Migration is nowadays one of the most important characteristics and common political
interests shared by European cities.362 Munich is a signee of the »European Charter for the Safeguarding of Human Rights
in the City« and a member of the »European Coalition of Cities against Racism«, which
explicitly encourages the right to active participation and equal opportunities for
migrants.363
European Integration policies seek both »to achieve positive outcomes for immigrants
within the domains of employment, housing, education, and health and so on« and to
improve the active participation of immigrants »in all aspects of society, including
the civic, cultural and political fields«.364 Active participation comprises both political participation, including the exercise
of formal political rights and participation in consultative bodies, as well as social
participation, including volunteering in mainstream or migrant organizations.365
The city of Munich, which, in the seventies, had the greatest number of foreign citizens
residing in the Federal Republic of Germany, was one of the first West German cities
to draw up integration policies aimed not only at improving the living conditions
of immigrants, but also at encouraging active participation on their part. By looking
at the immigration history of Munich in the seventies and the case study of Italian
associations, this paper aims to analyze the origin both of integration policies in
the city and of immigrant active participation. The focus of this paper is on a study
of the active participation of Italians, as until the late sixties Italians accounted
for the largest group of foreign workers, and by the seventies they were Munich’s
most longstanding immigrant population. In 1973, the Italian presence reached its
peak, surpassing 28,782 people of whom 5,330 were female.366
The paper’s key questions are: How have integration policies developed at a local
level? Were immigrants and their organizations able to play a role in defining integration
policies?
What forms did the Italians’ active participation take in the seventies in Munich?
What relationships did they have with the German and Italian institutions and organizations?
There are two spheres of influence which Italians contributed to: one being German
organizations and institutions, such as the Confederation of German Trade Unions (DGB)
and the local consultative body for foreign citizens, known as Ausländerbeirat; and the second sphere of influence being Italian organizations particular for Italians
in Germany. These latter were comprised of political, regional, and sports associations,
trade unions, and political representation of Italians abroad.
Unlike research in social and political science, historical analysis aimed at reconstructing
the various forms of active immigrant participation and studying the links and influences
between them is still in its early stages.367 Nevertheless, the purpose of this research is not to examine whether the role of
immigrant associations is of a bonding or bridging nature; rather, it sets out to
examine, on the one hand, the context in which the said associations are formed and
operate, and on the other, the effects of their activities, both on their host society
and on their society of origin.368
Against the background of the city of Munich’s integration policies and the origin
of the Ausländerbeirat, this paper will focus on the forms of active participation enacted by the Italians
within their own organizations, thus leaving unexplored the question of their participation
in German organizations and that of the relationships between different immigrant
organizations.
The Origin of Integration Policies and of the Local Consultative Body for Foreign
Citizens in Munich
Munich’s economic boom in the sixties had led to a sudden growth in foreign workers
arriving from Italy, Yugoslavia, Turkey, Greece and Spain—nations with which Federal
Germany had signed bilateral agreements for recruiting workforce.369 Such workers were mainly employed in construction firms and in the city’s largest
industries, among them BMW, MAN, Siemens, Bosch, and Agfa.370 While in 1961 there were 80,000 foreign citizens registered in Munich, ten years
later, in 1971, that figure had risen to 220,000. Women made up 30 percent and children
7 percent of the foreign population.371 Throughout the sixties, on the whole, municipal politics did not address immigration-related
issues; indeed, managing the flow of foreign workers was the duty of the Federal State;
housing problems had to be resolved by the companies employing foreign workers; and
welfare for foreign workers and their families was handled by the largest German charities.
These were namely Caritasverband, the Catholic church charity which also helped the Spaniards, Portuguese and Croatians,
Diakonisches Werk, the charity of the Protestant church for the Greeks and Arbeiterwohlfahrt, an organization linked to the DGB which was for the Yugoslavs and Turks.
