edited by Mariachiara Fugazza and Silvia Cassamagnaghi The dossier was produced by the Lombardian Institute of Contemporary History (Istituto lombardo di storia contemporanea)

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This dossier contains documents, testimonies, and articles on the political participation of women in Italy. The discussion begins with the events of the period following the unification of Italy and then concentrates on the years toward the end of World War II and immediately afterwards, when women's right to vote was formally recognized in 1945 and exercised for the first time in 1946, in an Italy that was emerging from the disasters of conflict and embarking on the path of democracy. The last part -- from the enactment of the Constitution to the present day -- briefly covers key developments in women's progressive acquisition of rights in the fields of work, family, and society. The sixtieth anniversary of the 1946 elections was the inspiration for our gathering of these resources, but the intention is not to celebrate an occasion. The theme of the participation of women in public life is, in fact, too important to be remembered only occasionally. Through the suffrage theme -- which is often dismissed or hurriedly noted in history textbooks - and, more generally, by reconstructing the citizenship path of women in our country, it is, in fact, possible to discern some underlying lines in the evolution of Italian society in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The materials offered here, in the form of an updatable and integrable dossier, are primarily intended to give teachers a starting point to develop in various directions, with a retrospective glance that looks at goals achieved in the past and also aims to understand the contradictions of our present day. Milan, May 2006