L'Italia liberale e il problema della disoccupazione. Il punto di vista degli economisti (Liberal Italy and the problem of unemployment. The point of view of the economists)

Between nineteenth and twentieth century, as well as in other European countries, Italy ‘discovered’ unemployment as a social problem. Many economists, from different point of view, contributed to this new awareness, despite marginalist mainstream, prevalent within the universities since 1890, undervalued the persistence of unemployment, neglecting as a consequence the phenomenon. The emergence of a theoretical debate on unemployment – first of all within the historicist milieu – depended both from capitalistic system’s growth (characterised by industrialization, urbanization and proletarianization of peasantry), and from the arise of workers’ movement. This last pushed Italian ruling classes to provide economic and social reforms. The debate among economists and politicians, at first mainly theoretical, determined at the beginning of twentieth century a real action against market labour disequilibrium, through the development of insurance instruments and job placement systems. On these bases statistical inquiry on labour market assumed an important role. It was organised, since 1902, within the Labour office of Minister of Agricolture, industry and trade. Labour office was led since 1903 by the socialist and marginalist Giovanni Montemartini.