In the early seventies, the municipal administration of Munich had found itself dealing
with an influx of 100,000 foreigners per year without sufficient staff and infrastructures
available.372 Foreign workers made up 18 percent of its overall workforce. The highest concentration
of foreigners was found in the city center, where it reached almost 30 percent.373 The presence of foreign workers and their families became an urgent social issue
for the city; consequently, the town council, governed by the SPD (German Social Democratic
Party) decided to task the Office for Planning and Development (Stadtentwicklungsreferat) with a study on the living conditions of foreign workers and their families. With
this research, the administration acknowledged that the foreign presence had become
an integral and enduring part of the urban fabric.374 This went in the opposite direction to national policy, which continued to define
West Germany as a nation of non-immigration, and laid the foundations for planning
an integration policy for foreign citizens.375 The main argument behind the national migration policy, which considered the employment
of foreign workers as temporary, was belied by the facts. The trends observed were
that foreign workers’ stays were gradually lengthening and the number of family reunification
cases was increasing—Munich being a case in point.
The study highlighted disadvantages and discrimination against foreigners which could
have been eliminated by improving their living conditions (providing lodgings, nursery
school places, support at school, healthcare assistance/advice and so on); by facilitating
their acclimatization to German society (information in their mother tongues and German
language courses); and by changing the law relating to aliens (Ausländerrecht) to allow foreign citizens to stay for unlimited periods and to participate in politics
in order to solve their problems.376 Based on the results of the study, in 1974, the city of Munich approved the first
municipal program to assist foreigners (Ausländerprogramm).377
This program was approved after the Federal government had ordered a halt on the recruitment
of foreign workers (Anwerbestopp), justifying it through the international oil crisis.378 On the one hand, it aimed to reduce the flow of foreign workers and to plan the infrastructure
appropriately in terms of housing, education, transport and healthcare. On the other
hand, it set itself the goal of improving living and working conditions for those
workers considered to be »integratable and willing to integrate« (Integrationsfähige and Integrationswillige) who had been long-term residents.379
At the city level, the Ausländerprogramm firstly suggested setting up a body which would deal with all issues concerning foreigners,
a body which would be working closely with the city’s administration and local politicians.
Secondly, it suggested creating a center for foreigners where they would be able to
find all the necessary information for obtaining a permit to stay, a work permit,
a healthcare card, and family benefits; receive social support; and organize leisure
activities. The first project resulted in the establishment of a local consultative
body for foreign citizens (Ausländerbeirat) in 1974. The second one, namely the creation of a »House for Foreigners« (Haus des Ausländers), would only be implemented, and with many difficulties, in the eighties.
The Ausländerbeirat’s remit was to voice the demands of immigrants through the body and the city administration
as well as to support the city in all matters concerning integration. The body was
made up of 39 members, of whom 26 were immigrants elected among the representatives
of foreign workers; their seats were allocated proportionately based on the size of
the ethnic group they would represent. In addition to these, there were 13 German
representatives nominated by organizations providing assistance to foreigners, political
parties and the local administration. The work of the Ausländerbeirat covered four areas: education and professional qualifications; accommodation and
social problems; leisure, sport and culture; and public relations.380 The problems were notorious: a worryingly large number of foreign children of school
age either did not attend school or left without any qualifications, thus losing the
opportunity to do an apprenticeship. The language problem diminished if the foreign
children had attended German kindergarten but here too there were few places and only
ten-twelve percent of foreign children had found places there.381
The percentage of foreign workers being promoted to senior positions was very low;
indeed, professional training was only encouraged if the company required qualified
workers and could not source them among the German workforce. In the early seventies,
in Munich only 0.04 percent of foreign workers attended professional training courses.
Very few companies offered German courses to their staff and this contributed to making
professional development impossible.382
The living conditions of foreign workers and their families were defined in the Munich
research as »unsustainable« from both a hygienic and a social perspective; only ten
percent of foreign workers lived in accommodation that met national quality and occupancy
standards. Both bed spaces (for individual workers) and family housing were very expensive,
despite the fact that many of these buildings were marked for demolition, being no
longer rentable to Germans due to their loss of structural integrity. The worst conditions
were faced by construction workers, who often lived in prefabricated structures and
by workers in small and medium businesses. The waiting list for a state-subsidized
flat (Sozialwohnung) in Munich was, for foreigners, ten years.383
The work of the first Ausländerbeirat demonstrated its commitment to aiding the social and political integration of foreigners.
