An article on the encyclical “Fides et Ratio” (Faith and Reason) helps to understand more about a complex and delicate issue

A business culture focussed on Christian ethics and in particular Catholic ethics. A particular view of managing production organisations. A view that needs to be understood well, so as to avoid, right from the start, the idea of the “do-gooder” which, in effect, is not actually part of Christian business ethics. Read “Fides et Ratio: Saint John Paul II on the Ground of Business Ethics” by Jim Wishloff (of the University of Lethbridge), is a good starting point to explore a certainly complex and, among other things, constantly evolving topic.

Wishloff starts his reasoning from the idea of good business performance and uses the theme for an in-depth study of the encyclical Fides et Ratio of St. John Paul II. The author, it is explained immediately, promises to link the text of this document with the entire corpus of Catholic social thought.

The article – published in one of the latest issues of the Journal of Religion and Business Ethics – first explores the content as a sort of “toolbox” on the subject, and then moves on to analyse the Christian view of enterprise management more closely. Later, Wishloff goes on to consider “business culture” seen through the eyes of Christian ethics. In his conclusions, Wishloff underlines that the business culture that springs from the understanding of reality offered by a philosophy of being and of Christian revelation contrasts with that developed by the modern mind’s rejection of the combination of faith and reason.

This is certainly not always an easy read, but Jim Wishloff’s piece is still a good read for those who want to understand more about the Christian business ethics that now play such an important role in the debate on the relationship between profit and social responsibility.

Fides et Ratio: Saint John Paul II on the Ground of Business Ethics

Jim Wishloff (University of Lethbridge), Journal of Religion and Business Ethics, Vol. 4, Article 3

The genius loci of Milan is to be found in its work, factories, construction sites, places of culture, schools and universities. This is a city that studies, creates and engages. And it is a “city that rises” in a frenetic and restless way, as Umberto Bocconi depicted at the beginning of the twentieth century. Gio Ponti explained this genius loci well when he said “Art has fallen in love with industry” and following this line of reason we can see how in essence, industry is culture. This sentence, exemplary and essential, is the title of a work on Gio Ponti published in 2009 by Rizzoli (edited by Ugo La Pietra), to mark the thirty years anniversary of the death of one of the greatest European architects of the twentieth century, and the relationship between projects and products, ideas and materials, designs and the realities of life and work. And it clearly traces the path on which Milan continues to grow, balanced between history and the contemporary.

A path that can be seen today from three converging points of view, all influenced, in one way or another, by the hand of Gio Ponti. The first is the Pirelli Tower, which he designed with Pier Luigi Nervi, and about which an exhibition opens tomorrow to commemorate its sixtieth anniversary. The second is the new Milan Polytechnic Campus, designed by Renzo Piano and opened on 22 June, continuing the renovation of Gio Ponti’s two historic buildings, the Nave and the Trifoglio. The third is the Assolombarda Annual Meeting, scheduled for 1 July, to discuss “regeneration”, the recovery of the economy and of society, in an Italian and European Milan, following the difficult and dramatic period of the pandemic and the recession. Gio Ponti’s Assolombarda building, in via Pantano, faces another of Milanese landmark, the Torre Velasca, where an ambitious renovation, redevelopment and relaunch project is underway. And the Annual Meeting is scheduled to be held in the former industrial area of the Falck Steelworks in Sesto San Giovanni, now the heart of an ambitious architectural and urban project, funded by Forster and Partners, with an investment of €4 billion. Architecture and manufacturing. Concrete ideas and projects. Economy and beauty. Indeed, one might simply say “Art has fallen in love with industry”.

Let’s take a closer look at this. Starting with the Pirelli Tower. It was opened in April 1960 and Dino Buzzati, leading Corriere della Sera writer, in his “Racconti del Grattacielo” (Short tales of the Tower) immediately wrote “The Pirelli tower in Milan, apart from its indisputable beauty, or perhaps precisely for this reason, has great character”.

