This book, which has recently been translated into Italian, outlines a step-by-step process for creating a business with a solid future

How a business gets off the ground is crucial for its future. This statement is clear and backed up by lots of concrete examples of good business ideas that ended badly and some others, in contrast, that were transformed into solid businesses. It is important to understand this subject of startups better and in more detail. From an operating view point, of course. Amid the vast array of manuals on managing startups, however, there is still a need for guides that successfully combine theory and practice into one workable handbook. This is the aim of the book Disciplined Entrepreneurship by Bill Aulet, which was recently translated into Italian under the title La disciplina dell’imprenditore. The book is based on lectures given by the author at MIT in Boston and provides a sound framework for starting up a company (or for reorganising an existing company) the right way.
The method proposed by Aulet suggests determining if a customer will benefit from the product offered by the company. It all boils down to six key questions: Who is your customer? What can you do for your customer? How does your customer buy your product? How do you make a profit with your product? How do you design and make your product? How can you expand your business? Together, these questions define a 24-step process to build an “action plan” to help entrepreneurs successfully meet their objective, or to fail more quickly if failure is the inevitable outcome of the process.
Aulet’s book is not only designed as a general guide to entrepreneurship, but also as an introduction on how to successfully create innovative businesses that effectively combine invention and marketing.
Written in a direct and practical style, Aulet’s book closes with a short afterword: ‘Building a business is much more than a 24-step process’. The conclusion to be drawn from this, as the author himself explains, is that once a startup has been successfully launched, the key is to expand it straight away, starting with the creation of a “business culture”. The message is clear – building a successful business is not only about doing the maths!

La disciplina dell’imprenditore
Bill Aulet
Franco Angeli, 2019

An article published in the American Journal of Economics and Business Management tackles the topic of planning customer-focused marketing

This method addresses how production is planned and, indeed, how the entire business is built. It is a human-centred approach. The concept of placing people at the centre of a business plan is only a given on the surface, even for businesses looking to grow by following a culture of production that is more than mechanical. We need to spread managerial thinking that is more complex than the approach concerned solely with the bottom line. Proposals like the one in the article entitled “Design Thinking as a New Method For Solving Marketing Challenges” recently published in the American Journal of Economics and Business Management and written by Klepikova Sofya Evgenievna (Siberian State University of Telecommunications and Information Sciences, Novosibirsk, Russia), help us understand what needs to be done.

The article focusses on “design thinking”, a method for resolving marketing issues businesses might have to face. The author explains that design thinking is a human-centred process that enables marketing professionals to better understand consumers by focussing on the customer. Design thinking is a five-stage research technique for finding solutions: understand the issue, define the issue, develop ideas to resolve it, create “prototypes” to test the solutions and begin testing, and select the best solution. The end result is that the user not only has an effective product that meets current requirements, but also has a solution to some of life’s biggest problems. The company, for its part, sees a significant improvement in its balance sheet. The critical basis of design thinking consists in the centrality of the customer (internal or external), the smart use of feedback and the firm insistence on creating an open-minded culture that welcomes innovation, other people and external pressures.

Sofya Evgenievna provides a brief but clear overview of design thinking which, in a short span of pages, provides a useful summary of this planning process. Businesses need to implement it for themselves to find what works and what does not.

09”

Klepikova Sofya Evgenievna (Siberian State University of Telecommunications and Information Sciences, Novosibirsk, Russia)

American Journal of Economics and Business Management, Vol. 2, 2019

An interesting book discusses the Co-evolution Approach used to cope with pressure arising from the environment businesses operate in

Constant change. This apparent contradiction in terms describes the experience of many businesses today; they are subject to the sole circumstance that remains constant, change. Yet, it is in navigating changes to the constraints and scenarios businesses operate in that many discover possibilities to develop. Success comes to those who manage to ride the wave which, by definition, is in constant motion.

L’impresa coevolutiva. Le quattro sfide del management (The Business of Co-evolution. Four Challenges for Management) by Daniela Bandera is an excellent read for anyone wishing to understand the system today’s companies are operating in and how they need to respond. Ms Bandera is an organisational sociologist. In the late 1980s, she co-founded the Institute of Nomesis Marketing and Social Research, and she continues to serve as a researcher and strategic consultant for businesses and institutions. Her strong point is an ability to observe manufacturers not only from a theoretical point of view but also in practical terms. This enables her to explain how organisational structures can deal with the continual changes that destabilise them, pursuing objectives that are increasingly hard to meet.