It worked to improve the academic and career prospects of young foreigners, to fight
against the ban on foreigners living in overpopulated areas and to allow social housing
to be granted to immigrants. It also campaigned for their right to participate in
the urban renewal plans for working-class areas, inhabited mainly by foreign workers,
and it strived as well to obtain voting rights in local elections.384
In order to create incentives for leisure activities for workers and their families,
the Ausländerbeirat supported the cultural and sporting initiatives of the immigrant associations, providing
financial and organizational support. Additionally, the Ausländerbeirat supported the foreigners’ cultural activities such as theatre and political debates
on the conditions of foreign workers which took place within foreign associations.
However, the initiatives which had most impact on the city were the folk events, which
were widely covered in the local newspapers and also influenced the image that German
citizens had of foreigners. The »foreigner’s day« initiative, linked to the Catholic,
Protestant and Orthodox churches, which was organized by the Ausländerbeirat from 1975 onwards, is the prime example: foreigners, and their lives, gained visibility.
In order to demonstrate »its gratitude« to foreign workers for their contribution
to the city’s affluence, once a year the city of Munich made available the most prestigious
spaces in the center, such as Marienplatz, Viktualienmarkt, the Deutsches Museum, the Altes Rathaus and Löwenbräukeller; they hosted concerts, traditional dance shows, regional food fairs, discussion forums
and they provided information.385 The fair also involved the city’s working-class areas, such as Haidhausen and Westend, and culminated in an international football tournament held at the Dantestadion.386 The event was immediately supported by the city’s press, which presented it thus:
Every sixth inhabitant of Munich feels homesick. These are the 215,000 foreigners
who live here but cannot forget their homeland. Nor need they because the ›metropolis
with a heart‹ has found a solution: ›The foreigner‹s day’.387
However, the president of the Ausländerbeirat did not hide his disappointment; he maintained that while all the events proposed
by the large charities, especially the religious ones, immediately gained attention,
he as the representative of the Ausländerbeirat had not managed to present his own proposals to the new mayor.388
The work carried out by the Ausländerbeirat, particularly its struggle to achieve better political and social rights, no longer
met with the favor of the city council, which had in the meantime, in 1978, elected
its first mayor from the conservative CSU (Christian Social Union). At the end of
his first mandate (1974–1979), the council changed the system of the Ausländerbeirat: its foreign members would no longer be elected from among workers’ representatives,
but nominated directly by the city council itself. Lastly, the replacement of local
party members with other representatives from charity organizations further weakened
the political nature of the Ausländerbeirat.389 The work to support the immigrant associations was, however, reiterated and improved
through an increase in the city’s budget for their activities. The CSU’s stance on
foreign workers was clear: »We are not dealing with foreigners in general, but with
Greeks, Turks and Italians«, and for this reason, »Foreigner’s Day« should be replaced
by the »Day for Greeks, Turks and other nationalities«, thus actively involving the
various respective consulates in planning these events. With this position, the CSU
aimed to »remind foreigners that they are citizens of other nations and are only here
as short-term guests«.390
Regarding the local authority’s refusal to allow the group Il Canzoniere delle Lame di Bologna to perform on the 1978 Foreigner’s Day, Lino Padovan, the president of the Italian
Consular Committee (Co.Co.Co.), who was involved in its organization, said: »The main
reason behind this refusal lies in the difficult political situation which has arisen
in the municipality of Munich, with the new administration under the CSU, which seems
to approve only of folk groups which are not politically engaged«.391
The Co.Co.Co. had links with the local government, not only through the Italian consulate,
but also and, above all, through the Italian members of the Ausländerbeirat.
The Italian members, first elected and later nominated to the Ausländerbeirat, were not only representatives of IG-Metall, the West German metalworkers’ union,
they were at the same time representatives of major Italian political, regional and
sports associations such as the Christian workers’ association ACLI, the association of Campani nel mondo, the Inter-Italia football association. These associations moved within a larger network of such associations
which reported to Italian institutions and politics. The members of the Ausländerbeirat bridged German institutions and organizations as well as Italian ones.
Italians and Their Organizations in 1970s Munich
If we analyze the active participation of Italians in nineteen-seventies Munich, it
becomes clear how, alongside the official structures such as the consulate and the
culture institute, there was a functioning network of associations with links to the
trade unions, the political parties and the Catholic Church. Moreover, the Italian
associations in the seventies also featured a strong push for active participation
on the part of the workers themselves.