The current exhibition, curated by the Pirelli Foundation and architect Alessandro Colombo, can be found on the 26th floor of the Pirellone, which since the 1970s has been the seat of the Lombardy Region and is now that of its Regional Council, and illustrates history and current events through images, technical drawings and testimonies. Piero Bassetti, the Region’s first president, had this to say “The Pirelli Tower is something dear and essential to Milan, because it was built by the private sector and then consensually became part of the democratic development of the country at a time of transformation of Italian society and political organisation”. And Gianfelice Rocca, president of Humanitas and former president of Assolombarda, speaks of innovation when he says “Milan must invest in sectors that look towards the future. I believe that the challenge for us all is to ensure that in Milan, also due to its cultural tradition, the digital revolution does not transform us all into virtual beings, but is instead put to the service of a real technological Humanism. And that means making the most of this revolution by bringing services to citizens, by encouraging human contact and communication, by making music, theatre and other cultural activities more accessible and widespread. By making sure that all this takes place in a form that maintains the same spirit that brought the Pirelli Tower to life. Keep your head looking upwards, but your feet firmly in society”.

This combination of memory and the future can also be found in the words of Marco Tronchetti Provera, CEO of Pirelli “In the sixties, the Tower quickly became the symbol of the economic miracle, in an Italy that wanted to start again and to do so found an extraordinary energy, so much so that in only a few years, it became one of the great industrial world powers. This was the energy of the business world, together with that of politics and trade unions, that came together in a great unitary development project, one for a better quality of life ”.

The Pirelli Tower is a significant statement of this. The desire to revive a large company, which has strong roots in Milan, while at the same time being distinctly international, a capability to fuse original culture and productivity, the creativity of important architects such as Gio Ponti and of engineers with globally recognised expertise such as Pier Luigi Nervi, the dynamism of a metropolis that understands and wants to look to Europe. Even today “The Tower is still a landmark for Milan and Italy“. Because, Tronchetti insists, “Milan as a metropolis, like the other great cities of the world, thrives on change, attraction and innovation. It grows in the heart of the most intense dynamics of history, often ahead of its time. It attracts economic, cultural and social resources. It welcomes people looking for a better future. And it stimulates creativity and resourcefulness, faces crises and each time finds the strength to recover, because giving up is not part of its DNA as an open community. In short, it is a metropolis on the move”.

The new Polytechnic Campus, led by a forward-looking Rector, Ferruccio Resta, confirms this. “It is a space open to light”, says Renzo Piano, integrating teaching, research laboratories and green areas. A “stitching together” of the historic late nineteenth-century headquarters in Piazza Leonardo da Vinci, the buildings designed by Ponti and an area of ​​Città Studi that had almost been forgotten but now restored and relaunched. A real “ideas factory“. A change that is of its time. As the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella noted, in his inauguration speech “The new Polytechnic Campus highlights how we can look towards the future in harmony with the period that our country is going through now. This is not a return to pre-pandemic conditions, but a new beginning on new and different terms”.

The themes of the Assolombarda Annual Meeting, led by Alessandro Spada, follow this path of renewal and relaunch, and are significantly in line with the ideas of the Head of State.

A good example of this is the “Milano Sesto” project (which attracted €4 billion in international investment), based in the area of ​​the former Falck steelworks, in the industrial north of Milan, creating services and housing, businesses and innovation spaces and a “City of Health and Research”. And in all Assolombarda territories (7 thousand companies, across Milan, Monza and Brianza, Lodi and Pavia), in an economy that is worth 13% of Italian GDP and the same share of all national exports, a relaunch project is already underway focused on innovation and work. This is the Great Milan, with its ancient industrial vocation reborn, relaunching itself on the basis of advanced models of social inclusion and environmental sustainability, to become a new urban destination where you can live, work, study and build on the work of the territory. Regeneration, in fact.

These are the same values ​​of the EU Recovery Plan. And of the strategic and operational indications of the RRP (Recovery and Resilience Plan) developed by the government chaired by Mario Draghi, whom Assolombarda admires and supports. These are the themes – innovation, work, competitiveness, solidarity – which move the experience of Milanese entrepreneurs. Strengthened by their “polytechnic culture” of science, technology, research, quality production and a sense of beauty. Let’s return to the memory of Gio Ponti, to the art that has fallen in love with industry. A love reciprocated.

A thesis discussed at LUISS University provides a first interpretive framework.