She bases her guidance on the Co-evolution Approach, which stems from a theory that combines suggestions from various schools of organisational sociology, as well as from other sciences and disciplines. The core of the co-evolution system is the manufacturing organisation’s ability to both adapt to and influence the organisational environment, creating a context in which doing business becomes easier. This pathway is not simple for manufacturers or for their managers, who must face four challenges: constant change, a new relationship with the market, creation of a collective intelligence and the need for a different type of leadership. These challenges, along with other factors, have christened the acronym SMART, which stands for the key words in co-evolution organisation: Socially sensitive, Merit-based, Allowing empowerment, Reflexive and Transformative.

Daniela Bandera’s book – which first analyses the situation and then moves on to an in-depth discussion of the challenges – is certainly not the only one on the theme of business challenges, nor does it claim to provide a cure-all solution to the issues that managers must deal with. However, it is the right reference for anyone wishing to understand how to cope with a world defined by one constant factor: change.

L’impresa coevolutiva. Le quattro sfide del management

Daniela Bandera

Franco Angeli, 2019

Analysing the operational and methodology facets of current technological innovation

Companies continuously face what is commonly referred to as “technological challenges”. The story is as old as time, yet very modern. Innovation, in other words, has always been around and throughout the centuries has both accelerated and decelerated. Today it is referred to as Industry 4.0. It is important to respond to all that is new. It is equally as important to analyse its meaning and scope. In doing so, we raise the question of development options and the changing culture of production. For this reason, it is interesting to read ‘Le nuove sfide tecnologiche e le principali risposte della politica industriale’ (New Challenges of Technology and the Main Responses of Industrial Policy), a study co-written by Marco Calabrò and Paolo Carnazza of the General Directorate for Industrial Policy, Competitiveness and SMEs – Ministry of Economic Development. The study was presented at the recent XVII Annual Workshop organised by the Italian Society of Industrial Economics and Policy (SIEPI).

The purpose of the study was to analyse the National Industry 4.0. Plan (Impresa 4.0), which the Minister of Economic Development introduced in September 2016. The objective was to: ‘Lay out the guidelines, goals and main measures that were undertaken in three successive budget laws, 2017-2019’. The article also provides ‘evaluations on the Plan’s impact from a macroeconomic perspective and in relation to opinions expressed by a sample of businesses based on a qualitative enquiry conducted by ISTAT’. Subsequently, from October 2017 to February 2018, other Impresa 4.0 results were studied through a survey implemented by MET on behalf of the Ministry of Economic Development.

Everything serves to understand how the Italian industrial system is actually responding to the complex Impresa 4.0 intervention.

Calabrò and Carnazza have reached a variety of conclusions. Beyond the positive evaluation of the interventions undertaken, new aspects have also emerged in the relationship between the industrial system and innovation, calling for attentive study. In particular, five ‘critical’ themes emerge: cybersecurity, privacy, new ethical questions, new forms of alienation and the issue of inequality. Each theme invokes further study that goes hand in hand with what is possibly the most determining aspect of Impresa 4.0: the profoundly cultural meaning of what is happening.

Le nuove sfide tecnologiche e le principali risposte della politica industriale

Marco Calabrò, Paolo Carnazza

XVII Annual Workshop organised by Italian Society of Industrial Economics and Policy – SIEPI (Rome, 31 January/1 February 2019)

The Italian economy continues to be fragile with little and poor growth, despite the presence of strong, dynamic businesses that are competitive on world markets. We have been in recession for months. The forecasts for 2019 range from zero growth according to the Confindustria Study Centre, to a similar 0.1% estimated by S&P and -0.5 predicted by LC Macro Advisor, the consulting company of Lorenzo Codogno, former chief economist for the Ministry of Economy and professor at the London School of Economics. Thus, we can expect a strongly negative economic trend that ranges between flat growth and recessionary conditions throughout the year, completely contradicting the optimistic (and unfounded) forecasts of the Conte government. We are at a serious standstill and it is now finally beginning to worry even the Ministry of Economy to the extent that Minister Giovanni Tria, at the recent Civil Economy Festival, admitted: ‘We are moving towards zero growth … the most productive part of Italy has come to a halt’ (the yellow-green governing parties did not appreciate this moment of clarity and honesty).

