Conference paper
Slovens in the Workers’ Movement of Argentina between the Two World Wars
Rado Genorio
; Institute of Geography, Edvard Kardelj University, Ljubljana Slovenia
Abstract
The mass »exodus« of Slovenes to Argentina and other South American coun¬tries was very much the result of the Rapallo Treaty which gave the Slovene Littoral to Italy, dividing it from its ethnic centre, and later condemning it to fascist economic, political and cultural oppression. Italian statistics record that 10,989 Slovenes from the Julian Province emigrated to Argentina between 1926 and 1934. They were mostly labourers and peasants from the Vipava valley, Goriška brda and the Slovene hinterland of Trieste and Gorizia. In his memoirs France Štoka-Rado mentioned 7,000 workers from these areas in Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay. The class conscio¬usness of these people and their hatred of fascism conditioned the way in which they organised themselves in Argentina. Among them were also organised communists. Slovenes had united themselves on an ethnic and class basis in the homeland with the worker organisation »Ljudski oder«, which later continued its work abroad after it had been banned in the homeland by the fascist authorities. Socialist ideas appeared in various Slovene periodicals in Argentina in the 1920s and 1930s. In the mid-twenties, a Yugoslav section of the Communist Party of Argentina was founded by communists from the mentioned areas, similar to other national Comsections in the Argentine Party. Slovene communists played an active role within party organisations, cells and district committees and were delegates to the central committee as well. Slovenes also participated in union activities and particularly in anti-fascist activities (together with Italians). Armed individuals took part in defensive workers' organisations in the period of General Uriburu's dictatorship. The experience gained during the Argentine military dictatorship and the international economic crisis was used in the 1930s to help the Spanish volunteers and later during the Second World War in the fight for freedom in the homeland.
Keywords
labour movement; Slovenes; Argentina
Hrčak ID:
128180
URI
Publication date:
31.5.1988.
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