Dead Valerio Castronovo, historian of Italian industry – Corriere.it

He had established himself by publishing a fundamental biography of the founder of Fiat John Agnelli, the grandfather of the lawyer Gianni. But in his long historiographical activity Valerio Castronovowho died at the age of 88, had dealt with Italian industry in the round, both private and state, and had also explored other territories, for example the events of the informative system, without ever neglecting the commitment to current issues. His choice to join the order of journalists of Piedmont in 2019 was significant in order to offer – he said – a sign of respect and solidarity following the hostile acts and public offenses recently received by Italian journalism, because the journalism a pillar of democracy.

Born in Vercelli on February 15, 1935Castronovo was initially dedicated to Modern historydiscipline that he had taught at the University of Milan since 1967, to then become professor of Contemporary history at the University of Turin, where he remained until 2004. At the beginning he had studied the Piedmontthen the horizons of his historiographical research had rapidly broadened.

In 1970 Castronovo had expressed his interest in the role of information, which then never failed, with the volume The Italian press from unity to fascism (The third). So in 1971 his was out John Agnelli (Utet; then Einaudi 1977), a mature work in which he had highlighted the basic social conservatism of the founder of the Fiatbut he also underlined his strong innovative spirit, which for example had led him to build a complex like the Ingot: it was not only the first Italian industrial plant in reinforced concrete, but it was also characterized, according to the American example, by the close correspondence of the architectural construction to a strictly integrated vertical conception of the production process in a single building. And later came the even larger plant of Mirafioriwhich would mark an era.

At the same time, in highlighting the support that Agnelli had given to Benito Mussoliniwillingly accepting the establishment of a new authoritarian order, Castronovo observed that the Piedmontese entrepreneur had remained substantially extraneous to the swirling market of speculations and trades characteristic of the great fascist bosses. Although he spared no respects for power, Agnelli could not conceive economic policy without a higher degree of productive development, without the guarantee of a more adequate growth process, a need of which it did not seem to him that fascism was sufficiently aware. In fact, the historian noted, Fiat’s attempt to acquire an international dimension under the regime had been mortified amidst the shoals of autarky.

Although it stood on left positionsCastronovo through his research had substantially reassessed the role of Italian industrialists as protagonists of the growth known by our country at the beginning of the 20th century, attributed by him, in the volume Big and petty bourgeois (Laterza, 1988) to the singular vitality shown by the entrepreneurial class in the most dynamic sectors. Even his judgment of fascism departed from Marxist stereotypes. Beyond the convergence of protectionist interests with the large economic groups, the values ​​promoted by the regime, such as fierce nationalism and blind discipline, in his view represented the negation of the fundamental motives of a capitalist industrial society.

Tireless investigator of economic affairs, Castronovo had published a large number of essays. And his intense production of him, with which he had plumbed the events of Italian and world capitalism, had intensified with the conclusion of his academic commitments: for example, he had revisited the history of the nationalization of electricity and Enel. But he had never missed his voice even in the newspapers, first in the Republic and then in the Sole 24 Ore. Since 1983 Castronovo had also led as scientific director a theoretical journal of considerable depth, focused on history and other forms of knowledge, entitled not by chance Prometheus. The mythological character who had given fire to men, arousing the wrath and cruel retaliation of the Greek gods, represented the symbol of the drive towards progress.

Of course, the crescents did not escape Castronovo tensions of an increasingly multipolar worldin which new far-reaching unknowns are added to what he had called, in a 2010 book The long shadows of the twentieth century (Mondadori). He was well aware that the achievements of civilization can be reversible. He worried him a lot for example the decline of progressive forcesto which he had dedicated the 2017 essay The autumn of the left in Europe (The third).

The most evident Achilles’ heel of the parties heirs of the workers’ movement appeared to him to be the lack of vision for the future, at a time when they could no longer make use of the therapies typical of Keynesian interventionism, which in the past had made it possible to relaunch employment and ensure social security and well-being. Globalization, financial crisis, mass immigration, Islamic terrorism in his opinion they had clearly displaced the left, favoring the rise of populist forces among the popular masses scourged by economic difficulties. A scenario which Castronovo was able to look at with the analyst’s cold eye, but which certainly did not leave his deep civil passion indifferent.