We are also facing a structural crisis, the sign of a country that has failed to build a positive cycle of growth and productivity in the last twenty years. We are limping behind the other EU countries, which are flourishing under the global and European growth conditions. In periods of slowdown, we perform worse than anyone else and now we find ourselves the only country in Europe in recession. Why?

Pierluigi Ciocca ‒ one of our most influential economists who for many years was the director of economic research at the Bank of Italy ‒ tries to explain it in Tornare alla crescita (Return to Growth) published by Donzelli. The picture is dramatic: ‘Italy produces no more than it did fifteen years ago; unemployment is high, and not just for young people; jobs are poorly paid and insecure; poverty is on the rise; the national debt is alarming the markets; the issue in the South has escalated; business productivity is stagnant. Culture, institutions, politics and civil society are struggling to jump start and face the challenge.’ Over the years, says Ciocca, no reforms were introduced or implemented to overcome the fragility of the economy. Economic policy did not deal with generational, social, geographical or income imbalances. Public and private investments are stagnant. The legal system has not stimulated competition or growth. For a long time, businesses have had the benefit of a weak exchange rate ‒ before the advent of the euro ‒ wage moderation, ‘scandalous tax evasion’ and state subsidies. Now, in times of radical economic and technological changes and global political relations, we are unable to cope with the new aspects of competitiveness. And yet, Ciocca believes we can still emerge from this long, profound crisis. We must restore public finances, invest, focus on knowledge and innovation, change the laws that hinder competition, and revive the South. He said: ‘The economy must be reconstructed, rebuilt.’

In short, a new development policy is needed. We need one that is very different to the present policy, which consists of public welfare spending and a lack of investment in infrastructure. If anything, the businesses that have innovated, invested, exported and gained important positions in high added value niches on the global market should be nurtured and made to grow. These are few in number, they make up perhaps a quarter of all Italian businesses. However, they will not be able to drive growth unless accompanied by a very different and improved economic policy, within the framework of EU development strategies.

Another way to deal with the crisis is to promote the ‘civil economy’, as suggested by Jeffrey Sachs, Director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University in New York (he spoke about it last week at the Civil Economy Festival in Florence). Sachs called for less inequality, more confidence, clearer choices regarding sustainable environmentalism, and the admission that the green economy is a real factor in competitiveness (Italian businesses are leading players in this regard, as Symbola documents year after year). This would therefore lead to working on the Tessiture sociali (Social Fabrics), as suggested by the title of the book published by Egea. It was written by Aldo Bonomi, a sociologist, and Francesco Pugliese, Managing Director of Conad, an energetic cooperative supermarket chain. There are four terms of reference: ‘Community, business, mutualism, solidarity’. These are times of the “sharing economy” and disruptive innovation and an Italy consisting not only of large cities but also of a myriad of smaller municipalities. It is vital that an effort is made to retain competitiveness and solidarity. The book describes a journey through forty cities ‘to places at the crossroads in which territorial proximity, putting down roots and community attitudes’ emerge as economic and competitive factors in manufacturing, trade, global distribution and “kilometre 0” values. Italian growth is possible only within the context of sustainability, both environmental and societal.

These are cultural, social and political challenges. Marco Bentivogli, Secretary of the CISL (Trade Unions Confederation) metalworkers’ union, has long maintained this premise, which he highlights in his acclaimed new book, Contrordine compagni (Counter-order Comrades), a ‘handbook of resistance to technophobia for the revival of employment and Italy’, published by Rizzoli.

Bentivogli discusses innovation, new and old professions, how to overcome the divisions between scientific and humanistic education, and general needs that must be satisfied without succumbing to populist temptations or to frightened nationalistic narrow-mindedness. In other words, action has to be taken without resorting to doom mongering market issues, inequalities caused by globalisation or fear of the future. If anything, we need a robust and far-sighted reformism that addresses the issues of competitiveness, sustainability, new social balances and the construction of novel employment solutions.

