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ROADS TOROADS RECONCILIATION e-ISSN 2610-9042 Sinica venetiana 5 ISSN 2610-9654 — Roads to Reconciliation People’s Republic of China, Western Europe and Italy GRAZIANI MENEGUZZI, SAMARANI, During the Cold War Period (1949-1971) edited by Guido Samarani Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni Sofia Graziani Edizioni Ca’Foscari Roads to Reconciliation Sinica venetiana Collana diretta da Tiziana Lippiello e Chen Xiaoming 5 Edizioni Ca’Foscari Sinica venetiana Direzione scientifica | Scientific editors Tiziana Lippiello (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Chen Yuehong (Peking University, China) Comitato scientifico | Scientific committee Chen Hongmin (Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China) Sean Golden (UAB Barcelona, España) Roger Greatrex (Lun- ds Universitet, Sverige) Jin Yongbing (Peking University, China) Olga Lomova (Univerzita Karlova v Praze, Cˇeská Republika) Burchard Mansvelt Beck (Universiteit Leiden, Nederland) Michael Puett (Harvard University, Cambridge, USA) Mario Sabattini (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Tan Tian Yuan (SOAS, London, UK) Hans van Ess (LMU, München, Deutschland) Giuseppe Vignato (Peking University, China) Wang Keping (CASS, Beijing, China) Yamada Tatsuo (Keio University, Tokyo, Japan) Yang Zhu (Peking University, China) Comitato editoriale | Editorial board Magda Abbiati (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Attilio Andreini (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Giu- lia Baccini (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Bianca Basciano (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Daniele Beltrame (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Daniele Brombal (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Alfredo Cadonna (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Renzo Cavalieri (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Marco Ceresa (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Laura De Giorgi (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Franco Gatti (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Federico Greselin (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Tiziana Lippiello (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Paolo Magagnin (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Tobia Maschio (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Federica Passi (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Nicoletta Pesaro (Università Ca’ Foscari Vene- zia, Italia) Elena Pollacchi (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Sabrina Rastelli (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Guido Samarani (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Direzione e redazione | Head office Dipartimento di Studi sull’Asia e sull’Africa Mediterranea Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia Palazzo Vendramin dei Carmini Dorsoduro 3462 30123 Venezia Italia e-ISSN 2610-9042 ISSN 2610-9654 http://edizionicafoscari.unive.it/it/edizioni/collane/sinica-venetiana/ Roads to Reconciliation People’s Republic of China, Western Europe and Italy During the Cold War Period (1949-1971) edited by Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni and Sofia Graziani Venezia Edizioni Ca’ Foscari - Digital Publishing 2018 Roads to Reconciliation. People’s Republic of China, Western Europe and Italy During the Cold War Period (1949-1971) Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni and Sofia Graziani (edited by) © 2018 Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni and Sofia Graziani for the text © 2018 Edizioni Ca’ Foscari - Digital Publishing for the present edition cb Qualunque parte di questa pubblicazione può essere riprodotta, memorizzata in un sistema di recupero dati o trasmessa in qualsiasi forma o con qualsiasi mezzo, elettronico o mecca- nico, senza autorizzazione, a condizione che se ne citi la fonte. Any part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission provided that the source is fully credited. Edizioni Ca’ Foscari - Digital Publishing Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia Dorsoduro 3246 30123 Venezia http://edizionicafoscari.unive.it/ [email protected] 1st edition April 2018 ISBN 978-88-6969-220-8 [ebook] ISBN 978-88-6969-221-5 [print] Immagine di copertina: Federico Greselin The volume is the result of a research project entitled Italia, Europa, Cina: relazioni economiche, politiche e culturali negli anni della Guerra Fredda (1954-1971), funded by Ca’ Foscari University of Venice (Coordinator: Prof. Guido Samarani). Certificazione scientifica delle Opere pubblicate da Edizioni Ca’ Foscari - Digital Publishing: tutti i saggi pubblicati hanno ottenuto il parere favorevole da parte di valutatori esperti della materia, attraverso un processo di revisione anonima sotto la responsabilità del Comitato scientifico della collana. La