Mark Gilbert was educated at Durham University and the University of Wales. He has taught at Dickinson College, the University of Bath, the University of Trento, and SAIS Europe, the Bologna Centre of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, where he is C. Grove Haines Professor of History. In 2018, he chaired the international jury of the Cundill Prize for History. He is associate editor of the Journal of Modern Italian Studies.

In this wise and penetrating book, Mark Gilbert demolishes the accepted view of postwar Italy as perpetually teetering on the edge of disaster and shows rather how it moved from the catastrophes of fascism and abject defeat in the Second World War to become a robust democracy which has lessons for the rest of us. A fascinating story wonderfully told.

Mark Gilbert was educated at Durham University and the University of Wales. He has taught at Dickinson College, the University of Bath, the University of Trento, and SAIS Europe, the Bologna Centre of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, where he is C. Grove Haines Professor of History. In 2018, he chaired the international jury of the Cundill Prize for History. He is associate editor of the Journal of Modern Italian Studies.

In this wise and penetrating book, Mark Gilbert demolishes the accepted view of postwar Italy as perpetually teetering on the edge of disaster and shows rather how it moved from the catastrophes of fascism and abject defeat in the Second World War to become a robust democracy which has lessons for the rest of us. A fascinating story wonderfully told.