My Top 5 Favorite Things About Italy!
1. The Food
2. The Scenery
Cities with beautiful architecture, The Alps, rolling hills in Tuscany, the beach with its spectacular coasts, wineries, a city on the water, and history everywhere you look. Photography of Italy always leaves me speechless.
3. The Things Made in Italy
Everyone knows that when you see a tag that reads, "Made in Italy" it means it is well crafted. Italy makes some of the finest cars, clothing, hand bags, shoes, artwork, etc. Italian products are beautifully and creatively crafted.
4. The People
Italians are generally very family orientated, loud, funny, and just great to be around. My mothers side of the family is your typical big Italian family, and it is never a dull moment with them. Italians are unlike any other type of people, and I always find myself drawn to them.
5. The Language
Italiano is a romance language. I love the beautiful poetic sounds of Italian. I took a semester of Italian, and loved it. I hope to speak fluent Italian one day.
Economic and Social Development
Economy
After WWII, Italy was rapidly transformed from an agricultural based economy to one of the worlds most industrialized nations. Italy has a market economy characterized by high per capita GDP and low unemployment rates. In 2012, Italy was ranked the 9th largest economy in the world and 5th largest in Europe in terms of nominal GDP. With an unemployment rate of 8.5%, it is one of the lowest in the European Union. It is a developed country, with the world's 8th highest quality of life in 2005. Italy is known for its influential and innovative business economic sector, an industrious and competitive agricultural sector, and for its creative and high quality automobile, industrial, appliance and fashion design. Today, Italy is the 8th largest exporter in the world.
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| Fiat |
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| Italian Wine |
Social Development
Since World War Two, Northern and Central Italy have become very prosperous. The poverty in Southern Italy has become much less than before. There has been a substantial progress in general social conditions. Income is much more evenly distributed, and Italy has a better education system now. There has also been increased availability of certain consumer goods and essential foods. However, in some sectors, such as public health, there has been a drop in facilities available.
Geopolitical Framework
Mussolini and the World Wars
After WWI left Italy a wreck, people were looking for a way to make Italy strong again. A wave of nationalism swept throughout the country and people were gathering together forming local nationalist groups. On March 23,1919 Benito Mussolini assembled these groups into a single national organization under his leadership. Mussolini called this group Fasci di Combattimento, also known as The Fascist Party. From 1922 to 1943, Benito Mussolini ruled over Italy. Mussolini was an influence and close ally to Adolf Hitler. Out of all the countries in Europe, Germany was the only country that supported Mussolini's attack on Ethiopia. Hitler admired Mussolini. In 1938, Italy passed the Manifesto of Race, which stripped Jews in Italy of their Italian citizenship. On May 22, 1939 Mussolini entered into the "Pact of Steel" with Hitler, which tied the two countries in the event of a war. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, which started the Second World War. During WWII, it was obvious to Mussolini that he was not an equal partner with Hitler and he did not like that. After Mussolini made several poor decisions during WWII, and when Russia and allied forces started bombing Rome, the Italian Fascist council turned against Mussolini in the summer of 1943.Politics of Present Day Italy
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| Current President of Italy: Giorgio Napolitano |
Italy is subdivided into 20 regions, five of these regions have a special autonomous status that enable them to enact legislation on some of their local matters. The country is further divided into 110 provinces and 8,100 municipalities.
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