The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Southern Europe Policy, Economy and Institutional Transformation, 1950s-1980s

Introduction
Lucia Coppolaro, Francesco Petrini and Leonida Tedoldi 

1. Competing Visions, Fragmented Strategies: The World Bank’s Loans in Southern Italy (1946-1959)  
Elisa Grandi                       

2. Learning from Early Mistakes: The World Bank’s Design and Evaluation of Cassa per il Mezzogiorno Programs, 1950-1959
Marco Martinez                       

3. Passing the baton: The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank in the 1950s and 1960s
Lucia Coppolaro                       

4. Italian governments and International Monetary Fund, between the 1940s and 1970s:  the Political Role of International Loans
Leonida Tedoldi                       

5. The IMF loans to Italy: between international constraints, economic distress, and political challenges (1974-1977)
Francesco Petrini and Roberto Ventresca                       

6. Conditional lending in the Cold War era. Italy, the IMF, and the stand-by arrangement of April 1977
Dario Ridolfo           

7. The International Monetary Fund and transition to democracy in Portugal (1975-1979)
Luciano Amaral 

8. Turkish Democracy, the International Financial Institutions, and the 1980 Military Coup
Nicola Degli Esposti 

9. Stabilizing Greece: the IMF’s Long Engagement, 1947-1980
Michalis Psalidopoulos

Biography

Lucia Coppolaro is Associate Professor of International History at the University of Padova. Her research focuses on international trade, the history of international economic institutions and European integration. She has published on the European Economic Community’s role in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade negotiations and the evolution of the European Investment Bank. Her recent publications in include Deciphering the European Investment Bank: History, Politics, and Economics (co-edited with Helen Kavvadia, Routledge, 2022); The Making of a World Trading Power: The European Economic Community in the GATT Kennedy Round Negotiations (1963–1967) (Routledge, 2013).

Francesco Petrini is Associate professor in History of International Relations at the University of Padua. His research interests comprise European integration history, Italy’s contemporary history and international economic history. His latest book is about Italy and the external constraint (La sferza del cambio. Il vincolo esterno nella storia dell’Italia repubblicana, Milano, 2025).

Leonida Tedoldi is Full Professor of History of International Relations at the University of Bergamo. His research focuses on the history of European and international institutions, democratic transitions and the role of international organizations in postwar political transformations. He has published on constitutional developments, parliamentary history and the influence of external actors on domestic political change. His publications include 'The Constitutive Process of European Central Bank: Issues and Problems of the Institutional Aspects' in Instituta. Journal of History of European and International Institutions, 2023 and 'The “Commission de Coordination' (Cocor) of the ECSC Special Council of Ministers', in Ventunesimo secolo, n. 53, 2023.