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Female Public Employees during a Post-Imperial Transition: Gender, Politics and Labour in Fiume after the First World War
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 May 2022
Abstract
After the demise of the Habsburg Empire in 1918, Fiume's long political transition provided women with new challenges and opportunities. This was especially true for female public employees who had to adapt to a weak and fluid state that provided them with social security and benefits in exchange for loyalty and control. Beginning with two case studies of women elected to the Fiume city council in 1919, this paper explores how the two professional cohorts they represented – teachers and tobacco workers – learned to cope with the turbulent national and political events, as well as with the rapidly deteriorating economic conditions.
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References
1 The Croatian name for Fiume is Rijeka. Here I will use Fiume because I wish to refer to the internationally known name, as well as to the territory of the city after 1918. In 1948, the cities of Fiume and Sušak were unified.
2 ‘L'esito delle elezioni’, La Vedetta d'Italia (VI), 25 Oct. 1919, 2. Olga Kucich was listed as a ‘private’, which could imply that she was employed in a private or family business, lived off private means or did not have paid employment.
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9 Dominique Kirchner Reill, The Fiume Crisis (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2020), 73–107; Giuseppe Parlato, Mezzo secolo di Fiume. Economia e società a Fiume nella prima metà del Novecento (Siena: Cantagalli, 2009), 99–112.
10 Ingrid Sharp and Matthew Stibbe, eds., Aftermaths of War: Women's Movements and Female Activists, 1918–1923 (Leiden: Brill, 2011); Ingrid Sharp and Matthew Stibbe, eds., Women Activists Between War and Peace: Europe, 1918–1923 (London: Bloomsbury, 2017).
11 See for example the recent ERC project ZARAH (Women's Labour Activism in Eastern Europe and Transnationally, from the Ages of Empires to the Late 20th Century) (P.I. Susan Zimmermann).
12 Among the few exceptions see: Parlato, Mezzo secolo di Fiume.
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15 Reill, The Fiume Crisis.
16 Ivan Jeličić, ‘Repubblica con chi? Il movimento socialista fiumano e il giallo Sisa nel contesto post-asburgico fiumano’, Qualestoria, 2 (2020), 73–95; Ordasi, ‘“Scale e Serpenti”?’.
17 Natka Badurina, ‘I croati di Fiume ai tempi di D'Annunzio’, Qualestoria, 2 (2020), 45–71; Vanni D'Alessio, ‘L'altra Fiume. La “dannunzìade” vista e vissuta da croati e jugoslavi’, Memoria e Ricerca, 3 (2020), 491–508; Francesca Rolandi ‘Un trionfo mai richiesto? Partecipazione politica femminile e rappresentazioni di genere nella stampa locale di Fiume e Sušak dopo la Grande guerra’, Italia contemporanea, 293 (2020), 73–98; Giovanni Stelli, ‘Gli autonomisti fiumani e l'Impresa dannunziana’, in Giordano Bruno Guerri, ed., Fiume 1919–2019. Un centenario europeo tra identità, memorie e prospettive di ricerca (Cinisello Balsamo: Silvana Editoriale, 2019), 37–59 and Vjeran Pavlaković, ‘D'Annunzio in Rijeka 1919: Representations in the Yugoslav Press’, in ibid., 99–117.
18 Pertinenza (Heimatrecht), the right of residence established in Austria-Hungary, a kind of local citizenship that allowed Habsburg subjects access to various measures of welfare in their hometown or in their parents’ place of birth, became the basis for post-First World War citizenship in Fiume. On the use and misuse of pertinenza in post-1918 Fiume see Dominique K. Reill, Ivan Jeličić and Francesca Rolandi, ‘Redefining Citizenship After Empire: The Rights to Welfare, to Work, and to Remain in a Post-Habsburg World’, forthcoming in The Journal of Modern History.
19 Legislazione di Fiume (Rome: Provveditorato generale dello Stato, 1926), 82–3, 92–3, 281–4.
20 Claudia Salaris, Alla festa della rivoluzione. Artisti e libertari con D'Annunzio a Fiume (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2002); Giordano Bruno Guerri, Disobbedisco, Cinquecento giorni di rivoluzione. Fiume 1919–1920 (Milano: Mondadori, 2019).
21 Judith Szapor, Hungarian Women's Activism in the Wake of the First World War: From Rights to Revanche (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2018); Victoria De Grazia, How Fascism Ruled Women: Italy, 1922–1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992); Ida Ograjšek Gorenjak, Opasne iluzije. Rodni stereotipi o međuratnoj Jugoslaviji (Zagreb: Srednja Europa, 2014).
22 ‘Cittadini!’, VI, 25 Oct. 1925, 2.
23 The plebiscite on the modus vivendi, a proposal for a compromise on the creation of a formally free State of Fiume strongly tied to the Italian state, held in December 1919, saw D'Annunzio nullifying the result, as it turned out to support the Italian government's compromise line. The elections for the Constituent Assembly in April 1921 were followed by fascists and legionnaires assaulting the courthouse and burning the ballot boxes.
