio-economic archetype, an original historical organizational model of labor, activities and society; the approach generally merges mainstream, mainly neoclassical, tools with more heterodox, evolutionary but also classical economic concepts. In more specific fields, relevant advances were achieved in the theorization, measurement and simulation of optimal city size; in the interpretation of the urban crisis à la Baumol, considering inter-sectoral but also inter-regional exchange relationships; in the analysis of urban forms and their impact on sustainability and social welfare; in dynamic modelling of the urban hierarchy and the theorization of city-networks, based on the advantages of synergy and division of labour; on a proper understanding of territorial competitiveness and the nature of urban land rent.

Keywords: urban economics, competitiveness, urban land rent, agglomeration

JEL Classification: R12, R14, R15

Knowledge Economy and Service Activities - (Paper first received, May 2009; in final form, July 2009)This paper identifies some paths in the evolution of the international and mainly European literature on service activities, and it seeks to relate them to the emerging interest in the cognitive dimension of innovation processes. In particular, it indicates the contributions of Italian researchers who have actively participated in this international debate and in some cases anticipated new perspectives which have then been adopted by other researchers. A characteristic of these contributions is the link between the analysis of services sectors and the spatial characteristics of Italy, such as the diffusion of industrial districts made up of SME specialized in medium technology sectors and the evolution of the Italian urban system consisting of numerous small and medium-sized cities.

Keywords: services, KIBS, innovation, knowledge economy, urbanization economies

JEL Classification: R3, L8, O3

Innovation, Technological Diffusion and Regional Development - (Paper first received, March 2009; in final form, June 2009) The paper reviews the contributions made by Italian regionalists to the debate on the role of knowledge, technical change, and innovation in regional development in the last thirty years. The results show that Italian scholars have given seminal contributions from the theoretical point of view, as well as providing strong empirical evidence in support of their theses. Many topics have been analysed and successfully developed by Italian regionalists (among others, functional deficit, innovative milieux, collective learning, and territorial competition). However, their most original contribution has been to draw a clear-cut distinction between space and territory, with material factors, more than physical proximity alone, playing a significant role in innovation at regional level.

Keywords: knowledge, innovation and territorial development

JEL Classification: R10, R11

Macroeconomic Regional Growth Models: Theoretical, Methodological and Empirical Contributions - (Paper first received, February 2009; in final form, June 2009) Macroeconomic regional growth models have experienced many advances have been achieved for what concerns both the theoretical and the methodological approaches, the former moving from constant to increasing returns models, the latter from a-spatial to spatial techniques. Many italian original contributions can be found in the vast literature in this field, which witness the active role played by italian scholars and by regional scientists, in particular. Original contributions in Italy cover both theoretical issues, like the definition of regional competitiveness, or advances in the new economic geography, as well as methodological issues. This wide spectrum of italian original contributions also covers empirical analyses with innovative statistical methods. The paper ends in a prospective way, by highlighting future research directions that should be followed by italian scholars.

Keywords: macroeconomic regional growth models, theories and methodologies

JEL Classification: R10, R11, R15

Regional and Local Development - (Paper first received, April 2009; in final form, July 2009) The paper deals with the changing features of regional development in the last decades and the changing research approach to them, seeking to identify the contributions of Italian scholars to the international debate. The ‘regional development divide’ of the 1970s induced Italian scholars to shift to analysis of new models of productive organisation underlying the active role of the territory in the development process. A crucial role was played by the model of industrial districts, which stressed that development can be achieved on the basis of SMEs and on specific local resources. The paper also deals with the ‘local productive systems’ determined by a close interaction between economy, society and territory which produces external economies and collective efficiency. The paper concludes by drawing some policy lessons for backward regions.

Keywords: local system, industrial district, endogenous development, external economies

JEL Classification: O18, O20, O30, R12, R58

Macro-Regions, Local Systems and Cities: Conceptualisation of Territory in Italy since 1950 - (Paper first received, April 2009; in final form, July 2009) How to conceptualise the territory has been a controversial issue in Italy both because of the variety of the scientific research programmes seeking to explain territorial performances and because of the extent to which the territorial organisation of the economic process has changed in the past five decades. The paper primarily discusses how the Italian territory has been conceptualised since the 1950s, relating changing conceptualisations, on the one hand, to theoretical shifts and, on the other, to the need to capture the rapidly and profoundly changing territorial organisation of the Italian economy. The paper also argues that the introduction and use of the concept of ‘local system’ have raised two fundamental scientific questions which have still to be properly addressed - and are now prominent on the research agenda.

