One of the key features in the development of Italian Fascism was the ideological inspiration it drew from Syndicalism. After World War I Fascism became the rightful heir to the movement that operated on the left wing of Italy’s Socialist Party. Many of Syndicalism’s ideological shapers and leaders became prominent fascists, deeply influencing Benito Mussolini. By mixing in other ideas – Synarchism, Technocracy, Futurism and militarism – modern fascism took form.
Georges Sorel was the most influential theoretician of Syndicalism in France at the time. His revision of Marx led Sorel towards a new conception of revolution that set him against the Marxist model. Direct action, violence and the social myth of mobilisation were all concepts that the Italian syndicalists borrowed from Sorel. It was around these concepts that a new brand of active, nationalist-oriented and elite Socialism was to be defined by Arturo Labriola, Enrico Leone and their intellectual followers. Sorel’s contribution to Italian Syndicalism is extremely important because the Italian theoreticians contributed to the revision of Marx by attempting to integrate economic marginalism with Marx’s theory of value. This revision brought an ideological change, which, coupled with Sorel’s influence, shifted Italian Syndicalism away from its Marxist origins producing, in the wake of World War I, a whole new concept of socialism, a national socialism with a nationalistic vision.
Deep doubts about Marx’s predictions of revolution flaming out of capitalism’s cyclical and deepening crises moved many socialists to shift their views. Organized labor was able to obtain direct benefits for the working class through negotiations. The political system adapted to this situation by legitimising the presence and activities of socialist parties, within the liberal democratic framework.
However, any idea of compromise with capitalism within the framework of a liberal parliamentary democracy was out of the question. Looking for a new way to the socialist uprising, these heretics found their way to Syndicalism, absorbing much of Sorel’s influence in the process. In Avenir socialiste des syndicats Sorel expressed the need to concentrate on the renovating forces of society in the syndicate, where a new elite should be educated morally and technically to be able to take over the production process from an already decadent bourgeoisie. In the next stage, in the Reflexions sur la violence, violence is seen as the renovating force in history and as the way to bring the masses into action.
Sorel centered his analysis on the concept of violence transformed into “direct action” exercised by a revolutionary elite. The recruitment of the forces of change should be made through the marshaling myth of the revolutionary general strike. With this in mind, the syndicalist intellectuals attacked the political attitudes of the Socialist Party and proposed to place revolutionary actions directly in the economic arena, in the field of production. Since the workers’ lives took place between the factory and the syndicate, socialist political theory had to be constructed around these two dimensions of proletarian reality. The factory represented actuality, the place where the production process took place. The syndicate represented the future, the place where the workers were to be morally and technically educated in order to be able to take over the direction of the production process from the capitalists. Syndicalism wanted to eliminate from the production process any kind of hierarchy that was not absolutely necessary for its technical improvement. The result would be a society organized solely on the basis of the fulfilment of economic needs, on consensual ties and on the technical discipline of production.
“The crisis of theoretic Socialism, as already stated, became unavoidable, due to the chasm between the old Marxist forms and the latest developments of economic science,” Arturo Labriola noted. “To fill this gap was the task of the actual movement of ideas directed to solve the crisis.” The Marxist economic analysis was seen by Labriola and Leone as obsolete. This line of economic thought had been preceded in Italy by the theories of Achille Loria. Benedetto Croce had also recognized the scientific value of syndicalism. From his point of view, Marxist economics completed the picture by providing an analysis of the sociological side of capital profit. Although both Labriola, Croce and other thinkers who worked on the revision of Marx provided a good opening, from the dominant socialist point of view, it was incomplete and unsatisfactory thus opening a (new) rift in the socialist bloc. The mainstream of the Italian Socialist Party was seen by the syndicalist wing as too willing to compromise with the state, on the basis of the acceptance of the principles of parliamentary liberal democracy by the socialist side, and the granting of all kinds of benefits to it by the liberal system. The benefits of such policies held up only as long as the economy flourished.
As a result, syndicalism became marginal within the socialist ranks, particularly within the ranks of the Italian Socialist Party. The second generation of syndicalist leaders and thinkers, men like Panunzio, Orano, Olivetti, Lanzillo, Bianchi and Rossoni, who started their political careers as revolutionary syndicalist socialists finished as fascists. Their political education, which included the revision of Marx along with Sorel’s doctrines, provided the grounds for their socialism. They became anti-Marxist, elitist and action-oriented. Their revolution was to be ethical, requiring higher moral values such as heroism and social altruism, and the will to fight and conquer. This new kind of socialism found a common language with Radical Nationalism that expanded greatly with Italy’s entry into World War I. for these Italian syndicalists, the nation had replaced the social class as the subject of history. It was National Syndicalism that gave fascism its first political program and a sound ideological underpinning.