While Federal Germany, on the one hand, did not allow foreign citizens to set up party
branches on its national territory, and discouraged the work of foreign trade unions,
especially those with a communist slant, on the other hand, it did allow foreigners
to establish their own cultural and recreational clubs.392 For this reason, the Italian trade unions and parties encouraged the formation of
workers’ associations in order to maintain contact with Italian workers.393 Italian associations thus became the definitive locations for the active participation
of Italians in Munich in the seventies. Alongside the obviously political associations,
a great many regional associations (for people from Trentino, Sardinia, Campania and
so on) sprang up. Given that they were classified as cultural associations, they were
not hindered by the German institutions; in fact, they became favored partners of
the City of Munich when it came to running certain events such as »Foreigner’s Day«,
the neighborhood parties and the »Italians’ Day«. Furthermore, it was in the seventies
that the Italian regional administrations were founded and their councils (Consulte regionali dell’emigrazione e dell’immigrazione) were keen to forge links with their citizens abroad through specific policies to
help emigrants.394
The Italian associations were both places for political activities aimed at supporting
Italy’s national parties as well as for cultural and leisure activities. This dual
function existed in the political associations as well as, to a lesser extent, in
the activities of the regional associations.
In the mid-seventies, the associations could also be classified according to those
which revolved around the Italian Catholic Mission, and those which revolved around
the Circolo Rinascita, which was the unofficial »branch« of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) in Munich,
thus more or less reproducing the Italian political scene of the time.
As Orazio Vallone, a former worker who arrived in Munich in 1964 describes:
When I arrived in Munich for the first time, only the Italian Catholic associations
existed and as a good young communist I used to hang out at the Italian Catholic Mission
as it was the only way to meet Italian girls […]. In 1972 when I returned the second
time, I went to a demonstration against the Vietnam War with a copy of L’Unità in my pocket and met another Italian who also had a copy of L’Unità in his pocket and I got talking to him […] a group formed which met regularly and
we started thinking about opening something of our own, all at our own expense, and
so we founded Rinascita […]. There was also the ACLI, they were linked to the church, Rinascita was on the other side.395
The Italian Catholic Mission was present in Munich from 1950 onwards.396 In addition to its religious work, the cultural, recreational and sports events of
the Catholic mission made it a key meeting place for youngsters and for Italian families.
The Munich Youth Center (Centro Giovanile Monaco), founded in 1970, promoted meetings and film forums, sports events and parties,397 and the Acting Group (Gruppo di recitazione) staged Italian plays.398 In the mid-seventies the Italian mission set up the Center for Migration Studies
(CEDOM) whose purpose was to offer a discussion platform to all the organizations committed
»to solving the problems encountered by Italians in Munich«. 399
The ACLI (Christian Associations of Italian Workers) belonged to the Catholic area. From the
sixties on they were present not only in Munich but across Bavaria, and they were
as active in Italy as well as in West Germany.400 The first president of the ACLI in Bavaria, Giuseppe Rende, had also been one of the first Italians in the Ausländerbeirat. He says: »In 1964 there were 600 or 700 of us Italians at M.A.N. I slept in a shack,
there were 4 of us on two bunk beds in a 12 metre-square room […]. We used to visit
the Catholic mission and Union ACLI and we thought we’d organize something ourselves
and help one another out«.401 The Catholic sector also included those associations registered with the Italian
Union of Associations for Immigrants and Emigrants (UNAIE), such as the association
of Trentino natives around the world (Trentini nel mondo)—the first regional association to be founded in Munich in 1964.402 The president of the Trentino association managed the social welfare service for
Italian workers run by the Caritasverband and also promoted a one-of-a-kind association, that of the Italian Families of the
Haidhausen quarter (Famiglie Italiane quartiere Haidhausen). The association was set up in 1974 and was open to all the Italians in the area.
In the mid-seventies, 85 families were involved in it. The purpose of this association
was to encourage neighborhood solidarity in order to tackle real and common problems.
