Page 97 - Mellinato, Giulio, and Aleksander Panjek. Eds. 2022. Complex Gateways. Labour and Urban History of Maritime Port Cities: The Northern Adriaticin a Comparative Perspective. Koper: University of Primorska Press.
P. 97
The Free Port Debate: Economic Policies, International Equilibria and Mythologies ...
and against a free port had started appearing from the 1810s (Torrejón
Chaves 2002).8
Eventually, Napoleon’s own project would be re-read as the will of
the ‘founder la liberté des mers’.9 Napoleon - a cumbersome figure, not
explicitly quotable in all contexts - was somehow recognized as the politi-
cal father of modern free ports, or in any case as the deviser of a vision of
free trade alternative to the English one. At the same time, in the Italian,
French, Spanish, and South American area the intellectual paternity be-
longed to Melchiorre Gioia (Sandelin 1847, 423). The Italian economist had
a vast, albeit indirect, influence: his masterpiece Nuovo prospetto delle sci-
enze economiche was in fact plagiarized by Mariano Torrente, a govern-
mental official, and published under the title Revista general de economía
política (1835) in La Habana, becoming a successful textbook of econom-
ics in all Spanish-speaking nations. In the 1830s discussions within the
Italian peninsula, from Venice to Naples, the passages on free ports tak-
en from the Nuovo Prospetto became an essential starting point, both for
the supporters of the free ports and for the critics. The main supporters
of the free port in Habsburg Venice were – and it seems not to be a co-
incidence – the cousins G iuseppe and Defendente Sacchi and Francesco
Foramiti, who shared an apprenticeship in Napoleonic Milan and Pavia
(Foramiti 1829; Sacchi and Sacchi 1830; Delogu 2019a, Delogu 2020a). At
that time, the Sacchi cousins gravitated around the milieu of the journal
savant ‘Annali di Statistica’ of which Gioia himself was also part.
The case of Venice appears to be of considerable interest because it
reveals other aspects, useful for a more comprehensive understanding of
the question of free ports between the eighteenth and nineteenth centu-
ries (Delogu and Farella 2020). In fact, in addition to confirming the cen-
trality of the Napoleonic experience and the theoretical elaboration start-
ed by Savary and later led by Gioia, the Venetian debate also highlights,
on the one hand, the involvement of the various social components of the
city, and on the other the role played by communication strategies and
the creation of suggestive and powerful images. As for the first point, the
sources of the time reveal the involvement not only of intellectuals such
as Sacchi and Foramiti, but also of lagoon fishermen, glassmakers, dyers,
8 See the documentation kept at the AGI, C, 61A and 61B, 1651, 1652, 1653, 1671,
L.1012.
9 Battur 1845, with the note that: ‘L’Editeur de cet ouvrage en a fait distribuer gra-
tuitement 500 exemplaires à MM les Membres de la Chambre des Pairs et de la
Chambre des Députés.’
97
and against a free port had started appearing from the 1810s (Torrejón
Chaves 2002).8
Eventually, Napoleon’s own project would be re-read as the will of
the ‘founder la liberté des mers’.9 Napoleon - a cumbersome figure, not
explicitly quotable in all contexts - was somehow recognized as the politi-
cal father of modern free ports, or in any case as the deviser of a vision of
free trade alternative to the English one. At the same time, in the Italian,
French, Spanish, and South American area the intellectual paternity be-
longed to Melchiorre Gioia (Sandelin 1847, 423). The Italian economist had
a vast, albeit indirect, influence: his masterpiece Nuovo prospetto delle sci-
enze economiche was in fact plagiarized by Mariano Torrente, a govern-
mental official, and published under the title Revista general de economía
política (1835) in La Habana, becoming a successful textbook of econom-
ics in all Spanish-speaking nations. In the 1830s discussions within the
Italian peninsula, from Venice to Naples, the passages on free ports tak-
en from the Nuovo Prospetto became an essential starting point, both for
the supporters of the free ports and for the critics. The main supporters
of the free port in Habsburg Venice were – and it seems not to be a co-
incidence – the cousins G iuseppe and Defendente Sacchi and Francesco
Foramiti, who shared an apprenticeship in Napoleonic Milan and Pavia
(Foramiti 1829; Sacchi and Sacchi 1830; Delogu 2019a, Delogu 2020a). At
that time, the Sacchi cousins gravitated around the milieu of the journal
savant ‘Annali di Statistica’ of which Gioia himself was also part.
The case of Venice appears to be of considerable interest because it
reveals other aspects, useful for a more comprehensive understanding of
the question of free ports between the eighteenth and nineteenth centu-
ries (Delogu and Farella 2020). In fact, in addition to confirming the cen-
trality of the Napoleonic experience and the theoretical elaboration start-
ed by Savary and later led by Gioia, the Venetian debate also highlights,
on the one hand, the involvement of the various social components of the
city, and on the other the role played by communication strategies and
the creation of suggestive and powerful images. As for the first point, the
sources of the time reveal the involvement not only of intellectuals such
as Sacchi and Foramiti, but also of lagoon fishermen, glassmakers, dyers,
8 See the documentation kept at the AGI, C, 61A and 61B, 1651, 1652, 1653, 1671,
L.1012.
9 Battur 1845, with the note that: ‘L’Editeur de cet ouvrage en a fait distribuer gra-
tuitement 500 exemplaires à MM les Membres de la Chambre des Pairs et de la
Chambre des Députés.’
97