Bentivogli insists (in Corriere Innovazione, 29 March): ‘Stopping progress is not only impossible, it is the most dangerous thing you can do for employment.’ Robots have been used in businesses for at least thirty years, improving work quality, reducing fatigue in the most repetitive tasks, and stimulating creativity, innovation and responsible participation. Bentivogli explains: ‘Repetitive tasks are reduced, the numbers of manual and clerical workers fall, but employment does not end – it simply changes.’ How does this come about? It is an ongoing process, which we must continue to build with creativity and a sense of responsibility.

There are masters of doom mongering and those who spread fear, such as Studio Casaleggio Associati (the “head” of the Five Star Movement, M5S), who maintain that employment will end in 2054. ‘A prediction with a reliability similar to the interpretations of the Mayan calendar regarding the end of the world in 2012,’ states Bentivogli with irony. It is far better to focus on training, employment policies and the intelligent use of welfare, not to distribute resources too thinly, like the living wage so dear to the M5S, but to act as a social security “cushion” when changing jobs or taking up studies to obtain new qualifications. This type of responsible attitude is even proving positive with the trade union: critical, informed, reasonable optimism.

A book illustrating how to exploit and make business art collections available to the community

“Visible” business culture. Objects, locations, works. The idea of production becoming culture has elements of both physicality ‒ factories for instance ‒ and immateriality, which stems from functioning as a part of the production organisation. Collections that could remain locked inside offices (or in rooms used by businesspeople and managers), could perhaps be put on display for the community as a genuine continuation of the spirit which led to their collection. The question of how to face the difficulties that might arise is answered in the recently published book Musei privati. La passione per l’arte contemporanea nelle collezioni di famiglia e d’impresa (Private Museums. The Passion for Contemporary Art in Family and Business Collections) written by various authors and curated by Alessia Zorloni.
The book starts by considering the fact that only a small proportion of the most important collections owned by public museums goes on display. This is an issue that is quite important for collectors who can take one of two options: decide to donate their pieces only on the condition that they are permanently exhibited, or open their own museums to enable their collections to be enjoyed by art enthusiasts. This same situation applies to many companies that come to the following conclusion: making their collections available (including objects which form an important part of their production history) is one of the aspects constituting a business’ social responsibility, which many now be considered the lifeblood of production operations.
The book gives the protagonists a voice and illustrates their creations, analysing the financial, tax and legal issues that families and businesses have to face in trying to manage and showcase their collections. The objective is to integrate the financial perspective with the legal and tax aspects so as to give each collector and the professionals at their side the right tools, methods and skills to develop and implement an integrated asset management strategy.
The three hundred pages of the book start with an overview of the subject together with an assessment of the situation, which is followed by a detailed look at the possible approaches for managing and showcasing collections. Then there is an analysis of the art in businesses and finally there is a focus not only on exhibition techniques, but also on the more operational aspects from a legal and fiscal standpoint. The book concludes with a series of accounts (from Italy and abroad).
The book, curated by Alessia Zorloni, tackles a business culture subject that is often overlooked or ignored but that develops on several fronts. This is a must read.

Musei privati. La passione per l’arte contemporanea nelle collezioni di famiglia e d’impresa
Alessia Zorloni (curator)
Egea, 2019

Examining positive approaches that benefit production and the community

Business and academia. Vital bedfellows, the coupling of which is not always effectively put into practice, but is one which is fundamental to both parties. When you then look to involve the community where this coupling is developing as well, the significance (and the results) can really be quite considerable. However, it is important to understand how to proceed, which is why it is useful to read the work by Cristina Cecchini (University of Florence & LabCom, Research and Action for Psychosocial Well-Being) entitled “Dalla ricerca all’impresa: lo spin-off accademico per agire nella comunità”(From research to business: the academic spin-off to take action in the community). This piece was presented as part of the recently published collection of works Comunità imperfette. Dalle dinamiche disgregative al decision making comunitario (Imperfect Communities, from Disruptive Dynamics to Community Decision Making).