Keywords: territory, cities, local development, regional disparities, Italy

JEL Classification: R11, O18

L’Europa del dopoguerra e la sua storiografia - Postwar Europe and its historiography analyzes Tony Judt’s Postwar. A History of Europe since 1945 (2005). The book marks an important methodological shift away from a predominantly political historiography of the very recent past. Judt challenges the accepted master narratives through his emphasis on the social changes that characterized the life styles of the successive generations.

Key words: Tony Judt, Europe, Post Second World War.

Parole chiave: Tony Judt, Europa, secondo dopoguerra.

La letteratura controrivoluzionaria italiana (1789-1799) - Italian counter-revolutionary literature (1789-1799) analyzes Luciano Guerci’s recent book (A spectacle never seen again in the world. The French Revolution as a unique, upside down event, for Italian counter-revolutionary writers 1789-1799, Turin, 2008). This is the first analytical study of the major texts, which display common elements. The Revolution is seen by these Italian writers as a unique historical phenomenon and interpreted as a complete overthrow of ancien régime society and Christian religion. The protagonists, whose articles appeared in the «Ecclesiastical Journal of Rome» are, among others, ex-Jesuits, still influential in the Curia, for whom the Revolution was begotten by the "heretical" culturer of the previous centuries, from the Protestant reform to jansenism, the Enlightenment and freemasonry. This original contribution adds to what has become a new field of studies on the Counter-revolution in Italy, France and elsewhere in Europe.

Keywords: Counter-revolution, Italy 1796-1799, Jansenism, Jesuits.

Parole chiave: Controrivoluzione, Italia 1789-1799, giansenismo, gesuiti.

Architettura e fascismo. Temi e questioni storiografiche - Architecture and Fascism. Issues and interpretative perspectives examines the historical debate regarding Fascist architecture which has been ongoing over the last decade. In particular, it analyses some interpretative issues that have proven most interesting both for political historians and architectural historians: the existence of a «totalitarian style», the relationship between the Fascist regime and architects, the ideological connotation of urban and rural landscape, the legacy of the Fascist experience on the Italian Republic.

Key words: Italian Architecture, Fascism, Totalitarianism, Urban and Rural History, Rome.

Parole chiave: architettura italiana, fascismo, totalitarismo, storia urbana e rurale, Roma.

La Repubblica sociale italiana come problema storiografico: il caso torinese - The Italian Social Republic as a historiographic problem proposes an interpretive key for a broader analysis of the Italian Social Republic (Rsi), from its formation to its collapse. The Party is seen both as the central actor of the Social Republic and the voice of its overall political project, within a prolonged confrontation and clash with the State. The relations of the Pfr with the different actors in the city of Turin are also explored: the urban community, the Church, the industrialists, the Germans and the Resistance. The interpretation reflects a micro-historical methodological approach, and proposes themes hitherto ignored, such as juvenile discontent and the generational break that resulted. The purpose is to propose new research tracks that make it possible to go beyond the local context, redefining some wider in historiographic questions.

Key words: Fascist Republican Party, Italian Social Republic, Turin, Generation, Community.

Parole chiave: Pfr, Rsi, Torino, generazione, comunità.

The silent casualty: documentaries and the environmental impact of war - Talks about the devastating impact war has on the environment: an issue that not always has been fully taken into consideration. Nonetheless, the interest of historians and film-makers for the topic has been increasing steadily over time. The forests and fields destroyed by the Americans in Vietnam, the oil wells set on fire by the Iraqis in Kuwait, the Yugoslav factories bombed by Nato air raids are just some of the possible examples of war-related environmental disasters. This article aims at showing some striking cases as they are depicted, beyond traditional historiography, in documentary films and at explaining the main issues at stake from the professional historian’s point of view.

Keywords: Documentaries, War, Environment, Vietnam, Kuwait, Kosovo.

Parole chiave: Documentari, Guerra, Ambiente, Vietnam, Kuwait, Kosovo.

