Sviluppo e strategie di guerra fredda: il contagio difficile

The article deals with the encounter of decolonisation and the Cold War and with the convergence of the discourse on development and the Cold War rhetoric in the 1950s. It argues against the master narrative on development, which tells the story of an enthusiastic propagation of the American empire and its idea of progress through the launch of Truman’s point four. It goes on to show that the concept of development existed well before the Cold War started, and that its ideological dimension became crucial between the 1930s and the 1940s, when it was not perceived in East-West terms. It discusses how after the end of World War II the rhetoric of the Cold War and the rhetoric of development were relatively independent one from another. It then discusses continuities in actors, ideas and methods between the Marshall plan and Truman’s point four. It focuses on the importance of the networks of experts in promoting ideas and strategies of development and, through the example of Italy, it shows how the Cold War rhetoric involved in Truman’s discourse was not immediately absorbed by the European allies. It finally turns to the inception of the “strange kind of Cold War” fought with money and technology to win the US-Soviet struggle for the hearts and minds of the decolonizing world. It argues that even among the Socialist countries, which in the mid 1950s were strongly influenced by the very same rhetoric of aid which they openly rejected, the promotion of a common strategy in order to use aid as a tool for political influence in the Cold War was not immediate and required effort and cooperation.