Cecchini explains that one of the university’s missions is to “promote the transfer of results deriving from university research into innovative products and services”. Given this, it works to develop “structured approaches that will facilitate the creation of new business ideas and support their direct application, thus contributing to society’s social, cultural and economic development”. Research thus becomes business and is therefore an opportunity to create well-being and advance social development. Applied culture, according to Cristina Cecchini, has a “positive impact from the point of view of resources and incentives, improving employment prospects for young graduates as well as for academic researchers”.

She continues, adding further detail to this reasoning. In addition to technological transfer, universities can also contribute with spin-off psychological research activities capable of “providing scientifically sound psychological actions based on a community approach, to compensate for the lack of public resources available to support people’s welfare requirements”. This reflects a marked improvement in the relationship between academia, business and the social sector. At a time when welfare is becoming an integral part of national collective labour agreements, and when an increasing number of companies are becoming open to and aware of their welfare and social responsibilities, research can play an important role in terms of providing support.

Cristina Cecchini’s work helps us to understand why and how.

“Dalla ricerca all’impresa: lo spin-off accademico per agire nella comunità”

Cristina Cecchini

In Comunità imperfette. Dalle dinamiche disgregative al decision making comunitario, Palermo, 2019

Leveraging culture. Critical thinking. Philosophy and science. In other words: good books, constraint-free research, conversations “for the love of truth”. Rediscover a genuine culture of dialogue that formed the foundations of our liberal democracies and therefore of our development, health, well-being and a civil society. Regain a Europe worth defending, reforming and strengthening.

In this era of wicked obsessions and mediocre thinking, where rhetoric, propaganda, fake news, subcultures hostile towards science and the free exchange of views, political bullying, and verbal violence (often verging on physical violence) prevail in public debate, there is fortunately a renewed commitment towards dialogue and a defence of civil values.

The central themes include science and the quality of economic development. An important contribution has been released in recent days with the paper “Why science needs philosophy” published by Pnas, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, one of the most internationally renowned scientific magazines. Included amongst the contributors there are two remarkable Italian scientists, Alberto Mantovani, internationally renowned immunologist and scientific director of the Humanitas Research Hospital in Milan, and Carlo Rovelli, physicist currently at Marseille University, nominated by Foreign Policy magazine as one of the top 100 global thinkers. Other contributors include Lucie Laplane (philosopher at the Sorbonne in Paris), Paolo Mantovani (professor of humanistic culture at the University of Roehampton in London), Ralph Adolphs (Humanities and Social Sciences at Caltech in Pasadena, California), Hasok Chang (History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge), Margaret McFall-Ngai (Pacific Biosciences Research Center at the University of Hawaii), Elliot Sober (philosopher at the University of Wisconsin) and Thomas Pradeu (History and Philosophy of Science at the Sorbonne). These are luminaries of science and of humanistic culture, women and men of international renown who are committed to reasoning with understanding and competence on the key drivers of contemporary thinking. They are genuine intellectuals: a term which needs re-evaluating, recalling the words of Tullio De Mauro: “It is a fine word, it is cultural progress and the possibility to face the world with greater awareness.” Devoted to building and innovating over time, a “polytechnic culture”is something Italy has excelled in (this has been brought up often recently in light of the initiatives and events to celebrate five hundred years of Leonardo da Vinci). Not only Italian culture, but also major Italian companies continue to provide significant evidence, with a foot in both the past and the future, skills with historical roots combined with high-tech innovation.

On the subject of the Pnas paper, Alberto Mantovani wrote the following on page 1 of Corriere della Sera on Sunday 24 March: “At a time when the distance between the two cultures is at risk of becoming ever wider, a group of philosophers and scientists have come together to publish a work in a renowned scientific magazine, underpinning with clear reasoning how it is that science needs philosophy. Is this a modern-day paradox, especially in a country like Italy, which is unfortunately scientifically illiterate? Not at all, just as it was no accident that the authors chose Raphael’s ‘The School of Athens’ as an illustration for their article: a tribute to Italy’s classical and humanistic culture.”

A great Italian masterpiece. And, as an epigraph to the paper, they cite a 1944 letter from Albert Einstein to Robert Thornton: “A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is—in my opinion—the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seeker after truth.” The need for research, independence from prejudice, the value of truth (we’ll come back to this in the following paragraphs regarding a new book entitled La verità al potere (The truth in power) by Franca d’Agostini and Maurizio Ferrera, recently published by Enaudi).

