Description:

Speaker: Caterina Alfonzo (University of Bologna)

Title: "The Making of Italians: Institutional Response to Disasters and Nation-Building"

Abstract: The emergence of nation-states posed the problem of aligning the borders of modern states to those of national communities, with the political legitimacy of new institutions being essential but not easily achieved. This paper examines how institutional responsiveness to local citizens' needs contributed to building political legitimacy and fostering national consciousness in the early years of the Italian state. Using the first earthquake after Italy’s unification as a quasi-natural experiment, results show that, only in places where the government provided some form of earthquake relief, the population significantly decreases the rate of evasion to the mandatory military conscription -- the proxy I use for local nationalistic sentiments. The comparison between government and monarchy interventions reveals a weak form of imperfect substitutability between the two, with the government emerging as the dominant institution in shaping the long-term process of nation-building.