There is no European society whose modern history has been more deeply marked by disasters, both natural and social, than has Italy's. Disasters whether epidemics, earthquakes, floods, war, or terrorism--test the social fabric and the political system to their limits, as survival and rebuilding draw on the deepest cultural reserves. This book brings together new research on all aspects of the Italian experience of disaster from unification to the present day. It book is a significant contribution both to the understanding of Italian history, and to the study of the impact of disasters on...

This is a medical and social history of Italy's largest city during the cholera epidemics of 1884 and 1910-11. It explores the factors that exposed Naples to risk; it examines such popular responses as social hysteria, riots, and religiosity; and it traces therapeutic strategies. This book is the first extended study of cholera in modern Italy; it sets Naples in a comparative international framework and relates the disease to larger historical issues, such as the nature of liberal statecraft, the "southern question," mass emigration, organized crime, and the medical profession.

Tuscany, a major agricultural region, played a key role in the rise of fascism to power. This is the first detailed study of the social origins of the fascist reaction within Tuscan society, offering an analysis of the tensions in the social fabric of the region to which fascism responded with such violence. Tuscan fascism was second to none in its violence, organizational strength, intransigence, and missionary zeal. In both town and countryside the central task is to answer the question of who supported fascism, and why. To what extent did Tuscany conform to national patterns? What were the...