To survive, and grow, a company has to be able to adapt to changeable circumstances. This is true for all its components, and it is therefore also true for the complex range of activities that nowadays fall into a single category, Corporate Social Responsability (CSR). Looking at how a company’s outer changes transforms CSR is very important – indeed, very useful. This is precisely what Matteo Gioia attempted to do with his thesis discussed at LUISS University, Business and Management Department, Communication Strategies and Advertising Practice programme.

Come è cambiata la Corporate Social Responsability dopo la pandemia (How has Corporate Social Responsibility changed after the pandemic) is an investigation aimed at “showing how the significance of CSR has changed after the COVID-19 period: in a situation of crisis, characterised by an epidemiological emergency and a lockdown period that has forced the whole country to quarantine at home, redefining goals and implementing an appropriate Corporate Social Responsibility strategy may prove to be essential.” Starting from this premise, Gioia begins to define the actual concept of CSR and then investigates behaviours, attitudes, issues between working from home and CSR as if they were different sides of the same coin. Gioia then explores in depth the possibility that after COVID-19, the approach to CSR itself might change,

and concludes by explaining: “Teams that deal with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), just as teams in all other business areas, had to adopt a more flexible approach to support the communities. Surviving the crisis while providing tangible contributions to the common good is now an objective as important as containing economic damage and starting again in every industry and at all corporate levels. Robust and coherent CSR policies have become a milestone in the identity of several brands, with customers strongly identifying with the causes a company supports.” COVID-19, in other words, has become a means of social cohesion not just within society, but also between society and businesses. “The new stage does not simply entail going back to business as it was pre-COVID, but, most likely, it will open up a new era defined by rapid changes in cultural norms, social values and behaviours, such as the greater demand for more responsible corporate policies and renewed brand purposes.”

Matteo Gioia’s work has the virtue of summarising a complex, constantly evolving topic, while also foreseeing something that still needs to be discovered and verified.

Come è cambiata la Corporate Social Responsability dopo la pandemia (How has Corporate Social Responsibility changed after the pandemic)

Matteo Gioia, Thesis, LUISS University, Business and Management Department, Communication Strategies and Advertising Practice programme, 2021.

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A book curated by Codeluppi contemplates – and leads readers to contemplate – a corporate culture case study that’s pretty much unique, and still relevant today.

Coco Chanel passed away fifty years ago, and a hundred years ago launched on the market the biggest selling perfume in history: Chanel No. 5. These two anniversaries inspired this collection of published and unpublished writings on the “Chanel case”, which has always been highly regarded, due to its brand identity and communication campaigns. A case that also exemplifies a particular manner of expressing corporate culture that demands to be studied and appreciated. These are the premises of Chanel. Identità di marca e pubblicità (Chanel. Brand identity and marketing), a book curated by Vanni Codeluppi, professor of Media Sociology at IULM University of Milan, and prominent expert on the subject of companies and brands.

As the curator explains, Chanel’s is an exemplary case, thanks to which it is possible to reflect on what happens to a company image over time, but that also leads to the investigation of certain questions that are relevant for the understanding of the nature and workings of something as complex as a brand. The book, then, aims to commemorate Chanel and its perfume – both of which, despite all this time, still have a place among major brands in culture and on the market – highlighting what both Coco as an individual and her most iconic creation can still teach to the world of marketing and communication.
It collects published and unpublished writings, offering readers some thoughts on the “Chanel case”, which has always been highly regarded in terms of brand identity and communication campaigns.

It all starts by focusing on the protagonist, Coco Chanel, of course, as well as her product, seen for what it is: an innovation. This is followed by contributions that first centre on the brand’s identity and its features, and then on the means of product communication. What arises is an effective and significant overview of a particular kind of corporate culture that, though unique, should become a model for everyone.

This book curated by Codeluppi is a must-read, as it is also an example of good collective writing on a business case.

Chanel. Identità di marca e pubblicità (Chanel. Brand identity and marketing)

Vanni Codeluppi (curated by)

Franco Angeli, 2021

“We need to make sure that the recovery is fair and sustainable” asserts Prime Minister Mario Draghi. A return to growth, after the crisis unleashed by the pandemic and the subsequent recession, it’s not enough. If in the past “we forgot about social cohesion”, if “we took democracy for granted” and ignored “the risks of populism”, now we need to look at the quality of development in societies that “are experiencing major economic changes.” As such, “we need to support workers through active labour market policies”, creating “new opportunities for women and for young people, as well as retraining those who lost their job.”

