The expulsion of Jews from the accountancy profession in Fascist Italy

Valerio Antonelli, Raffaele D’Alessio, Stephen P. Walker

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapter

Abstract / Description of output

Drawing on Foucault’s concepts of biopolitics and race and an array of primary and secondary sources, this chapter explores the apparatuses of biopower deployed to remove Jews from the Italian accountancy profession. These included anti-Semitic legislation to define the offending population, a census to identify and locate it, and bureaucratic mechanisms to secure its removal. It is shown that following their fascistisation, accountancy organisations in Italy functioned as agencies for the purification of the profession. Although the object to “kill” through expulsion was activated in most cases, the existence of transitional “let live” provisions indicated the complexities of activating a biopolitical project on the basis of biological racism. When parts of Italy came under German control in 1943, “indirect murder” through expulsion was supplanted by the actual murder of a number of Jewish accountants.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationAccounting for the Holocaust
Subtitle of host publicationEnabling the Final Solution
EditorsWarwick Funnell, Michele Bigoni, Erin Twyford
PublisherTaylor & Francis
Chapter6
Pages113-137
Number of pages25
ISBN (Electronic)9781040047019
ISBN (Print)9781032685274
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 28 Jun 2024

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