GIAMPAOLO CALCHI NOVATI

Studi e politica ai convegni coloniali del primo e del secondo dopoguerra

N. 155

Summary — Due to the structural backwardness of her economy and society, Italy developed her colonial expansion later than most of European powers. For a long time imperialism confused with emigration. The colonial groups needed helping their pressure through a well conducted activity of promotion. That was the main aim of the national Conferences organized by a number of bodies, which on behalf of scientific or commercial interests actually pursued political conquest. The series of Colonial Conference started in 1905 at Asmara, capital town of the newly born colony of Eritrea.

The convenor was governor Ferdinando Martini, who tried to mobilize human and economic energies for an undertaking that insofar was not kept up adequately. More Conferences followed in the years around the First World War. The purpose was to strengthen the shaky and wavering commitment of Italian authorities in the colonial field. The target of Italy's penetration was Africa, and more precisely Ethiopian highland and the hinterland of Red Sea, though Italian settlers and economic assets were concentrated in the South Mediterranean shore. The rhetoric didn’t conceal how reluctant was Italian political system, concerned above all in carrying out the process of State-building and national unity, to invest too many resources overseas, in remote and unknown lands, with a uncertain outcome.

Fascism’s rise gave a moving force to Italian imperialism. Hence a more aggressive approach inspired the Conferences which took place in the Thirties; in spite of the ruthless policy imposed from above, they left an outstanding aggregate of research and studies in all the disciplines involved. Finally, the paper examines the last Colonial Conferences after the Second World War. Because of the defeat in the conflict, Italy lost all her African territories and yet the colonial entourage worked to prepare a "return" to Africa asking for a U.N. trusteeship. The main source of the paper are documents and proceedings of the Conferences themselves.