Equity, environmental and social sustainability, employment as cornerstones of the new economic season that we are trying to rebuild. Mario Draghi, adamant that “cohesion is a moral duty” as well as a positive economic opportunity, spoke in Barcelona, alongside the Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, when he was awarded the “Cercle d’Economia” award on Friday 18 June. That was the same day when, in Italy, a trade unionist was run over and killed by a lorry trying to force its way through the picket line of workers striking against “a logistics hell” in Biandrate (Novara).

A coincidence (“an incidence”, would have said Leonardo Sciascia), embodying strong symbolic values. The world of labour is multi-faceted: the high-tech transformation in digital factories active on the international markets, with improved and sophisticated terms of employment and salary conditions, and the backwardness of a service industry where chasing the lowest price results in stark economic and social imbalances. Heavy contradictions and harsh contrasts that we need to resolve and reconcile.

The contextual framework is precisely that of the “fair and sustainable” recovery rightfully mentioned by Draghi. The means include reforms concerning employment, the laws that regulate it, the contracts, the social buffers. A major commitment to be taken on, without cheap rhetorics, with long-term reforms in politics, social representation and businesses. And the current tools include the implementation of the EU Recovery Plan in terms of green and digital economy, as well as the knowledge dissemination process (in schools, through long-term training), social cohesion, and their translation into the PNRR (Piano nazionale di resistenza e ripresa), the Italian recovery and resilience plan recently approved with flying colours by Brussels. Yet, the challenge that lies in that “paradigm shift” accompanying products, production and consumption, which the best international economic literature as well as Pope Francis and those companies more attuned to the need of blending sustainability and competitiveness, productivity and solidarity, have been pointing out for years, is more widespread.

Reforms, then. And investments, thanks to the resources deriving from the debt taken on by the EU and its States (the “good debt” Draghi talks about, as opposed to the “bad debt” generated by ‘crony welfarism’, the productive public expenditure that generates development), as well as a collaboration strategy between public and private sectors, State and market companies.

And looking at companies and their evolution, intriguing data can be found in the Annual report entitled Coesione e competizione – Nuove geografie della produzione del valore in Italia (Cohesion and competitiveness – New geographies of value production in Italy, issued by the Symbola Foundation, Unioncamere and Intesa San Paolo.Or, more concisely, “cohesion is an impressive productive factor, especially in Italy”, as explained Ermete Realacci, president of Symbola.

The world, so says the Report, is changing and the economy that has been guiding us for years is no longer able to deal with the current crises. Furthermore, “through sustainability, new models related to the use of resources (green economy,

sharing economy, circular economy, bioeconomy) and of shared expertise (open innovation, crowdsourcing), to access information (platform economy) and funding (crowdfunding, sustainable bonds), are enabled by new and digital technologies. These are challenges that encourage businesses, communities, institutions, citizens to act together.”

Looking at manufacturing businesses, especially small and medium ones, we can count 49,000 cohesive companies – those more attuned to their workforce, to the territories they liaise with and all other stakeholders. Their number and competitive abilities are growing. And their economic results are better: they export more (58% compared to 39% of non-cohesive companies); they make more eco-investments (39% compared to 19% of non-cohesive companies); they invest more in the enhancement of products and services (58% compared to 46% of non-cohesive companies); they implement measures related to the Italian Transition Plan 4.0 (28% compared to 11% of non-cohesive companies). Moreover, the percentage of cohesive companies that will invest in processes and products that are more efficient in terms of energy and water consumption and with a reduced environmental impact over the 2021-2023 period amounts to 26% compared to 12% of non-cohesive companies.

In cohesive companies, continues the Symbola report, the ability to build good relationship with the world of culture (through donations, sponsorships, partnerships with cultural institutions, etc.) is significantly higher: 26% compared to 11% of non-cohesive companies.

A further significant figure concerns digitalisation: the proportion of businesses that have adopted or are planning to adopt measures related to the Transition Plan 4.0 amounts to 28% of cohesive companies as compared to  11% of non-cohesive companies.

