Not ideal victims but real victims: modes of reaction among survivors and families of victims of terrorism in Italy, 1969-1980

The contribution aims to discuss the results of a qualitative study conducted by the Author using in depth-interviews to survivors and family members of victims of terrorism assaults that affected Italian society from 1969 to 1993. Those assaults produced massacres in train stations (Bologna 1980), on trains (Italicus 1974; Rapid 904 1984), squares (Brescia 1974), banks (Milano 1969). The interviews focus, on the one hand, on the analysis of social, relational and psychological exits of trauma, and on the other hand, on the discrepancy between social representations of victims of terrorism - like martyrs or heroes - and their self perception, recalling the central distinction between “ideal” and “real” victims. Then, a very interesting way to react to crime has been the creation of associations among survivors and family members of victims: it is thanks to the “living memory” of these associations - rather than from the “dead”, static and self-referencing memory of commemorative rhetoric - that efforts have been made to rebuild social and institutional bonds of trust.