Italian agricultural employers' associations in the Fifties and Sixties. Their 'influencing' action on politics

The essay discusses the "influencing action" of the two most important organizations of agricultural employer: Coldiretti and Confagrcicoltura in the Fifties and Sixties. In the second post war the rural system became ground for comparison between the governements led by the Christian Democratic Party and the opposition of the Left. Within this framework, even if Confagricoltura managed to stop a reform about landowners and employees relations, it ended in representing an increasuingly mionority interest. Conversely, even if with some limits, Coldiretti managed to interact with market changes, represented the interests of their members and palyed a political function with regard to modernization, defense of production and, at last, social protections.