Gabriele Balbi, Le origini del telefono in Italia. Politica, economia, tecnologia, società, Bruno Mondadori, 2011
10.6092/issn.2038-3460/16866
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Simona Isabella
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Tecnoscienza – Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies
Gabriele Balbi, The Origins of the Telephone in Italy. Politics, economics, technology, society, Bruno Mondadori, 2011
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2011-12-29
2023-07-06
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Simona Isabella
2011/12/29
10.6092/issn.2038-3460/16866
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Gabriele Balbi, The Origins of the Telephone in Italy. Politics, economics, technology, society, Bruno Mondadori, 2011
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/article/download/16866/15840
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126   BOOK REVIEWS




      science, there is no reference to the              “Tecnogénesis. La construcción de las
      social construction of gender or race.             ecologías humanas” Madrid, AIBR pp.
                                                         XIX-XXV.
      The reflections presented here are in          Tirado F., Domènech M. (2008), Asociaciones
      fact mainly theoretical. One of the                heterogéneas y actantes: El giro postsocial
      most surprising things about the                   de la teoría del actor-red, in T., Sánchez
      volume is that, despite the criticism              Criado     (ed),    “Tecnogénesis.      La
                                                         construcción de las ecologías humanas”
      of modernity and its self-referential              Madrid, AIBR pp. 41-79.
      analysis, the book does not take
      account of the precarious employees’
      perspectives, even if the authors
      point out the risk of continuing to                                 ***
      misunderstand the other. By trying to
      get a better understanding through
      the contribution of the now universal
      sciences, it is probably possible to                          Gabriele Balbi
      achieve a merely topological turn,
      instead of a radical one, as it would            Le origini del telefono in Italia.
      be necessary. Nonetheless, the                   Politica, economia, tecnologia,
      authors, with their proposals, are                            società
      certainly providing a good starting              (The Origins of the Telephone in Italy.
      point to approach realities and                  Politics, economics, technology, society)
      problems of our contemporary
                                                         Milano, Bruno Mondadori, 2011,
      societies.                                                     226 pp.


      References                                                   Simona Isabella

      Gieryn, T. F. (1983) Boundary-work and the                (Università di Cagliari)
         demarcation of science from non-science -
         strains and interests in professional
         ideologies of scientists, in “American         Telecommunications are conside-
         Sociological Review”, 48 (6) pp. 781-795.   red as the most representative infras-
      Gómez-Soriano, R., Vianna, B. (2008)           tructure of contemporary society:
         Demasiado mono: Versiones occidentales      they play in fact a crucial role not
         de los grandes simios, in T., Sánchez
         Criado     (ed),    “Tecnogénesis.     La
                                                     only in our economic system, which
         construcción de las ecologías humanas”      is characterized by an intense and
         Madrid, AIBR, pp.173-229.                   continuous exchange of material and
      Latour, B. (2008) Llamada a revisión de la     immaterial goods, but also in cultural
         modernidad. Aproximaciones antropológi-
                                                     activities and interpersonal relation-
         cas, in T., Sánchez Criado (ed),
         “Tecnogénesis. La construcción de las       ships. Even if the word tele-
         ecologías humanas” Madrid, AIBR, pp.        communication can refer to a wide
         167-192.                                    range of different activities that can
      Sánchez Criado T., (2008) Presentación de la   be dated back to the first attempts to
         obra in T., Sánchez Criado (ed),
                                                     transmit information over significant
                                                         TECNOSCIENZA – 2 (2)       127




distances, the origin of modern           transmission by the new medium
telecommunication systems is con-         during the 1870s till the beginning of
ventionally traced back to the            the First World War in 1915. Each
diffusion of the electric telegraph at    chapter takes into consideration a
the beginning of the 19th century.        small lapse of time between 1877 and
    Based on the results of a PhD         1915, which is precisely subdivided
research, the book by Gabriele Balbi      into four periods: the urban
deals with one of the modern and          networks building during the 1880s;
most popular telecommunication            the nationalization attempt, the
systems: the telephone network. In        concentration process and failed
particular, the author focuses the        building     of the       long-distance
analysis on the development of this       network during the 1890s; the
medium in a specific time and in a        nationalization process between 1903
particular geographical area, i.e. he     and 1907; and the failure of public
studies the history of the telephone in   management and return to private
Italy between the end of the 19th and     operation between 1907 and the First
the beginning of the 20th century.        World War. In the course of
Balbi’s historical research focuses on    narration, as announced in the
two major interests: on the one hand,     subtitle of the book, the author
the study tries to understand the         collects the different “voices” that
dialectical relationship among the        were involved in the debate about
different social groups that had a        the construction of the meaning of
great influence on the debate about       the new medium. Political debates,
what role the telephone should have       private companies interests, technical
in the process of modernisation that      expertises and early subscribers’
Italy, as the other European              needs emerge clearly from the
countries, was going through. On the      historical      background        Balbi
other hand, the analysis helps            reconstructs in order to contextualize
identify some characteristics of the      the history of the telephone. The
Italian telephone history that            result is an original work based on an
configure a kind of Italian style in      unusual methodology: in fact the
telecommunications: the relevance of      author chooses three theoretical and
old media (electric telegraph in          methodological approaches. Apart
particular) for the new one, political    from a more traditional histo-
uncertainties, foreign investments,       riographical analysis, Balbi combines
difficulties in interconnecting differ-   the multifocal approach (Richeri,
rent systems, a lively and overlooked     2006), the Social Construction of
demand.                                   Technology (SCOT) approach and
    The book is a historical recons-      studies on Large Technical Systems
truction of the development of the        /Macro Système Technique. The idea
telephone network in Italy and it has     of making use of concepts deriving
a chronological structure that starts     from different theoretical perspec-
with the first experiments of voice       tives could be very useful in studying
128   BOOK REVIEWS