valutazione è stata condotta in aderenza ai criteri scientifici ed editoriali di Edizioni Ca’ Foscari. Scientific certification of the works published by Edizioni Ca’ Foscari - Digital Publishing: all essays published in this volume have received a favourable opinion by subject-matter experts, through an anonymous peer review process under the responsibility of the Scien- tific Committee of the series. The evaluations were conducted in adherence to the scientific and editorial criteria established by Edizioni Ca’ Foscari. Roads to Reconciliation. People’s Republic of China, Western Europe and Italy During the Cold War Period (1949-1971) / Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni and Sofia Graziani (edited by) — 1. ed. — Venezia: Edizioni Ca’ Foscari - Digital Publishing, 2018. — 220 p.; 23 cm. — (Sinica venetiana; 5). — ISBN 978-88-6969-221-5. http://edizionicafoscari.unive.it/it/edizioni/libri/978-88-6969-221-5/ DOI 10.14277/978-88-6969-220-8 Roads to Reconciliation People’s Republic of China, Western Europe and Italy During the Cold War Period (1949-1971) edited by Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni and Sofia Graziani This volume include essays originally delivered at the international workshop Italy, Europe, China: Economic, political and cultural relations during the Cold War years (1949-1971) held at the Department of Asian and African Studies of Ca’ Foscari University of Venice on 13th-14th February 2014 as well as invited research papers by two international outstanding scholars who have made valuable contributions to the study of China’s foreign policy and engagement in the ’50s and ’60s. The book illustrates recent trends in international research on China-Western Europe relations in the years of intense Cold War, complicating the long-held image of Mao-era China as sealed off from the outside world. Keywords Cold war. China. Europe and Italy. Relations. Exchanges. Roads to Reconciliation People’s Republic of China, Western Europe and Italy During the Cold War Period (1949-1971) edited by Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni and Sofia Graziani Table of Contents Editors’ Introduction Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni, Sofia Graziani 9 The Research on China’s Foreign Policy in the Cold War Period Chinese Scholars’ Exploration and Thinking (2001-2015) Liang Zhi 梁志 and Shen Zhihua 沈志华 15 CHINA AND WESTERN EUROPE Living in Mao’s China The European Experience 1949-1969 Beverley Hooper 57 Between Economic Interests and Political Constraints The Federal Republic of Germany and the People’s Republic of China During the Early Cold War Giovanni Bernardini 79 The Hong Kong Riots and the Sterling Empire Last Stand Roberto Peruzzi 99 France Facing the People’s Republic of China (1949-1964) A Policy of Economic Relations Under Control Thierry Robin 117 CHINA AND ITALY Italy’s Attention Turns to China Between the ’50s and the ’60s Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni 141 Italy’s Communist Party and People’s China (’50s-early ’60s) Guido Samarani 159 A Welcome Guest? A Preliminary Assessment of Velio Spano’s Journey to Mao’s China 1949-1950 Laura De Giorgi 177 International Political Activism in the ’50s The World Federation of Democratic Youth and Bruno Bernini’s Encounter with Mao’s China Sofia Graziani 197 Roads to Reconciliation People’s Republic of China, Western Europe and Italy During the Cold War Period (1949-1971) edited by Guido Samarani, Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni and Sofia Graziani Editors’ Introduction Guido Samarani (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia) Carla Meneguzzi Rostagni (Università degli Studi di Padova, Italia) Sofia Graziani (Università degli Studi di Trento, Italia) The birth of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949 occurred at a time when the world order was being divided into two opposing geopolitical blocs. China’s foreign policy was thus from the very beginning heavily influenced by the logic of the Cold War. The Sino-Soviet alliance, formalised in February 1950, was seen by Communist leaders (especially Mao Zedong) as a neces- sity for the PRC given the emerging international context. The outbreak of the Korean War (1950-1953) further consolidated China’s position within the Soviet bloc, causing the majority of Western states not to recognise the newly established Communist government. The new Chinese government also proceeded to eliminate the former Western presence from the country. International historiography on the Cold War has for a long time been dominated by an emphasis on the bipolar confrontational nature of the Soviet-American conflict as well as by a focus on the superpowers’ poli- tics and the role of the United States. With the end of the Cold War and the subsequent access to newly available archival sources from the former Eastern bloc, new approaches to the study of the conflict have emerged, giving way to a more