24 Oscar Pedrazzi, ‘Le donne fiumane’, VI, 7 Sept. 1919, 3.
25 See, e.g., ‘Il trionfo di domenica’, VI, 19 Oct. 1919, 2.
26 Silverio Annibale, La questione di Fiume nel diritto internazionale (Fiume: Unione italiana, Trieste: Università popolare, 2011), 93.
27 On the nexus between women's political participation, suffrage and nationalism, see Emma Schiavon, ‘The Women's Suffrage Campaign in Italy in 1919 and Voce Nuova (“New Voice”): Corporatism, Nationalism and the Struggle for Political Rights’, in Sharp and Stibbe, eds., Aftermaths of War: Women’s Movements and Female Activists, 1918–1923 (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 49–68; Angelique Leszczawski-Schwerk, ‘Dynamics of Democratization and Nationalization: The Significance of Women's Suffrage and Women's Political Participation in Parliament in the Second Polish Republic’, Nationalities Papers 46, 5 (2018), 809–22. On local humanitarianism see: Emiliano Loria, ‘“Tizzoni fiammeggianti”: l'assistenza all'infanzia nella Fiume dannunziana (1919–1920)’, in Fiume 1919–2019. Un centenario europeo tra identità, memorie e prospettive di ricerca (Cinisello Balsamo: Silvana Editoriale, 2019), 159–82.
28 Laura Lombardo Radice, ‘Le “Lettere da Fiume” di Gemma Harasim’, Fiume, 9, 3–4 (1961), 184–85.
29 Enrico Morovich, Un italiano di Fiume (Milano: Rusconi, 1993), 40–2.
30 Pieter M. Judson, Guardians of the Nation. Activists on the Language Frontiers of Imperial Austria (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006), 23–4.
31 Laura L. Downs, ‘“The Most Moderate Italianization?” Social Action and Nationalist Politics in the North-Eastern Adriatic Borderlands (1919–1954)’, Acta Histriae, 26, 4 (2018), 1087–102; Monica Galfré, Una riforma alla prova. La scuola media di Gentile e il fascismo (Milano: F. Angeli, 2000), 94.
32 Fabio Giomi, ‘Forging Habsburg Muslim Girls: Gender, Education and Empire in Bosnia and Hercegovina (1878–1918)’, History of Education, 44 (2015), 274–92.
33 Robin Pickering-Iazzi, Mothers of Invention: Women, Italian Fascism, and Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995).
34 Danilo Massagrande, a cura di, I verbali del Consiglio Nazionale Italiano di Fiume e del Comitato Direttivo 1918–1920 (Roma: Società di studi fiumani – Archivio Museo storico di Fiume, 2014), 249–50; Reill, The Fiume Crisis, 218–22.
35 ‘Traditori fra i nostri insegnanti’, Il Giornale politico, commerciale, marittimo e finanziario, 28 Oct. 1919, 2.
36 Marta Verginella, ‘Political Activism of Slovenian Women in Venezia Giulia after World War I and the Rise of Fascism: From Autonomy to Subordination’, Acta Histrae, 26, 4 (2018), 1040–62; Gorazd Bajc, ‘Internments after the First World War. The Case of Women in the Northern Adriatic, 1918–1920’, Acta Histrae, 26, 4 (2018), 1017–40.
37 Questura di Fiume Sezione presidiale, 13 Sept. 1922, k. 56, Opći spisi (3), Školsko vijeće Rijeka (42), Državni arhiv u Rijeci (DARI).
38 Letter by Rosa de Emili, 12 Nov. 1921, k. 55, 3, 42, DARI; ‘Per non dimenticare. I meriti dei nostri liberatori’, La Voce del popolo, 9 Sept. 1922, 2; Patrizia Hansen, ‘Le prime scuole a Fiume in un quaderno manoscritto di Stefano Tuchtan e Antonio Sirola’, Fiume, 33 (2016), 49.
39 Reill, The Fiume Crisis, 207–18.
40 1190, cart. 28, Governi di Fiume, AGF (Archivio generale fiumano), Fondazione Il Vittoriale degli Italiani (FVI).
41 She later became the secretary of Riccardo Zanella, the chief of the Autonomist Party. Relazione sull'ispezione delle classi parallele delle scuole elementari ungheresi, 22 June 1919, k. 54, 3, 42, DARI; b. 723, Casellario Politico Centrale (CPC), Ministero degli Interni (MI), Archivio centrale dello Stato (ACS).
42 Folder Riječko Nacionalno Vijeće (Consiglio nazionale italiano) Reggenza Italiana del Carnaro, k. 53, 3, 42, DARI.
43 Rapporto della prof.ssa Maria Vitali a carico della sig.na prof. Ofelia Nascimbeni, 11 Jan. 1925, k. 53, 3, 42, DARI.
44 Massagrande, I verbali, 256–7.
45 See, i.e., Antonio Demori to Comando della M.V.S.N., k. 62, 3, 42, DARI.
46 Attilio Depoli, Fiume XXX ottobre 1918: scritti scelti (S. Giovanni in Persiceto: Li Causi, 1982), 227–8; Massagrande, I verbali, 406–7, 412–3, 419, 488.
