Description
Book SynopsisPresents a historical and sociological account of how, by the late 1960s, three small Italian towns had come to lead the world in the production of gold jewelry - even though they had virtually no jewelry industry less than a century before, and even though Italy had western Europe's most restrictive gold laws.
Trade Review"I hope this book will be widely read, not only by people interested in the Italian industrial districts but by all those who want to know more about the social dimension of markets."--Vera Zamagni, American Historical Review "Dario Gaggio's study of three Italian jewelry-making towns is a noteworthy contribution to the literature on Italy's postwar economic 'miracle'."--Tristan Kirvin, Continuity and Change "Dario Gaggio's book, In Gold We Trust, is the twentieth-century story of the important Italian industrial districts active in the manufacture of jewelry, and offers a significant and precious contribution to our understanding of the phenomenon."--Franco Amatori, Enterprise and Society "[T]his theoretically sophisticated, methodologically innovative, and empirically well-grounded study confidently challenges or complicates longstanding assumptions about the evolution of modern industry, structural analyses of social networks, and traditional narratives of successful or failed modernization on the Italian peninsula."--Anthony L. Cardoza, Technology and Culture "This is an interesting and well-written book, articulated over seven chapters and alternating between theory and historical narrative. Gaggio's use of oral history is an effective counterbalance to the drier archival material. Together, they provide a vivid picture of the multifaceted life of artisans, workers, and business owners in twentieth-century provincial Italy."--Francesca Carnevali, Business History Review
Table of ContentsList of Tables ix Preface xi INTRODUCTION: The Political Economy of Small-Scale Industrialization in Twentieth-Century Italy 1 CHAPTER 1: The Socialists' "City of Gold": Valenza Po's Jewelry Industry from the 1890s to the Fascist Era 33 CHAPTER 2: Negotiating the Economic Miracle: Valenza Po's Jewelry Industry in the Decades after World War II 83 CHAPTER 3: From Craftsmen to Craftsmen: The Development of Vicenza's Jewelry Industry 128 CHAPTER 4: A Pyramid of Trust: The Development of Arezzo's Jewelry Industry 154 CHAPTER 5: The Epistemology of Craftsmanship: Patterns of Style and Skill Formation 204 CHAPTER 6: Constructing Locality: The Jewelry Towns, the International Market, and the Italian State 245 CHAPTER 7: Between Development and Decline: Jewelry Work from an International Perspective 279 Conclusion 321 Index 333