True, there’s still much to do, but cohesion also means “improving the gender balance”: looking at women’s presence in listed companies’ BoDs, the Report highlights an increase from 170 (5.9%) in 2008 to 811 (36.3%) today, while in boards of statutory auditors there has been a rise from 13.4% in 2012 to 41.6% in 2019, with 475 women auditors.

To companies, cohesion represents the opportunity to increase a sense of belonging and life satisfaction in employees (in 2020, welfare disbursements as per trade union bargaining

increased by 19.5%); to strengthen relationships with supply chains and districts (as established by Intesa Sanpaolo, in past years companies within districts have seen their production growing more than the production of companies outside districts); and, finally, to compete in a market that increasingly rewards virtuous behaviours.

While in terms of investments, more capital is injected into businesses that show care for social and environmental aspects. And consumers, “voting with either their wallets or their mouse, are incrementally and deliberately choosing products that respect humanity and environment, and at times support the most sustainable businesses through crowdfunding.”

As the survey conducted by Ipsos for Symbola demonstrates, citizens perceive the themes of cohesion and sustainability as increasingly linked with the notion of quality. Nowadays, two Italian persons out of three are happy to pay a premium price on products and services offered by companies with a cohesive attitude – a difference in price that, on average, amounts to 10% more in favour of cohesive companies.

Where are most cohesive companies located? Almost 70% in northern Italy and more than 50% in three regions: Lombardy (26.3%), Veneto (13.6%) and Emilia-Romagna (13.4%). The Symbola Report also identifies a positive relationship with economic prosperity: the regions with a higher number of cohesive companies are also those with a higher GDP per capita. Territories that benefit not only from economic, but also social and environmental prosperity as, indeed, the correlation between regions where cohesive companies are present and ISTAT’s BES (Benessere Equo Sostenibile – Equitable and sustainable well-being) indicators shows highly beneficial interrelations between “quality of work”, “quality of services”, and “politics and institutions.”

On 27 May 2021, Pirelli presented the Circuito Panamericano, the largest and most modern multi-track complex in all of Latin America. The complex, which is located in the municipality of Elias Fausto, 110 km from São Paulo, covers an area of 1,650,000 m², with seven tracks giving a total of 22 km. It is to be used for developing and testing the company’s new tyres, but it is also available to assemblers and other Pirelli partners, who can carry out technical tests. The main car and motorcycle manufacturers will be able to use it for the launch of their new products. The circuit, which comes in addition to the Feira de Santana and Campinas factories for the production of car and motorcycle tyres, thus expands the presence of Pirelli in Brazil, with technologically advanced activities and products for both the consumer and motorsport sectors. This is a story that goes back a long way.

Pirelli started its production activities in Brazil way back in 1929 when it took over the Companhia Nacional de Artefactos de Cobre (CONAC) and built a factory in Capuava, in the municipality of Santo André, for the production of electric cables and, later, tyres. By the 1930s, Pirelli tyres were already playing a lead role in races on the main circuits around the country. In 1937 and 1938 the Italian driver Carlo Pintacuda won the Rio de Janeiro Grand Prix on the Gavea circuit in an Alfa Romeo with Pirelli tyres.  In the 1950s, Pirelli came to the fore on the Interlagos circuit, as we see in the pages of Noticias Pirelli, the house organ for employees of the Brazilian group, which was published from 1956 to 1981, and which is now available online. In 1956 Pirelli took top spot with a Ford driven by Catharino Andreatta and Breno Fornari, in 1957 with a Fulgor Especial driven by Celso Barbieri and Rugero Peruzzo, and again in 1958 with a Maserati driven by the Argentine champion Juan Manuel Fangio. Pirelli also made its mark in rallying in Brazil, winning the first International Rally in Brazil in 1974 with a Fiat 131 Abarth fitted with Pirelli P7s.

The Santo André factory was joined in 1971 by the one in Campinas, in the industrial area of São Paulo, and then came the one in Gravataì, in the state of Rio Grande do Sul in 1976, and the one in Sumaré in 1980, with the first tyre test track in South America opened in 1988. In 1986 it was the turn of the modern complex of Feira de Santana, in the state of Bahia, now the first 4.0 centre in the area thanks to a substantial investment made by the Pirelli Group over the past three years. The Circuito Panamericano is thus part of the continuing investments in innovation and research and development, showing how Brazil is a key player in the strategy of Pirelli, which is now preparing to celebrate its 150th anniversary.