47 On other tobacco factories in the region, see: Miroslava Despot, ‘Tvornica duhana u Senju. Njen postanak, razvoj i prestanak rada (1894–1945). Prilog privrednoj povijesti Hrvatskog primorja’, Senjski zbornik: prilozi za geografiju, etnologiju, gospodarstvo, povijest i kulturu, 6, 1 (1975), 407–20; Raul Marsetič, ‘La Regia Manifattura Tabacchi a Pola’, Quaderni del Centro di ricerche storiche di Rovigno, 27 (2016), 81–139; Tamara Nikolić Đerić, ‘Tobacco Industry Changing Lives: Women Workers at the Turn of the 20th Century’, Narodna umjetnost: Hrvatski časopis za etnologiju i folkloristiku, 52, 1 (2015), 173–88; Anna K. Benedikt, ‘Von diesen Studen an ist unser Geist erwacht’: Arbeiterinnenbewegung in Kärnten 1900–1918 (Klagenfurt: Institut für die Geschichte der Kärntern Arbeiterbewegung, 2014). For an overview on female working conditions: Susan Zimmermann. Die bessere Hälfte? Frauenbewegungen und Frauenbestrebungen im Ungarn der Habsburgermonarchie 1848 bis 1918 (Vienna: Promedia Verlag; Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 1999).
48 Vinko Anić et al., Povijest Rijeke (Rijeka: Skupština općine – Izdavački centar Rijeka, 1988), 259.
49 Karpowicz, Ljubinka and Sobolevski, Mihael, Sindikalni pokret u općini Rijeka do 1941. Godine (Rijeka: Općinsko vijeće Saveza sindikata Hrvatske, 1990), 30Google Scholar, 71; Fried, Ilona, Fiume città della memoria, 1868–1945 (Udine: Del Bianco, 2005), 34Google Scholar.
50 Santarcangeli, Paolo, Il porto dell'aquila decapitata (Firenze: Vallecchi, 1969), 151Google Scholar; Diana Grgurić, ‘Canzonetta fiumana’, Sušačka revija, 89–90, 2016. See b. Canzoni fiumane, Archivio Generale, Archivio Museo Storico di Fiume – Società di Studi Fiumani.
51 Reill, ‘Post-Imperial Europe’, 666.
52 1.242, cart. 28, Governi di Fiume, AGF, FVI.
53 Massagrande, I verbali, 406.
54 Ibid., 297, 311, 349.
55 4.5055, cart. 242, Governi di Fiume, AGF, FVI.
56 Parlato, Mezzo secolo di Fiume, 53.
57 Despot, ‘Tvornica duhana’, 57.
58 K. 44–5, Privremene vlade (3), DARI.
59 K. 5462, Odsjek za Istru 1918–1921, Zemaljska vlada. Odjel za unutarnje poslove (79), Hrvatski državni arhiv.
60 Ivan Jeličić, Nell'ombra dell'autonomismo. Il movimento socialista a Fiume, 1901–1921, PhD Thesis, University of Trieste, 2015–16, 279–89.
61 ‘La lezione delle tabacchine ai corruttori dell'anima fiumana’, Fiume ai fiumani, 23 Apr. 1921, 2.
62 ‘Operiamo nella realtà’, VI, 17 Feb. 1921, 1.
63 Depoli, Fiume, 251.
64 Stefancich apparently became involved in politics well before her husband, Angelo Adam, who would have later become a political activist close to the Autonomist Party. Both Adam and Stefancich, as well as their daughter, became victims of post-Second World War reprisals in their hometown, possibly because of their union activism and their opposition to the annexation of Fiume to Yugoslavia. See Mario Dassovich, L'aquila aveva preso il volo. Pagine fiumano-istriane dall'ultimo dopoguerra (Gorizia: LEG, 1998), 52–3.
65 ‘Voci dalla Tubetti’, VI, 23 June 1922, 2; b. 4942, CPC, MI, ACS; fasc. Manifattura tabacchi, k. 28, Riječka prefektura (8), DARI.
66 See the section ‘Movimento sindacale fascista’, VI, 13, 14, 18 July 1923, 3.
67 K. 13, 8, DARI.
68 ‘La chiusura della Manifattura Tabacchi’, VI, 20 Jan. 1925, 2; ‘L'agitazione delle operaie delle Manifatture’, VI, 20 Jan. 1925, 2.
69 ‘Si riprende il lavoro alla Manifattura tabacchi’, VI, 24 Jan. 1925, 2.
70 Partiti sovversivi, 25 Sept. 1926, k. 136, 8, DARI.
71 Bartulović, Željko, Sušak 1919–1947: Državopravni položaj grada (Rijeka: Pravni Fakultet Sveučilišta u Rijeci, Adamić, 2004), 79–80Google Scholar, 441; ‘Pitanje penzije otpuštenih radnica riječke tvornice duhana’, Naša Sloga, 21 Feb. 1930, 2; ‘Sušačke radnice o svom boravku u Beogradu’, Naša Sloga, 23 Feb. 1930, 2.
72 Massagrande, I Verbali, 71.