Parliamentary inquiry on extreme poverty

Directed by Giorgio Ferroni

The documentary recounts the realities of hardship from north to south, entering urban neighborhoods and rural areas, culminating in a year-long field study in the Lucanian village of Grassano.

In 1950, Italy embarked on the road to post-war reconstruction, but it was still a country marked by structural deficiencies and a backward, predominantly agricultural economy. Especially in the south, farmers and farm laborers accounted for over 60 percent of the workforce, and there were millions of unemployed and poor people. In September 1951, a group of parliamentarians decided to promote an investigation to learn more about the social reality of the country and launched the “parliamentary inquiry into poverty and the means to combat it.” The research and investigation took place throughout the peninsula: the Alps, the Po Delta, the southern regions, the islands, and the poor neighborhoods of large cities such as Milan and Rome. The results, made public in July 1953, paint a picture of an Italy suffering from dramatic imbalance.