Over 3,500 students sign up for Pirelli Foundation Educational courses

School lessons are over for this year too. During the 2020-2021 school year, over 3,500 students took part in the all-digital educational programme put on by Pirelli Foundation Educational. The live-streamed courses involved higher-secondary-school students who logged on from different regions across Italy. It was an opportunity for the students to gain insight into the business world and, through a number of events, learn about and examine some of the salient aspects of current affairs, as well as the industrial and cultural history of Italy.

The schools involved were able to choose between four different educational courses. The “Companies and factories of yesteryear and today” course introduced them to the various stages involved in tyre production and to the historical and technological evolution of Pirelli, the first company in Italy to manufacture objects made of rubber. Founded in Milan in 1872 as the brainchild of Giovanni Battista Pirelli, it is now a multinational company that operates all over the world. The “Pirelli Mobility Revolution” course enabled students to explore the history of mobility, with a particular focus on the innovations introduced in this field by Pirelli: from the production of the first tyres for velocipedes to mass motorisation with the Cinturato, through to autonomous connected driving. “Vertical city” is a course on the huge social, architectural and urban changes that have affected Milan – a city that has always had close ties to the company – which has now become both vertical and smart. And in “The history and future of a poster”, which was much appreciated by the schools, the children discovered the works of the great masters of graphic design who, over the years, have worked with Pirelli: from the artistic advertisements of the early twentieth century to the works created by the great names of Italian and international graphic design in the 1950s and 1960s, through to the global campaigns of the 1990s. Historical documents, introductions to works of art and photographs, virtual tours, virtual exhibitions, quizzes and hands-on activities were some of the ways in which the children became involved in the various topics examined.

We wish to thank all the students who took part in the courses with such enthusiasm and we’d like to say farewell to this school year with the backstage of the video that was made at the end of the “History and future of a poster” course. The video was made by two classes of the Istituto Tecnico ed Economico Familiari in Melito di Porto Salvo, in the province of Reggio Calabria. With the support of their teachers and principal, the students drew inspiration from Pirelli’s historic advertising campaigns to create a short commercial in which the Pirelli logo comes to life and keeps track of time. It was a great team effort and involved the young people as actors and videomakers in all aspects of the production of the commercial, from the concept to the set, to the editing and choice of music.

“Architecture can’t work miracles. Just like several other art forms, it can’t change the world. Even so, it can help along or at least interpret a changing world.” This is Renzo Piano‘s view, found within the pages of Il canto della fabbrica (Song of the factory), the book – published by Mondadori – dedicated to Pirelli’s Polo Industriale plant at Settimo Torinese, which, in fact, was designed by Piano. It aptly expresses the challenges that just now, in this season of crisis arising from the pandemic and the economic recession, we need to tackle in order to finally improve our living and working conditions.

“The pandemic is forcing us to rethink our lives and, along with them, our cities,” asserts Carlo Ratti, engineer and director of MIT Senseable City Lab in Boston, referring to the “development of new neighbourhoods” as well as to the “conversion of existing districts in line with more sustainable guidelines in terms of society and environment.” (Corriere della Sera, 28 May).

This is one of the main debates that are capturing public opinion: talks about urban regeneration (like the one held by the Aspen Institute Italia at the beginning of June) and of “the city as a physical and mental space”, but also about new and improved city governance – a key topic just now, when Rome and Milan, Turin, Naples, Bologna and many other Italian regions are getting ready for the autumn’s electoral campaigns that will appoint new mayors and city councils.

The pandemic has highlighted the extreme vulnerability of healthcare, society and economy of both megalopolises and metropolises, towards which most of the world population continues to flock, and, especially in Europe, the “15-minute city” concept, introduced by Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo and taken up by others, such as Milan mayor Beppe Sala, still holds strong. Several cultural and environmental associations (such as the Touring Club Italiano, for example) insist on beautiful, homey hamlets.

