Cold War Trieste: the Untold Story of Allied Military Occupation 1945-1954
This project investigates the US strategy in Trieste by examining the views of a wide set of American actors who framed, formulated, and implemented the Cold War logic of containment at the southern point of the Iron Curtain. In line with new approaches to the Cold War that have increasingly shifted away from a narrow diplomatic focus and disputed its centralized nature, this study explores the Triestine problem within American public discourse, the thoughts of American officers and political appointees, and, above all, the views and actions of the Trieste United States Troops (TRUST). While unraveling the complex and dynamic interaction between political action and the public sphere, this study ultimately aims to shed light on the role that the ideology, political language and culture of the Cold War played in the Allied Military occupation of Trieste.
Refugees and Right-Wing Politics: How the European Project is drowning in the Mediterranean
Drawing from my in-depth study of the Triestine case and the Adriatic diaspora, this project aims to comparatively investigate the rise of right-wing political extremism and the weakening of popular support for European integration during the refugee crises that accompanied the Yugoslav wars of succession of the 1990s and the political instability plaguing both the Middle East and North Africa since 2011. In particular, the project examines the parallels between European reactions to both incoming Yugoslav migrants/refugees and incoming refugees/migrants crossing the Mediterranean to unveil the specific sense of otherness that was forged within the European public. In discussing the politicization of the humanitarian tragedy that has transformed the Mediterranean from the “lake of Europe” into a no-man’s land, this project comparatively also explores the extent to which inner-European disagreements greatly impaired Europe’s ability to respond to the humanitarian emergency across its Adriatic frontier and south-eastern border. Aware of the specificities of each case, this project broadens scholarly understanding of the political costs of European discord in decision making, the challenges that have been placed on the project of European integration, and the surge in nationalist rhetoric that has weakened public support for a supranational, democratic, open, and tolerant Union.