Fashion: A Matter of Governance

Analysing the geography of Italian fashion is a way to assess its fragmentation from an institutional perspective. This chapter examines the various organizations involved in safeguarding and promoting Italian fashion. These actors faced the challenging task of regulating their specific interests to reconcile them with the overall objective of making fashion a stable source of economic growth, while striving to build a genuine fashion system. The analysis sheds light on a variety of contrasting, overlapping, and sometimes even competing governance models that were operating, albeit with varying degrees of effectiveness, from the late 1940s to the mid-1970s. More specifically, in this chapter, we will focus on the organizational structure and main activities of the Associazione Italiana Industriali dell’Abbigliamento (AIIA, Italian Clothing Industry Association, 1945), the Comitato Moda degli Industriali dell’Abbigliamento (CMIA, Ready-to-Wear Fashion Council, 1959), the Ente Italiano della Moda (EIM, Italian Fashion Body, 1951), the Centro di Firenze per la Moda Italiana (CFMI, Centre of Florence for Italian Fashion, 1954), and the Camera Nazionale della Moda Italiana (CNMI, National Chamber of Italian Fashion, 1962). In the following pages, we will also mention the Centro Italiano della Moda of Milan (CIM, Italian Fashion Centre, 1949), the Comitato della Moda of Rome (Fashion Committee, 1949), the Centro Internazionale delle Arti e del Costume of Venice (CIAC, International Center for the Arts and Costume, 1951), and the Centro Romano dell’Alta Moda Italiana (CRAMI, Centre of Rome for Italian High Fashion, 1953).