Dr Giulia Sbaffi

Leverhulme Early Career Fellow
The Leverhulme Trust
2028
In 1980s Italy, queers* - including lesbian, intersex, non-binary, trans, and agender identities - forged political solidarities by recognizing the interconnectedness of their marginalization. Their coalitions were not just strategic alliances but sites of shared rebellion against structural exclusion. Reflecting current times, Italy’s activism unfolded in a landscape shaped by shifting welfare policies, restrictive migration laws, and the rise of neoliberalism, making resistance both deeply local and inherently transnational. As a key entry point to Europe, Italy’s approach to migration and public health policies has been shaped by its geographical and socio-economic position with transnational implications. In 1981, street sex workers in Italy staged their first strike against HIV-related stigma. By 1988, Rome hosted its first World AIDS Day, marked by a constellation of grassroots awareness events in community hubs, clubs, cafés, and bookstores, where queers gathered to challenge misinformation and demand action. In 1991, transgender movement in Bologna (MiT) published a comprehensive informative fanzine on treatments for HIV, advocating for community care while directly challenging the ruthless experimental medicalization and Florence witnessed Italy’s first national queer AIDS demonstration, where activists laid out a memorial quilt in front of the Church of Santa Maria Novella - echoing the 1985 AIDS Memorial Quilt displayed in Washington, USA, as a powerful gesture of transnational solidarity, linking Italian activism to a broader global movement demanding dignity, visibility, and justice for those living with HIV. In 1995, a coalition of queer movements, doctors, and public health experts published Italy’s first inclusive HIV informational guidelines and Italy became the first country in the world to elect a transgender municipal councilor; sex worker-led networks launched the country’s first peer-to-peer harm reduction strategies, specifically aimed at protecting queer people of color and racialized sex workers from HIV transmission on the streets.