The problems of housing, work and day nurseries were dealt with by working closely
together with the local social services and by engaging in civic-political participation
through joint activities with other associations in the local area.403
The left-wing associations revolved around the hub that was the Rinascita club. Founded in 1973, it was part of the unofficial PCI Federation of Stuttgart;
in Munich it had its own headquarters in the same building as the Italian communist
trade union INCA-CGIL (Istituto Nazionale Confederale di Assistenza). Alongside its political commitment in favor of the PCI, Rinascita was a cultural and recreational club which responded to the needs of Italians in
Munich.404 Thus, Orazio Vallone says:
We couldn’t use the name PCI as it was prohibited in Bavaria and so we took the name
of the magazine (of the PCI). We opened in 1973 […]. We paid a good rent, organized
our activities, lots of political action, different groups were founded, many groups,
we were already predisposed to forming groups, which then went their own way: ›we
women‹; ›photography course‹; ›theatre course‹ […]. In the beginning all the members
of Rinascita were registered with PCI, however, immediately after (as we had begun to provide
courses in German for Italians), we stopped asking to see membership cards of the
people who came, that is to say that whoever was registered with the PCI was automatically
also registered with Rinascita but you could also register only with Rinascita and not with the PCI.405
Rinascita’s political activities were, first and foremost, directed towards Italy; one example
was the support for the PCI’s campaign for the 1975 administrative elections provided
by the branch’s monthly magazine Tempi Nuovi, in which the Christian Democratic Party (DC) was directly accused of not having
wanted to guarantee respect for the rights and dignity of Italian workers abroad.406 The workers were called upon to organize themselves in order to make their voices
heard and to vote for the PCI, the only guarantor of the change which would allow
them to return to work in Italy.
On the Munich Italian associations scene, Rinascita followed a line of promoting through the Comitato d’Intesa, a platform for drawing together the democratic associations and trade unions with
the aim of establishing common initiatives to resolve issues related mainly to school,
housing and welfare, and of having greater influence in the decisions taken by the
consular bodies.407
Also on the left wing was the Italian Federation of Emigrant Workers and Families
(FILEF) set up in Munich in 1974.408 This organization was founded in Italy in 1967 by the author Carlo Levi with the
intention of promoting autonomous emigrant associations »going beyond every limitation
of party or vision«. Carlo Levi described FILEF as »the democratic organism and the
tool of all those Italians who […] will be recognized no longer as only passive working
instruments but as protagonists.«409
In the mid-seventies, the Munich FILEF drew a large number of activists from Lotta Continua, an extra-parliamentary Italian left-wing group. One of them, Gianfranco Tannino,
says:
I arrived in Munich in 1971 and gradually began to socialize with people who, like
me, had lived through the experiences of left-wing political movements in Italy, and
we reanimated a branch of Lotta Continua. During the May first demonstrations we did not take part in the march organized
by the German Trade union, but in the one run by German autonomous groups […]. During
these demos, the few of us who were from Lotta Continua found that our slogans were being repeated by a lot of people who weren’t members
of Lotta Continua but who knew the songs, knew the name Lotta Continua, and we were excited by that. It was like saying, in Germany there’s still fertile
ground, political activism is possible here.410
In Munich, Lotta Continua supported the protest of Italian workers which led to the wildcat strike at BMW in
1972. 411 The Lotta Continua group which met up at the premises of Rinascita and FILEF decided to sign up to the latter, which with its 300 members was the largest
active Italian association in Munich. In the following years, FILEF took critical
stances against the politics of the Italian Communist Party. This led to a schism
with Rinascita and, in 1980, the Circolo Cento Fiori was founded, which later linked itself to Democrazia Proletaria and then to the Italian Green Party.412 FILEF was linked with the regional association of Emigrant Workers and Families from
the Friuli-Venezia Giulia region (ALEF) whose members numbered 57 in 1976413 and with the Democratic Association of Apulian Emigrants (ADEP) which counted 139
members in the same year.414
Left-wing activism, both political and union-related, was discouraged by the German
Federal Republic. For this reason, there was scarce and problematic contact between
the Italian political associations and the German ones.
Thus Orazio Vallone says:
There was CGIL which was the strongest trade union, there was also CISL, very small,
then there was also UIL which shared its headquarters with DGB, the German trade union.