The acceleration trend towards smart working, undertaken by many companies, attests to a new work-life balance and raises the issue of digital networks and internet connections as essential not just to the economy, but also to political involvement and access to social services, the key tenets of citizenry.We are facing changes that are not merely technological, but also anthropological: it’s a metamorphosis. It’s a world in motion that rightfully demands new political and cultural ways of thinking, as well as better city governance. “How will we live together?” is in fact the theme of the current Biennale di Architettura, the international exhibition that has been running in Venice since mid-May – a crucial question, related to a future that’s already here.

Some people – remarks Fulvio Irace, scholar of architecture and urban planning – seem to think that the future of the metropolis will entail a disaggregate model, a kind of urban archipelago consisting of small towns. The founders of Grafton Architects, Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara, who designed the Bocconi University building on via Roentgen in Milan and winners of the 2020 Pritzker Prize, the most prestigious international architecture award, believe it to be a good idea: “It’s the traditional neighbourhood model. Neighbourhoods within a larger bubble, the city: the old-fashioned model with virtually self-sufficient neighbourhoods reliant on two types of mobility, the general city transport system and more localised walking for short distances.” (Il Sole24Ore, 13 June).

Redeveloping the city, then – redeveloping the heart of the so-called “agglomeration economy”, hub of ideas, assets, knowledge, and experiences.

It’s true that during the hardest times of the pandemic, people developed a passion for hamlets, a trend towards living in the countryside or in small villages. Yet, Farrell and McNamara warn us now, “even if technology allows us to work remotely and to be self-sufficient, the human pleasure we take in networking, mingling, experiencing that kind of closeness that only cities can offer, has not faded.”

We need to “redesign cities, amongst shadows and hopes”, as mentioned in our blog from 25 May, when we also talked about relaunching Milan as a “more productive and inclusive” city, as the point of reference within a strategy of national development along the axis running from Europe to the Mediterranean. Recalling once again the powerful painting by Umberto Boccioni, The city rises – and it does so with dynamic energy, disrupted by the pandemic but now reawakening (all large building projects are making progress, starting with the MIND Milano Innovation District development on the site that hosted the Milan Expo, and the ambitious MilanoSesto project in the north of the city, with an investment of over 4 billion between manufacturing services, construction industry and parks).

In essence, critical rethinking has become necessary, as asserted by Piano and Ratti, such as redesigning the territory so that the peculiarities unique to Italy are taken into consideration: only a few metropolises (Milan, Rome, and Naples if we want to take into account the crowded, tangled Vesuvius area) and a dense web of small, medium and large cities, towns, villages, parts of the countryside that are intensely industrialised and human-altered, and other areas (the Apennines in particular) marked by widespread abandonment.

Our current times are distinguished by the “Next Generation EU” recovery plan inspired by a green and digital economy – i.e. environmental sustainability and innovation – and by its Italian equivalent, the PNRR (Piano nazionale di resistenza e ripresa), the recovery and resilience plan set up by Draghi’s fine government, whose aim is to spend the 200 billion in loans and non-repayable financial support granted by the EU wisely. In these circumstances, investing in areas that need to be safeguarded, regenerated, and considered essential assets for the development and quality of life becomes crucial.

Reconceiving urban spaces, but interior spaces, too – homes, offices, community areas.

In this respect, the musings shared by Emanuele Coccia, professor at the ’École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, about a genuine “Home philosophy”, come in handy. In his book, published by Einaudi, Coccia discusses “domestic space and happiness” and observes that “we only ever inhabit this planet thanks to, and from within, a house.”

A house understood as “a mental and material artefact, which allows us to exist in the world better than nature would permit.” Thus, rooms and furnishings, but also people and animals, with which we interweave “a relationship so intense that our happiness and our life become one.” Coccia’s narration includes reflections bolstered by personal experience (about 30 house moves in 45 years), joys and pains, a balance often shattered and re-established, as well as overarching analyses on how the habit of making a home could be broadened to include our whole, profoundly human-altered planet. Finding new relations between intimacy and outwardness, often under critical conditions: attempting to find the best ways to live and inhabit this world now it’s more worthwhile than ever.

