«Second to None in Love of Country»: De Gasperi and the National Con-sciousness of a Borderland Man
Journal title VENTUNESIMO SECOLO
Author/s Maurizio Cau
Publishing Year 2026 Issue 2026/58
Language Italian Pages 33 P. 8-40 File size 306 KB
DOI 10.3280/XXI2026-058002
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For over half a century, Alcide De Gasperi was accused of «Austrophilia» (austriacantismo). Liberals, socialists, fascists, communists, and neo-fascists repeatedly questioned the Trentino leader’s national loyalties. Taking these ac-cusations as its starting point, the essay reconstructs De Gasperi’s conception of the nation. Shaped in Habsburg Trentino, amid local patriotisms and mul-tiple loyalties, it found expression in a «positive national consciousness» that rejected both irredentism and nationalism and did not require nation and state to coincide. This conception survived the transition to the Italian state and, al-though transformed by new political contexts, remained discernible after 1945 in De Gasperi’s approach to national minorities and European integration. The postwar controversy over his alleged Austrophilia thus reveals the ten-sions surrounding a non-exclusive conception of national belonging.
Keywords: De Gasperi; national consciousness; nationalism; Trentino; Europeanism
Maurizio Cau, «Non secondi a nessuno nell’amore alla patria». De Gasperi e la coscienza nazionale di un uomo di confine in "VENTUNESIMO SECOLO" 58/2026, pp 8-40, DOI: 10.3280/XXI2026-058002