      the history of telecommunication            connivance between politics and
      because it allows us to explore a           economy and of a political short-
      phenomenon from different points of         sightedness, the development of the
      view and reconstruct a multifaceted         telephone network in Italy was
      history. Le origini del telefono in         characterized by a sort of “natural
      Italia is not only a political, technical   uncertainty” between public manage-
      or economic history of the telephone,       ment and private operation.
      but it gives a many-sided viewpoint             Moreover, the technicians’ point
      of how Italian society welcomed the         of view emerges principally from
      new medium between the eighteenth           technical manuals and journals that
      and nineteenth century.                     show how they were the only ones
          The constructivist approach pro-        who had a long-term view of the
      vides the author with the concept of        development of the telephone net-
      relevant social group (Pinch, Bijker,       work and were aware of the technical
      1984), which he uses in order to            gap existing between the Italian
      analyze relationships and conflicts         telephone infrastructure and those of
      between the main groups. Politicians,       the other European countries.
      private companies, technicians such             With regard to the early subscrib-
      as electrical and telegraphic engine-       ers, the main sources the author
      ers and users are the four relevant         utilizes to understand how they
      social groups Balbi takes into              oriented the meaning of the
      account. They were involved in the          telephone at that time were
      debate about the telephone and tried        telephone books and some literature
      to impose their own vision of the new       that describes common uses of the
      medium. In order to show the                medium in everyday life situations.
      different points of view and improve        Telephone books turn out to be a
      the frame of reference that creates         sort of symbolic space where
      the background of the process of co-        discussion between subscribers and
      construction of this technology, the        telephone companies took place: on
      author also uses less considered            one side private companies tried to
      sources and some grey literature.           give instructions on the “correct”
      Parliamentary debates prove to be           way to use the medium (a kind of a
      very interesting documents not only         program of action in the terms of
      to understand political interests, but      actor-network theory) and criticized
      because they show the degree of             “incorrect” utilizations; on the other
      comprehension (sometimes very               side companies tried to make
      low!) politicians had of the medium,        subscribers assume a responsibility
      and to what extent the political            asking them to report malfunctions
      decisions they took were often              of the network in order to improve it.
      motivated by economic interests,            Completely dedicated to users
      since many politicians were also            practices, the last chapter of the book
      shareholders of some telephone              deals with the role of subscribers in
      companies. As a consequence of this         the technical and social construction
                                                             TECNOSCIENZA – 2 (2)             129




of the telephone: the author                  Consequences, The MIT Press, Cam-
describes, indeed, how subscribers            bridge (MA).
                                           Latour, B. (1992), Aramis ou l’amour des
imposed many ways of use that                 techniques, La Découverte, Paris.
forced changes in telephonic admini-       Pinch, T. & Bijker, W. E. (1984), The social
stration. An interesting example is           construction of facts and artefacts: Or how
the social practice called “parasi-           the sociology of science and the sociology of
                                              technology might benefit each other, in
tism”: for a long time Italian tele-          “Social Studies of Science”, 14(3), pp.
phones were managed with flat rates           419–424.
and subscribers often borrowed their       Richeri, G. (2006), The media amidst the
telephones, sometimes in exchange             enterprises, the public and the State.
for money and sometimes for free.             “Studies in Communication Sciences”
                                              6(2), pp. 131–143.
This social practice forced major
changes in rate’s policies.
    Balbi’s research is very interesting
because it shows a telecommuni-
cation system, which nowadays is                                ***
considered as a taken- for-granted
infrastructure, in its early phase of
diffusion. He in fact highlights some
steps in the process of stabilization of               Mauro Turrini (ed)
the telephone, emphasizing the
                                            Biocapitale. Vita e corpi nell’era
heterogeneous pushes and pressures
                                                del controllo biologico
that contribute to the co-construc-
tion of the medium and demonstrate,         (Biocapital. Life and bodies in the age of
with a series of examples, how often                     biological control)
“creating an infrastructure is as much           2011, Ombre Corte, 175 pp.
social, political, and economic work
as it is theoretical” (Bowker, Star,
1999: 109). Moreover, the study here                     Manuela Perrotta
presented underlines a recent redis-
                                              (Norwegian University of Science and
covery of the origins of telecommu-
                                                         Technology)
nication systems as a new and pro-
mising area of research in media and
telecommunication, and it can be an
interesting reading also for those who        As Mauro Turrini notices in his
are involved in studies on New             introduction to this edited volume,
Media.                                     the concept of biocapitalism has been
                                           imported only recently in the Italian
                                           debate and it has been received in its
References                                 broadest sense. According to Codel-
                                           uppi (2008, p. 2), for instance, “the
Bowker, G.C. Star, S.L. (1999), Sorting    biocapital is the most advanced
   Things Out: Classification and Its      evolution of the capitalist economic
