Gli studenti internazionali dopo il fascismo. Il caso dell’Università di Pisa (1945-1970)

This paper analyses the numbers of foreign students enrolling at the University of Pisa during the early years of the Italian republic. It identifies their country of origin and positions this case study in the broadest national context. The first part outlines the law concerning foreign student matriculations, with an emphasis on procedures designed, and strengthened during the fascist dictatorship, to prevent the arrival of exiles. Such procedures remained largely unchanged after the war and this prevented the University from again providing the traditional welcome they once extended to refugees and which, in the 1930s, had led to numerous foreign students enrolling at the university. For a long time, further restrictive factors made it difficult to attract other categories of foreign students. Exceptions were Greek students whose numbers grew significantly from the 1950s. The second part of the paper focuses precisely on the Greek community to investigate the dynamics that characterized the 1960s. At the start of the decade, the attempt by Italian institutions to compete in the forming of the ruling classes of developing countries stimulated a rapid increase in international enrollments. Channels of arrival were limited during the years marked by protest, also because of protests involving foreign students, whose leading protagonists in Pisa were Greek students arriving in Italy following the military coup by the Greek junta.