But coming back to Pnas. Mantovani claims that: “Science and philosophy share common historical roots. Indeed, we mustn’t forget that in ancient Greece, Aristotle was both a great philosopher and a great scientist. And 19th century Cambridge, where there was a high concentration of Nobel prize winners, saw the best of British science and its rebirth emanate from the so-called Philosophical Society. In the past, even the most recent past, the fusion between philosophy and science has led to scientific progress. For example in immunology, the recent general theory on the functioning of the immune system has philosophical roots: it recognises its discontinuity with the microbial world and in tissue damage. Furthermore, in the stem cell sector, the definition by Hans Clevers of the various classes of cells has philosophical roots. In the life sciences sector, the area in which philosophy has had the most direct impact is in the cognitive sciences, where the reflections of certain philosophers, like Jerry Fodor on the modularity of mind, hastened and drove psycho-neurological research on cognitive mechanisms.”

Comparing competences. These are strong values to be defended, reaffirmed and relaunched whilst keeping a close eye on sustainable development, the environment and on the future for new generations. The values of critical thinking.

Mantovani rightly states: “Beyond specific contributions, there is a fundamental and founding value of philosophical thinking which is at the root of scientific and medical research. It is the propensity for critical thinking, the vaccine we require to protect us from losing our bearings in the face of the barrage of so-called fake news. This is the humanistic culture that science cannot do without, and that it simply cannot ignore. Defending it does not mean remaining entrenched in obsolete or uncritical positions when, for example, talking about teaching scientific subjects in English. Instead it means promoting a critical thinking approach that reflects on the frontiers of science, on the challenges, including ethical ones, which lay ahead of us. I think of the recent cases of genetic modification of human embryos, which led to twins being born in China with modified DNA that made them resistant to the AIDS virus, without any medical justification.”

To conclude: “The meeting and merging of these two cultures is what the authors of the Pnas article desire for science and thinking to progress. Philosophy which understands science well and embraces its advancement can then be — perhaps even by actually being present in research centres, as is suggested by the article — an important instrument for building the bridges that can help society.”

Bridges between thinking and alternative viewpoints, between cultures. Bound by a great common need to go back to speaking about “truth”. Truth is an opponent to propaganda, to the rhetoric of disinformation, to the indifference of opinions.

Critical thinking and the search for truth are featured together in an excellent book by Franca D’Agostini and Maurizio Ferrera (whom we spoke about at the beginning of this blog). The authors write: “We need new rights and a new idea of democratic politics to protect our need for truth and to stop the uncontrolled circulation of nonsense and lies which are damaging to everyone,”. They remind us that the truth “is not a dogmatic notion which leads to unresolvable conflict” (which is actually generated by “the widespread tendency of considering to be true that which is not true at all”) but is the result of research in an “open society” which recognises “alethic rights” (from the Greek a-letheia, meaning “unconcealedness”), for example to receive an education “which enables us to discern, as far as is possible, between truth and falsehood”, and to “have a scientific system and, in general, epistemic authorities which alethically give credibility to individuals, theories and doctrines, or rather are oriented towards the truth, instead of interests that are exclusively financial or political”.  Indeed, truth is challenged in our system that loves prejudice, discrimination, “magical thoughts” unimpeded by science or fact, propaganda founded on fear and discomfort. It is challenge to “liberal thinking” which must be able to “draw on the abilities and critical skills it has historically developed”.

The story of factories during the Great War sheds light on a little-known aspect of Italy’s industrial culture

