The origin of the historical archives was concurrent with the foundation of the Center, and was based on the papers of Piero Gobetti. While these still form the most historically relevant nucleus of the Center's collection today, numerous additions have been made over the course of the years. These include donations and acquisitions of collections related to important protagonists of the antifascist movement, political and labor movements and organizations, and more in general, to the history of the 20th century.

The archive now consists of 35 collections and occupies 72 linear meters of shelves. The materials accrued primarily cover the period from the early 1900s to 1990, and deal for the most part - although not exclusively - with the situation in Turin and Piedmont. The Center still maintains an active acquisitions policy because of the conviction that, in an epoch such as ours which presents high risks for dispersion and destruction, even private cultural institutes - along with public archive administrations - play an important role in the conservation of historical documents pertaining to the contemporary age.

To this end, the institute has been a member, since 1991, of the national "20th Century Archives" project, promoted by the BAICR consortium of libraries, archives and Roman cultural institutes. The project welcomes all Italian institutes that conserve 20th century documents in private archives, and seeks to facilitate the creation of common policies which adequately respond to the type of cultural demands made today.

Members of the "20th Century Archives" project may purchase a special software program called GEA (Electronic Archive Management). The Center has been using this program over the past few years to catalogue its collections. GEA was designed to create records of texts, images and other types of material, and allows the data banks to be arranged in subsets. This makes it possible to perform rapid searches within - and even among - the various collections. Eventually, a regional and national network of archives is to be created, linking the different computer systems in the network. The public will thus have access to many different inventories and catalogues and, in some cases, to on-line versions of the documents themselves.

List of Collections

Piero GOBETTI

Ada PROSPERO GOBETTI MARCHESINI

Norberto BOBBIO

ANPPIA (Associazione Nazionale Perseguitati Politici Italiani Antifascisti)

Barbara e Ugo ALLASON

Franco ANTONICELLI

Enzo ARIAN

Giovanni BOERO

Clara BOVERO

Umberto CALOSSO

COGIDAS (Centro operativo tra genitori per l’iniziativa democratica nella scuola)

CONSIGLI di GESTIONE del PIEMONTE

LA CONSULTA. Associazione di cultura politica

Pietro DE MATTEIS

Fernando DE ROSA

Gioacchino DOLCI

Ugo FEDELI

Giuseppe FERRERO

Leo FERRERO

Mario GIODA

Michele GIUA

GIUSTIZIA e LIBERTA’

Terenzio GRANDI

Franco GUARNASCHELLI

Franco Bianca GUIDETTI SERRA

Costante MASUTTI

Augusto MONTI – Luisa STURANI

Umberto MORRA

MOVIMENTO per la PACE

Giannotto PERELLI

Giuseppe RAPELLI

Antonino REPACI

Ada ROSSI

Gustavo SACERDOTE

SPAGNA

Silvio TRENTIN

Marcello VITALE (movimenti politici e sociali degli anni ’60 e ’70)

Domenico ZUCARO