«There is no second chance at childhood»: pratiche e politiche di child welfare nella comunità ebraica italiana nell’immediato dopoguerra

Abstract

At the end of the Second World War, recovering, safeguarding, rehabilitating and educating Jewish children who survived the Shoah became a common mission for humanitarian organizations involved in the rescue of European civilians, for the Jewish minorities devoted to the reconstruction of their communities, and for Zionist movements involved in the rescue operations and the organization of young Jews’ migration to “the land of Israel”. The essay offers a first survey of the debate on child welfare and child education within the Italian Jewish minority. It emerges that the modern concepts of welfare and education promoted by humanitarian organizations in Republican Italy was unable to replace pre-existing assistance and educational models.