Factories during war: industrial culture applied to weapons and everything else a soldier may need in the heat of the battle. Oddly, this is a relatively unexplored part of Italy’s manufacturing history. Yet, learning how factories coped with the production demands of war can be enlightening for many, including the managers and businesspeople who today are called to lead Industry 4.0. It’s a matter of being aware of the past, understanding what the present is rooted in and paying attention to those who came before. Which is precisely why it is useful to read Industriarsi per vincere. Le imprese e la Grande Guerra (Industrialisation for the victory. Businesses and the Great War), edited by Andrea Pozzetta and published just a few weeks ago.
The book is a crescendo of images and words that come together to form an interesting mosaic made up of portraits of factories and, more importantly, of women and men who fought the Great War from behind the scenes, working endless hours in order to keep the military production efforts moving.
The volume is an unprecedented iconographic journey about the extraordinary technical and productive mobilisation of Italian factories during the World War I emergency. Canteens, mess tins, canned meat, grey and green wool for uniforms, ammunition, shovels, ice axes all the way to vehicles – from bicycles and cars to aeroplanes and ships – create a fascinating fresco of day-to-day life during the hardships of war, full of previously unpublished documents, postcards and vintage photos. This carousel of items would soon become symbols of Italy’s war effort and shape the collective identity of generations of soldiers and civilians. However, these items are also the tangible manifestation of a thriving industrial culture. As Alessandro Barbero writes in the book’s preface: “This is not just a voyage through faded memories but a lucid commentary on Italy during the first World War: the Italy of our grandparents and great-grandparents, who were called to sustain the most daunting effort our country has ever had to face.”
Pozzetta begins with a description of the “factory of industrial mobilisation”, then proceeds to examine the relations between business culture, scientific research and the demands of war. The book then examines specific developments in the textile and food industries, as well as the inner workings of weapon and cannon production, and the aeronautical, shipbuilding and steel industries as well as the manufacturing of those objects belonging to the so-called “daily life of wartime.”
What emerges is a unique culture of production, which nevertheless represents a proud moment in Italy’s industrial history, and one which had a major impact on things to come. As Pozzetta explains: “Wartime innovation and technical experimentation led to the full-fledged boom of the aeronautics, automotive and mechanical engineering sectors, which in a matter of years would reshape the life and customs of an entire society. On the other hand, factories and workshops witnessed the very first, embryonic forms of welfare and the earliest formal talks between factory-owners and unions. Also, for the first time ever, women became a real presence in the industrial workplace.”
All in all, Industriarsi per vincere is a book that deserves to be read carefully if we hope to rediscover the long and winding road that led to Italy’s industry as we know it. And then there are the photos. Those hundreds of faces with eyes that pierce the page and arrive straight to our soul, like a stern warning we can’t afford to ignore.

Industriarsi per vincere. Le imprese e la Grande Guerra
Andrea Pozzetta (ed.)
Interlinea, 2018

Il socio occulto (The Hidden Partner). This is the catchy title of the latest book by Marella Caramazza, a corporate training expert and director of the ISTUD Foundation. It is also an apt description of the strategy employed by criminal organisations with businesses in Italy’s wealthiest and most dynamic areas, such as Lombardy, Veneto and Emilia, but also Piedmont, Liguria and even the tiny but attractive Aosta Valley. This “hidden partner” infiltrates businesses through a strategy of subsidies, support, protection and funding schemes. Then it securely takes over the company, often expunging its original leaders. And from there it proceeds to expand, destabilising the market, its competitors and social structures, while bribing its way into politics and public administrations.

For years, and unfortunately even until recent times, we’ve heard plenty of people ‒ including prominent local and national politicians ‒ say that “there is no mafia in Lombardy” or that “there’s no sign of it in Veneto, and anyone who says otherwise is trying to slander us”. The same things were said in the 1960s in Sicily, Naples and Reggio Calabria. Then, in time, we found out how much influence Cosa Nostra, the Camorra and the ‘ndrangheta had in those regions, how deeply they had penetrated the socio-economic fabric of the towns and cities, killing, harassing, blackmailing and destabilising so much of Italy’s south. Today, those gangsters rely less on guns, but they are still hell-bent on raking in profits and gaining control of companies and interest groups, destroying businesses and communities, just like a cancer.

A cancer that has spread. It must be fought and excised through better understanding of how the Modelli Criminale (Criminal Models) are evolving, to paraphrase the title of an excellent book by Giuseppe Pignatone, State Attorney of Rome (following a long and distinguished career in Palermo and Reggio Calabria) and Michele Prestipino, Adjunct Prosecutor of Rome. Their book, published by Laterza, is a well-documented and compelling reconstruction of how mafias have changed and are changing, from the Sicilian ‘ndrine of the 1980s that first made its way up North, to the Camorra’s drug-trafficking and illegal waste-disposal operations, all the way to “Mafia Capitale”.