We (PCI members) always wondered how UIL, a small trade union, shared its headquarters
with DGB while CGIL, which was strong, had come to be completely snubbed by the German
trade union: the reason was that CGIL was communist. For the German trade unions,
CGIL was to be snubbed the way we Italian communists were snubbed by the SPD. In that
period the only left-wing groups which considered us were the German Communist Party
DKP, but we had clear orders from Italy (from the Italian Communist Party): no contact
with German communists, because we knew that it was the DDR and Russia who paid the
German communists. They (the Italian Communist Party) told us to stay in contact with
SPD only, however, the SPD treated us like dirt. Nevertheless, there was a group in
the SPD, the young ones (the Die Falken group), who had always helped us and we began forging links with them.415
In Italy, in the late sixties, there was a unitary trade union consultation between
the three most important Italian trade unions, CGIL-CISL-UIL, which initiated a new
united trade union policy to set out a common plan of action on emigration but there
were notable difficulties in enacting it at an international level.416
CISL and UIL were affiliated with the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions,
like the German DGB, while CGIL belonged to the World Federation of Trade Unions which
meant that in Germany the main trade union did not cooperate with CGIL, the leading
Italian union.417 Due to these difficulties, the unified trade union decided against founding its own
sections in areas of immigration or pushing Italian workers to register with foreign
trade unions. In 1971, for the first time DGB affirmed its active involvement in the
safeguarding of the interests of foreign workers and, starting in 1972, all foreign
workers gained the right to vote in the internal commissions; this was a right granted
first to EEC citizens and later also to those from outside the community.418 Despite this, the union assistance branches (INCA-CGIL) in Munich continued to operate
in a semi-official fashion until 1986, when their support activities were recognized
by the DGB.419
However, the regional associations, as mentioned, were instead accepted by German
institutions. Each of these associations aimed at fostering their native region’s
culture and creating opportunities for Italians to come together.
Thus Francesco Cuomo, who was the chairman of the Associazione dei Campani nel mondo from 1974 to 1989, says:
There were 250 members, but the paying members—because I asked them to pay 25 marks
a year—well there were only around thirty paying members […] There were four parties
organized per year: Carnival, May first, San Gennaro and the Christmas party, there
was nothing religious about them […]. San Gennaro was a party with music and dancing,
and at Carnival we danced and ate together. In those days, there was no Italian television,
and there were still the first generations who would make a point of coming to the
parties, especially those who had children of marrying age, so they could meet other
young people. In those days, parents wanted Italians to marry other Italians.420
Like the Campania association, other regional associations also held regular parties
and this allowed Italian workers and their families to have a social life. The idea
of staying in Germany for a brief period drove the Italians to keep to themselves
and meet up at these special occasions, which were their main leisure activities.
In the words of Mattia Marino, head of the CGIL Office in Munich:
Back then people only looked to Italy but not towards the Germans, practically we
lived our lives in isolation […], contact with German society was rather arduous,
possibly due to the language, the culture, and the Italians sought to join these associations,
clubs and so on, which were very popular back then, with events, parties and so on,
400–500 people, sometimes even more […]. Initially people thought: I’m away three,
four, five years and then I’ll go back to Italy, one famous slogan went »return to
vote, vote to return«, and the associations and all these clubs were all somehow involved
in Italian politics and not in German society, then gradually that changed.421
The idea of returning to live in Italy as soon as possible meant, above all, working
and saving as much as they could. Social and political life developed within the Italian
associations and Italians had limited contact with and interest in German society.
