70 years of the Fiat 600: the car that shaped the history of Italy, Yugoslavia, and Spain

Seventy years ago, the brilliant Italian car designer Dante Giacosa could hardly have imagined that the Fiat 600 would become an intergenerational symbol of Southern Europe and one of the most successful designs in history, still relevant and relevant seven decades later.

The Fiat 600, which made its commercial debut in 1955, soon became a symbol and a piece of Italian history, and from 1957 onwards, also that of the former Yugoslavia and Spain. In 1955, the aftermath of the post-war period was still visible in Italy, a very young democracy that, under the political hegemony of the center-right Christian Democracy party, had to face significant social and political tensions. The second largest force in the country was the Italian Communist Party (PCI), which in some elections even shook the Iron Curtain structures in the face of a possible communist victory in a Western bloc country.

The Italian government needed to develop a welfare state that would counterbalance the rise of the Communist Party, and so it commissioned Gianni Agnelli's Fiat company to design a future model that was affordable, easy to repair, and reliable, and could democratize access to mobility for a large portion of the population. The response was the Fiat 600, a model just over 3.22 meters long with room for four occupants and a 633 cc engine located in the rear, delivering 21 hp and capable of reaching a top speed of 95 km/h. These figures, very modest in perspective, represented a great step forward in the mobility of millions of people.

The success of the Fiat 600 in Italy during its production years (1955-1969) was truly spectacular, with a total of 2,695,197 units registered. As an example, and to reflect the volume, the Spanish version, the Seat 600, registered 814,926 units, and the Yugoslavian version, called the Zastava 750, continued in production until 1985, with a total of 923,487 units registered. The 600 became a cultural phenomenon in Italy, but it was perhaps in Spain where the Seat 600 version achieved its greatest popularity, becoming a symbol of Franco's economic development in the 1960s.

The Fiat 600 was also the basis for further developments, such as the Abarth version, which incorporated a fifth gear and a new radiator that improved the engine's compression ratio, which evolved from 767 cc to 1049 cc. Or the fantastic Multipla version, which transformed the 600 into a minivan and sold over 240,000 units.

The legacy of the 600 is such that even today Fiat and Abarth market models with this nomenclature and that -with all due respect- they want to maintain the urban, democratic and accessible spirit of the original version, always closing the door to any attempt by Seat, now under the control of the Volkswagen group, obtain commercial rights.