A recently published book collects theory and practice of these new forms of production organisation

Combining profits with attention to the social impact of a company’s activities: an important goal, already achieved by many businesses, though many others are still far from it. An important goal that comes into sight when, within the context of production organisation, a different vision about production starts making inroads. Reading this joint literary effort curated by
Giorgio Fiorentini, senior professor in Social Enterprise Management at Bocconi University, truly helps one grasp all that’s needed to reach a synthesis between both the economic profit and the social profit that can derive from corporate activities.

Tutte le imprese devono essere sociali (All enterprises should be social), curated by Fiorentini and with the contribution of several prominent researchers, begins with a statement: all enterprises should be social. A statement not meant as a suggestion but rather as an instigation to make this customary, a necessary condition for the development of the socio-economic system and the sustainability of the ecosystem. Not a choice, then, more of an obligation.

Indeed, profit and social impact are two sides of the same coin, and this is the book’s leading theme: social impact companies. Each side complements the other in terms of sustainability, and both are the “stuff” profit and non-profit companies are made of.
Profit (relative profit maximisation) and economic and financial balance are obtained by good company management and, here, making a positive social impact comes to be the essence of entrepreneurship, without aesthetic or reductionist connotations, as well as the necessary condition for the development of the system.

In other words, a successful business is one that uniquely integrates “social ends” (as well as environmental ones) and combines economic productivity with social and territorial productivity, rather than one merely gaining profits for its shareholders.

However, as the book points out, measuring and evaluating social impact is important, not only to obtain a baseline for a business’ social rating, but also because social impact acts internally (e.g. corporate welfare) and externally (e.g. commitment and development of the territory as “space” and “community”), and both lead to a profitable social reputation.

This is the common thread linking the 22 contributions by researchers and professionals gathered in this work that take into consideration, for instance, the place of social enterprises within corporate theory, as well as borderline cases, hybrid social businesses, the relation between for-profit and non-profit companies, the value derived from volunteering activities, and much more. All laid out after Fiorentini’s long and broad introduction, which frames a theme that is, after all, a continuously evolving one.

Tutte le imprese devono essere sociali (All enterprises should be social)

Fiorentini Giorgio (curated by)

Franco Angeli, 2021

A study curated by Ca’ Foscari University of Venice explores the Veneto region’s diverse contexts

History as a means to better appreciate the present. Culture as an essential element of our times. These are the two principles that underpin Industrial Heritage. Le competenze manageriali per l’industrial cultural heritage & brand identity (Industrial Heritage. Managerial skills for industrial cultural heritage & brand identity), a research work curated by Fabrizio Panozzo (professor of Management at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice), for Assindustria Venetocentro.

Furthermore, the investigation takes its cue from a complex vision of good corporate culture, understood as the capacity to bring value to a company’s cultural heritage, history, identity, creativity and unique know-how, and as such the ability to enhance its image, create a sense of belonging, make it different from its competitors. Here, culture also means promoting the attractiveness of one’s territory, thus increasing its appeal and uniqueness, as well as its national and international fame. And more, culture seen as production: creating engagement and excitement, the sharing of meanings, values, emotions, and constantly evolving quality standards. Corporate culture, then, conceived as the lever towards a rebirth of the territory and of Italy.

All this, under different guises, is included in this string of studies curated by Panozzo, who succeeds in mapping the various managerial visions, know-how and expertise that can turn a company’s cultural heritage – always conveyed but less often promoted – into a strategic asset.

This research work includes 57 studies conducted by companies or productive districts of the Veneto region, and 25 studies by museums of labour and of regional industrial cultural heritage, for a total of 82 institutions comprising corporate museums, autonomously managed company museums, regional museums, company archives, state-of-the-art showrooms, educational/experiential paths, commemorative architectural spaces.

The result is a unique and exhaustive snapshot showing the different types of artistic and cultural activities undertaken by regional companies, useful to build a managerial model that can combine productive competitiveness with the ability to showcase one’s origins. Indeed, this is research work that should also be read and used as a model for other regional contexts.

Industrial Heritage. Le competenze manageriali per l’industrial cultural heritage & brand identity (Industrial Heritage. Managerial skills for industrial cultural heritage & brand identity)

Fabrizio Panozzo (curated by), Professor of Management at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Assindustria Venetocentro, 2021