Abstract

The articles in this section focus on three significant commemorative events that took place in Italy, Germany and Japan in the span of a decade: the centenaries of Italian (1961) and German unification (1971) and the Meiji Restoration (1968). All three commemorations proved to be turning points in the political, social and cultural life of the three nations (or rather four, due to the German division into two states since 1949) that had emerged defeated and devastated from WW2. All three articles show that anniversary commemorations are particularly controversial crossroads, especially regarding the (re)construction of national identities in societies experiencing fast-paced processes of modernization.