When it came to reaching out to all the Italians and keeping them informed of the
various initiatives, the Italian editorial team of the Bayerische Rundfunk played a key role, using Radio Monaco to let Italians know about the main events
at both local and national level.422
However, the regional associations not only mobilized Italians for traditional festivities,
but for political demonstrations as well—such as those on 1 May, when they joined
the march organized by the DGB and above all, 25 April, Italian Liberation Day, when
along with the other Italian organizations and institutions, they commemorated their
liberation from Nazi-Fascism at the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial. Although there
was great attendance, this did not resonate in German society and was only minimally
reported. Of the Dachau commemoration, as Cuomo describes, »Nowadays 2,000 of us attend,
but before there would be at least 10,000, we’d run coaches from Munich and we would
all go along with our flags and banners«.423 Dachau was where almost half of all Italian political deportees interned in Nazi
concentration camps had lost their lives.424 The commemoration was always attended by delegations of former partisans from Italy.425
Italian associations in the seventies displayed a remarkable capacity for cooperating
and building joint platforms. The various social and political clubs and organizations
worked together in three committees: the Comitato d’Intesa; the Consular Committee for the Coordination and Promotion of Welfare Activities
(Co.Co.Co.), and the Italian Scholastic Assistance Committee (Co.As.Sc.It). The Comitato d’Intesa, promoted by Rinascita, aimed to achieve more active participation from the democratic and anti-fascist
associations in the Italian consular bodies.426 Excluded from the Comitato d’Intesa were the right-wing associations linked to the neofascist Movimento Sociale Italiano (Italian Social Movement), such as the Italian Tricolor Committee of Italians around
the World (C.T.I.M.), the Tricolor Committee of Friulian Emigrants and the Tricolor
Committee of Italian Families, as well as the »Nuova Italia« Association.427 These associations, despite their small member numbers, had been included, along
with the sports associations’ representatives, in the Italian Consular Committee Co.Co.Co.,
the body which promoted activities aimed at developing welfare and recreational activities
to help the Italian community using funds from the Foreign Affairs Ministry provided
to support the projects of associations working in Munich.428 Until the mid-seventies this consular committee had been controlled by Catholic organizations,
namely the Catholic Mission and the ACLI, which dominated the field of welfare and
leisure initiatives aimed at Italians. In 1979, the work of the Comitato d’Intesa, and especially Rinascita, aimed at allowing left-wing associations (which were the most active and numerous
ones) to also have an influence on consular policies, led to the election of the first
communist president of the Co.Co.Co. This Committee was directly involved in staging
initiatives such as »Foreigner’s Day« promoted by the City of Munich.
The third committee in which Italian associations and organizations in Munich worked
was the Italian Scholastic Assistance Committee (Co.As.Sc.It). It too had a budget
from the Italian Foreign Ministry, for educational activities for both children and
adults living in Bavaria.429 This committee worked closely with the City of Munich’s culture office (Kulturreferat) to set up what were termed Modellklassen, that is, classes where teaching was done in the pupil’s mother tongue.430
While relationships between the three Italian committees were strong, those between
the said committees and the German organizations and institutions were somewhat less
intense, though they did exist. And while relationships between the Italian Catholic
Mission, the German Catholic Church and the Caritasverband were straightforward, those between Italian and German trade unions and political
parties were more strained. The first premises of Rinascita and of the INCA-CGIL union were in the same building and just steps from the Munich
of the SPD and its youth group Die Falken which was networked with Rinascita. Some major joint demonstrations were, for example, the workers’ celebration on 1 May.
However, links between Italian and German organizations and institutions in the seventies
were formed mainly by individual players. Indeed, representatives of the various Italian
associations (whether political, regional, or sporting) were also active members of
the German trade union, of the Ausländerbeirat, or of the Munich Caritasverband. The sources examined show, for example, that the president of the Bavarian branch
of ACLI was a member of the three representative committees of the Italian associations
as well as a member of the IG-Metall trade union and of the Ausländerbeirat too. The president of the Inter-Italia sports club was a member of the Co.Co.Co. as well
as a trade union representative for IG-Metall and a member of the Ausländerbeirat. The members of Rinascita were active in the various Italian regional associations as well as in IG-Metall.
These initial links in the seventies gradually strengthened more and more, particularly
in the nineties, when European citizens got the right to vote in local elections and
German parties took a more active interest in relationships with foreign associations
and political parties. However, at the same time the growth of Italian associations
had already begun to slow, with a drop in member numbers owing, on the one hand, to
immigrants returning to Italy and, on the other, to political changes caused by the
fall of the Berlin Wall. Indeed, international political events did not fail to alter
the nature of such associations. Once national parties such as the Partito Comunista Italiano or Democrazia Cristiana had disappeared, Italian associations abroad underwent major changes. The regional
associations gradually died out, while political ones such as Rinascita and the Circolo Cento Fiori changed completely, abandoning their political party-based nature once and for all;
focusing on their cultural activities, they joined the register of German public interest
associations.431 While up until the nineties, Italian associations had moved mainly within the perimeters
defined by the Italian community and by Italian institutions, from the early nineties
on, the synergies developed with the city of Munich’s organizations and institutions
gradually multiplied; for indeed, both sides had by now developed an awareness of
their mutual reliance.
