CAPITAL INTENSIVE MODERNIZATION, INTERNAL EXPANSIONARY POLICIES, COMPETITIVE EXPORT: THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF U.S. NUCLEAR ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS DURING BRETTON WOODS. THE CASE OF ITALY BEFORE THE END OF FIXED EXCHANGE RATES

Through the research perspective of U.S. nuclear assistance programs to Italy under the fixed exchange rate international monetary regime of Bretton Woods, this paper investigates the meaning and importance of high technology transfer in the framework of the international economic policy of the United States government and the Bretton Woods institutions, particularly the World Bank Group. Through the case study of the country most dependent on foreign energy supply both during the Bretton Woods years and after the demise of currency convertibility, we follow the U.S. assistance programs to erect and to develop an Italian nuclear energy industry. We aim to shed light on the linkage between the development of capital intensive sectors and the American aim to make the reintegration of each advanced industrial economy in the postwar system of international economic relations revolve around the combining non-inflationary domestic economic growth and stable external equilibrium, including both foreign exchange stability and sound terms of trade. We make the argument that the U.S. pursued this combination both during and after the collapse of Bretton Woods international monetary arrangements by drawing upon a flow of high capital intensive technology transfer. Furthermore, while focusing only on the period prior to floating currencies in the 1970s, this article maintains that Washington carried out this foreign economic policy both under the Bretton Woods regime and after its demise, through foreign exchange adjustments and financial assistance programs respectively. After reviewing how the leading literature on the history of U.S. foreign economic policy has portrayed it so far, we focus attention on the Italian case to explore the hypothesis that both under Bretton Woods and after its collapse a very close interlocking was established between exchange rate regimes and the U.S. policy of technology transfer. Through the case study of Italy, we make the argument that prior to the deterioration of fixed exchange rate arrangements Washington provided Rome with technological assistance to target the twin objective of advancing expansionary internal economic policies and pushing forward an ever-rising level of international economic integration of her partner industrial economies. We frame this reconstruction on the decades prior to currency floating before a broader interpretation about the meanings of U.S. financial assistance in the field of high capital intensive manufacturing way beyond the collapse of fixed exchange rates and the end of cheap foreign energy supply.