Versione italiana

   This conference aims at analyzing the history of Italy’s nuclear energy policies during the Cold War, by placing the Italian case in a comparative perspective and highlighting the importance of the international context in shaping the country’s specific experience. It builds upon a previous conference, organized by Elettra-Sincrotrone Trieste S.C.p.A and the University of Trieste in 2012 (Nuclear Energy in Italy after the Second World War: Research, Culture, Politics - http://www.elettra.trieste.it/Ippolito/). This conference proposes to examine the ways in which international politics and economics, technological and scientific exchanges, as well as social and cultural movements, influenced Italian nuclear energy policies, both civilian and military. Furthermore, it seeks to understand how the Italian case compares to other national histories, in Western and Eastern Europe, the U.S., Latin America, Asia and Africa.

   With few important exceptions, the Italian case has largely remained on the margins of a growing scholarship on the history of nuclear energy. This conference intends to provide a venue for work-in- progress by junior and senior scholars, with the aim of consolidating a national and international research group on this topic. We are particularly interested in fostering an interdisciplinary dialogue and encourage papers that use a variety of approaches, such as history, science and technology studies, physics, engineering, political science, economics, international relations, anthropology, and geography.

Some of the issues that the conference will address are:

  1. The ways in which the Cold War shaped Italian civilian and military nuclear policies.
  2. The role public opinion, social and cultural groups, anti-nuclear and pro-nuclear movements, had in shaping Italian nuclear policies.
  3. The ways in which an interdisciplinary approach such as that of Science and Technology Studies (STS) might provide a new understanding about the history of nuclear energy in Italy.


“Europa nucleare. Bollettino della Commissione per l’EURATOM della Confederazione Internazionale dei Dirigenti d'Azienda”, y. II, i. 3, May-June 1959: 30.

   This conference is organized by Elettra-Sincrotrone Trieste S.C.p.A., the Department of Humanities of the University of Trieste, the Department of Political Sciences of the University of Roma Tre, and the Physics Department and the Department of Documentary, Linguistic-Philological and Geographic Sciences of the University of Rome “La Sapienza”.

   The working group responsible for the conference programme includes professors and researchers from the University of Trieste – Humanities Department; University of Roma Tre – Political Science Department; Machiavelli Center for Cold War Studies – CIMA; University of Rome “La Sapienza” - Physics Department and Departments for Documentary, Linguistic-Philological and Geographical Sciences; Elettra-Sincrotrone Trieste S.C.p.A.

Note: The conference will be held in Italian

Scientific Committee:
Giovanni Battimelli (University of Rome “La Sapienza”)
Elisabetta Bini (University of Trieste)
Igor Londero (Elettra-Sincrotrone Trieste S.C.p.A.)
Leopoldo Nuti (University of Roma Tre)
Giovanni Paoloni (University of Rome “La Sapienza”)
Carlo Rizzuto (President CERIC-ERIC)
Elisabetta Vezzosi (University of Trieste)

Organizing offices
Giulia Iannuzzi (University of Trieste)

Con il contributo