The alarming extent of mafia presence in the North of Italy is confirmed by the latest report published by DNA, the national anti-mafia agency: “’ndrangheta infiltrations in the legal economy of Northern Italy are widespread. This is evident also from the many anti-mafia injunctions issued against companies in the north in such sectors as construction, waste management, transportation and the restaurant business.”

These criminal activities and shady relations are found within political and financial circles. In fact, the DNA report highlights how “gangs, when identifying possible candidates to serve as frontmen for their operations, pay little attention to where these people are from or to the geo-criminal context in which their companies are headquartered”.

Mafia bosses from Calabria, Sicily, Campania and recently also Apulia are colluding with businesspeople in Milan, Brianza and the wealthy industrial areas of Lombardy (“’ndrangheta, you see Cantù but you think it is Locri”, said Nando Dalla Chiesa, director of the CROSS Monitoring Centre on Organised Crime, commenting on a trial involving ‘ndrangheta bosses and local accomplices). But they are also in Brescia and Bergamo (where several ‘ndrangheta men specialised in “debt collection services” were arrested just days ago) and in the rich cities of Veneto and Emilia.

The mafia in Northern Italy is a growing menace that we must try to defeat in the name of a healthy economy.

Further evidence that the problem exists comes from Verona, where the Chamber of Commerce and Avviso Pubblico (a network of local associations against organised crime) have recently sponsored a conference on “Mafias and the economy”, which saw the participation of magistrates, businesspeople, public administrators, members of law enforcement and a vast contingent of students.

“Pay the utmost attention to red-flag offences,” was the warning offered by State Attorney Angela Barbaglia: odd corporate bankruptcies, invoice fraud, tax evasion, bribery. Bruno Cherchi, the lead anti-mafia prosecutor for the Veneto region, noted that “the entire region is at risk of mafia infiltrations”. Indeed, as much was clear just this past February, when a major sting operation led to the arrest of 50 people including ‘ndrangheta and Camorra bosses (with ties to the infamous Casalesi clan), local administrators and businesspeople involved in construction, money laundering and other activities typically related to organised crime.

The answer? According to Verona’s new prefect, Donato Giovanni Cafagna, the answer is to “weaken the mafia by limiting its economic power”. Incidentally, Cafagna, who cut his teeth in the troubled Terra dei Fuochi area of Campania and then in Apulia, also worked in Milan during the delicate Expo years provides an excellent example of how prefecture injunctions to companies suspected of entertaining criminal relations can improve the odds of completing major public projects quickly and efficiently, while also ensuring transparency at all levels of public administration.

We must therefore look closely at what is happening in Milan in order to identify new criminal trends and understand how civil society reacts to them.

Which brings us back to Ms Caramazza’s book: “The mafia’s choice to penetrate the lawful business landscape by taking control of healthy companies represents one of the major risk factors for the preservation of a free market ruled by principles of fair competition.” The author goes on to add: “Their strategy is aggressive but silent and mimetic: lawful business becomes a target for criminal organisations up to the point where the line between legal and illicit – or even criminal – activities is no longer clear.”

The awareness of this phenomenon is exactly what prompted Assolombarda ten years ago to focus on safeguarding and promoting legality as a key element to keep Milan and its businesses competitive, considering mafias (starting from the ‘ndrangheta, which is currently the most prominent and powerful) as a dangerously subversive presence. Subversive for the market, for economic sustainability, and for business and labour relations in countless areas of society and of the economy, including construction, public contracts and procurement, healthcare, commerce, transportation, waste management and a variety of financial services. Assolombarda has championed a staunch anti-mafia effort founded on researching the phenomenon, on strong relations with the Judiciary organs (investigative and repressive action is crucial, even though it isn’t enough on its own) and on constant awareness-raising and communication activity aimed at the leaders of member companies. The key message is to understand that the mafia isn’t a service agency you can contact to solve a problem, obtain a loan, collect a debt, win a public contract, best a competitor or resolve a labour dispute. A relationship with the mafia is “for ever”. So, once a company is “contaminated”, it is bound to sink permanently into the murky waters of illegality.

Message received. “Hidden partners” are still lurking in the shadows – a constant temptation – but so far, they aren’t winning.