Italian Popular Sport and West German Arbeitersport (1945-1950) - Focuses on the sport policies of the Italian Communist Party and the West German Social Democratic Party in the post-war period. Whereas the Pci leadership decided to build up a flanking sports association (the Unione Italiana Sport Popolare, established in 1948), the Spd abandoned the pre-Nazi tradition of the Arbeitersport (workers’ sport). Based on a research undertaken in the archives of the two parties, the article analyses their sport policies in a comparative perspective. Particular attention is paid to the legacy of the Nazi and Fascist regimes and the different political contexts in the two countries after World War II.

Keywords: Italian Communist Party, West German Social Democratic Party, Sport, Labour Movement, Leisure.

Parole chiave: Partito comunista italiano, Partito socialdemocratico tedesco-occidentale, sport, movimento operaio, tempo libero.

Iqbal Masih. New forms of slavery examines how the concept of slavery evolved through the 19th and 20th centuries - The definition of slavery used by the international organizations - League of Nations, International Labour Organization, United Nations - has acquired an ever broader significance: in place of chattel slavery, it has come to include the different forms of the violent subjection of men, women and children in order to exploit them. The "new forms of slavery" of the contemporary period differ from the traditional ones (which still exist in some countries, such as Mauritania), while still maintaining various elements of continuity with them. The comparison between old and new forms of slavery can deepen our understanding of both at the historiographic level.

Key words: Slavery, Contemporary Slavery, Human Trafficking, Human rights.

Parole chiave: schiavitù, nuove schiavitù, tratta, diritti umani.

International ranking for history journals - The history of the initiative of the European Science Foundation (Esf) to create a European Reference Index for the Humanities (Erih), intended to replace peer review by metrics, is reconstructed, with an analysis of the multiple limitations, distortions and negative consequences, that are apparent in the initial list, rendered public on the web in 2007. This followed by three case studies, of this followed by accounts of the highly negative responses to the initiative of the research communities and funding bodies in Germany, France and England.

Key words: Ranking, History journals, Erih, Humanities, Peer Review.

Parole chiave: Ranking, riviste di storia, Erih, Scienze umane, Peer Review.

L’Europa orientale a venti anni dal 1989 - Eastern Europe twenty years on looks retrospectively at the radical changes that have occurred in East-Central Europe since 1989. Despite the Cold War, cultural, economic and social exchanges and "métissages" had developed between the two parts of Europe. The communist collapse of 1989 offered a simultaneous opportunity of reforms and integration, given the interdependence between the "post-socialist transition" and the double process of the Eu enlargement and deepening. Nationalism however has emerged in opposition to integration (and globalization) in both Eastern and Western Europe, giving a new dimension to processes that increasingly have emphasized how Europe is no longer divided in an East-West dichotomy, but displays similar problems in dealing with diversity, social welfare, effective governance and mutual recognition.

Key words: Post-socialist transition, European Union, métissage, Nationalism, Globalization.

Parole chiave: transizione post-socialista, Unione europea, meticciato, nazionalismo, globalizzazione.

Discutere il concetto d’identità e di cittadinanza non è mai un’operazione neutrale poiché le implicazioni politiche attraversano le nostre prese di posizioni di fronte al mondo. Mostrando la cittadinanza come il risultato di un rito istituzionale definiamo il comportamento e le regole di comportamento nella società, ovvero l’ethos. Possiamo anche considerare l’identità come l’espressione delle disposizioni interiori attraverso il processo di socializzazione, ovvero l’habitus. Infine, mostrando la sovrapposizione di questi due concetti all’interno di ogni gruppo d’individui sveliamo il meccanismo di conservazione del territorio dove si costruiscono, si conferiscono, si producono e si riproducono le argomentazioni di una rappresentazione integrata dell’unità dei gruppi e dei loro interessi. Questo articolo aiuta a comprendere che la durabilità di un territorio simbolico e fisico, all’interno del quale cittadinanza ed identità sono costituiti, dipende dalla capacità sociale di includere gli altri integrando i loro interessi. È grazie a questa pratica sociali che la società sino ad ora hanno assicurato la loro conservazione ed è inevitabilmente lungo questo processo che continueranno a farlo.