Investments in East Africa. The Entrepreneurial Development of Eritrea in The Italian Imperial Framework Between Government Action and Spontaneous Initiatives of Emigrated Settlers (1934-1941)

The examination of the Italian colonial presence in Africa still reserves many research ideas: among these, one of the most interesting concerns the analysis of the phenomenon of the business carried out by Italian entrepreneurs who decided to start or transfer their activities in the territories of East Africa. Eritrea, after years of fruitlessness and insufficient development purely for commercial purposes, from 1936 onwards was destined for development as a base for overseas trade in the northern and central regions of the empire: therefore, the entire economic structure of the “first-born colony” and all industrial and commercial initiatives had to be, from that moment on, no longer considered from the restricted local point of view but instead had to know how to fit into the imperial framework. Although the will of the regime was to develop a colonial society formed by the “new” Italian man, forged with hard work, disinterested in the need to seek personal enrichment, most of the Italians who moved to Eritrea created a dense network of companies capable of influencing the economic structure of the Eritrean colony, which developed characteristics that were quite peculiar in the Italian colonial context. Unpublished and sometimes not inventoried sources, identified in the Historical Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Rome), in the Central Archive of the State in Rome, in the Historical Archive of the Bank of Italy (Rome), in the United Nations Library & Archives Geneva and in the Archive of the Istituto Agronomico per l’Oltremare (Forence), have been placed side by side with documentary materials already known, which made it possible to provide a further contribution to understanding the development and economic and social conditions of the Italian community of Eritrea.