Georges Sorel was the most influential theoretician of Syndicalism in France at the time. His revision of Marx led Sorel towards a new conception of revolution that set him against the Marxist model. Direct action, violence and the social myth of mobilisation were all concepts that the Italian syndicalists borrowed from Sorel. It was around these concepts that a new brand of active, nationalist-oriented and elite Socialism was to be defined by Arturo Labriola, Enrico Leone and their intellectual followers. Sorel’s contribution to Italian Syndicalism is extremely important because the Italian theoreticians contributed to the revision of Marx by attempting to integrate economic marginalism with Marx’s theory of value. This revision brought an ideological change, which, coupled with Sorel’s influence, shifted Italian Syndicalism away from its Marxist origins producing, in the wake of World War I, a whole new concept of socialism, a national socialism with a nationalistic vision.
Deep doubts about Marx’s predictions of revolution flaming out of capitalism’s cyclical and deepening crises moved many socialists to shift their views. Organized labor was able to obtain direct benefits for the working class through negotiations. The political system adapted to this situation by legitimising the presence and activities of socialist parties, within the liberal democratic framework.
However, any idea of compromise with capitalism within the framework of a liberal parliamentary democracy was out of the question. Looking for a new way to the socialist uprising, these heretics found their way to Syndicalism, absorbing much of Sorel’s influence in the process. In Avenir socialiste des syndicats Sorel expressed the need to concentrate on the renovating forces of society in the syndicate, where a new elite should be educated morally and technically to be able to take over the production process from an already decadent bourgeoisie. In the next stage, in the Reflexions sur la violence, violence is seen as the renovating force in history and as the way to bring the masses into action.
Sorel centered his analysis on the concept of violence transformed into “direct action” exercised by a revolutionary elite. The recruitment of the forces of change should be made through the marshaling myth of the revolutionary general strike. With this in mind, the syndicalist intellectuals attacked the political attitudes of the Socialist Party and proposed to place revolutionary actions directly in the economic arena, in the field of production. Since the workers’ lives took place between the factory and the syndicate, socialist political theory had to be constructed around these two dimensions of proletarian reality. The factory represented actuality, the place where the production process took place. The syndicate represented the future, the place where the workers were to be morally and technically educated in order to be able to take over the direction of the production process from the capitalists. Syndicalism wanted to eliminate from the production process any kind of hierarchy that was not absolutely necessary for its technical improvement. The result would be a society organized solely on the basis of the fulfilment of economic needs, on consensual ties and on the technical discipline of production.
“The crisis of theoretic Socialism, as already stated, became unavoidable, due to the chasm between the old Marxist forms and the latest developments of economic science,” Arturo Labriola noted. “To fill this gap was the task of the actual movement of ideas directed to solve the crisis.” The Marxist economic analysis was seen by Labriola and Leone as obsolete. This line of economic thought had been preceded in Italy by the theories of Achille Loria. Benedetto Croce had also recognized the scientific value of syndicalism. From his point of view, Marxist economics completed the picture by providing an analysis of the sociological side of capital profit. Although both Labriola, Croce and other thinkers who worked on the revision of Marx provided a good opening, from the dominant socialist point of view, it was incomplete and unsatisfactory thus opening a (new) rift in the socialist bloc. The mainstream of the Italian Socialist Party was seen by the syndicalist wing as too willing to compromise with the state, on the basis of the acceptance of the principles of parliamentary liberal democracy by the socialist side, and the granting of all kinds of benefits to it by the liberal system. The benefits of such policies held up only as long as the economy flourished.
As a result, syndicalism became marginal within the socialist ranks, particularly within the ranks of the Italian Socialist Party. The second generation of syndicalist leaders and thinkers, men like Panunzio, Orano, Olivetti, Lanzillo, Bianchi and Rossoni, who started their political careers as revolutionary syndicalist socialists finished as fascists. Their political education, which included the revision of Marx along with Sorel’s doctrines, provided the grounds for their socialism. They became anti-Marxist, elitist and action-oriented. Their revolution was to be ethical, requiring higher moral values such as heroism and social altruism, and the will to fight and conquer. This new kind of socialism found a common language with Radical Nationalism that expanded greatly with Italy’s entry into World War I. for these Italian syndicalists, the nation had replaced the social class as the subject of history. It was National Syndicalism that gave fascism its first political program and a sound ideological underpinning.
1 comment:
I am a sort of right libertarian influenced by medieval society (Bakunin considered medieval cities to be an example of anarchy, and was a nationalist), corporatism, syndicalism, Proudhon and fascism. The leftists will scream and cry and grasp as straws when you point out the clear relationship and overlap between these ideas. The reason is because they don't really care about anarchism, they don't actually read the classical anarchists, they don't actually know what fascists believe and they don't WANT TO. They are, first and foremost, LEFTISTS who hate order, authority, property, family, ethnicity and European culture. They don't give a shit about abolishing the state or improving the conditions of workers, they simply project onto the state the image of their malfunctioning home life and use it as an excuse for their own inferiority and laziness. I have no doubt that Proudhon, Bakunin and Sorel would DESPISE modern boutique anarchist SJWs just as much as Mussolini would.
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