Leonardo Chess

My research project aims to trace the historical trajectory of interventionism and pacifism in order to study their effects on contemporary Italian politics. The goal is to demonstrate that certain dynamics still present in national politics and in Italy’s subsequent foreign policy decisions—which have resurfaced as significant divides in public opinion and social movements following, for example, the intensification of conflicts in Ukraine and Palestine—can be explained as the continuation of ideological traditions spanning the different political groups and parties that have shaped Italian and European history in the past century, from socialists and communists to liberals, Christian Democrats, and nationalists. Furthermore, the concepts and language they constructed around the issue of war to manage the narrative of the major conflicts of the twentieth century still determine their respective positions in today’s political debate.