Carlo Rosselli:
Socialist Heretic and Antifascist Exile
Stanislao Pugliese in Conversation with Solveig Wilder

Throughout my years as an activist, I have often been struck by the realization that I am reinventing the wheel. That realization became particularly acute as I read Carlo Rosselli: Socialist Heretic and Antifascist Exile (Harvard University Press, 1999). Rosselli, an Italian socialist intellectual and activist during the years between World War I and World War II, devoted his entire life and considerable fortune to the anti-fascist struggles against Mussolini, Hitler, and Franco. He and his brother, Nello, were eventually assassinated in 1938 for their work in anti-fascist movements. Such is the stuff of heroes, of course, and not ordinary activists like you and me. But many activists today will surely see themselves in Rosselli as he grapples with Marxism, criticizes the ineffectiveness of the left, and desperately tries to develop new theories and movements that had a real chance of defeating the right. I discussed this with author and DSA member Stanislao Pugliese.

DL: Why did you write a biography about Carlo Rosselli?

SP: In 1991 I was a CUNY graduate student in search of a dissertation topic. Since my field was twentieth-century Italy, I first thought about fascism. On reflection, I decided that while there is still much to say about fascism, little work had been done on Italian anti-fascism in the United States. One group that stood out as anti-fascists was Carlo Rosselli’s Justice and Liberty, part of a heterogeneous underground intellectual movement that included Primo Levi, Cesare Pavese and Leone Ginzburg. Rosselli was a charismatic, dynamic, immensely sympathetic character with a dramatic life. I felt that a biography on Rosselli would not only introduce an important figure to an American audience, but that it could help to introduce readers to this critical chapter in Italian history.

DL: The book is written in an accessible and engaging fashion. At times, however, you seem to presume some familiarity with Italian history and culture. Did you have a particular audience in mind when you wrote this book?

SP: This was a major problem: I wanted the book to be as accessible as possible, yet it still had to be a rigorous reading of twentieth-century Italian history. There is nothing inherently contradictory about this; the problem arises because the history of Italian fascism and anti-fascism is not so well known in the United States. In fact, the book is being translated into Italian but this will require some revision because I had an American reader in mind while writing. Or rather I should say I had several “ideal” readers in mind. There was, of course, the person who regularly reads Democratic Left, The Nation, Dissent, the Village Voice, and the alternative press in general. Then there was the “intellectual” perusing the pages of the New York Review of Books, the New York Times book review, and scholarly journals, and also general readers interested in historical biography and a “good read.” Admittedly, this isn’t beach reading; one reviewer wrote that the book is “demandingly dense.” It is a dramatic human story with tragic overtones, one that might inspire DSA youth section members, or graduate students, to study the people and ideas of Italian anti-fascism.

DL: Rosselli was frustrated by the sectarianism, divisiveness, rigidity, dogmatism, determinism, paralysis, and impotence of the left. He urged not only a revision of Marxism, but a “total repudiation without pity.” Toward this end, Rosselli linked the values of collectivism and individualism into a synthesis he called Liberal Socialism. He elaborated on this perspective in numerous journals, and in the postulates of his anti-fascist organization, Justice and Liberty. Can you explain briefly and simply what this theory was about?

SP: Rosselli had a profound admiration for Marx. He wrote that Marxism had penetrated the consciousness of the modern individual to such an extent that “we are all, in a certain sense, Marxists.” But Marxism for Rosselli failed because it was a deterministic philosophy and not humanistic (there is no indication that Rosselli had read the 1844 manuscripts). Socialism, in the end, was a form of humanism for Rosselli. It was not the socialization of the means of production nor the proletariat in power nor simple material equality. For Rosselli, “Socialism, grasped in its essential aspect, is the progressive actualization of the principle of liberty and justice among men.” Liberals refused to accept that liberalism could and should evolve into socialism; orthodox socialists and Marxists refused to accept the sacrosanct status of the individual. Rosselli agreed with traditional socialists and orthodox Marxists that socialism should be conceived as the concrete movement for the emancipation of the proletariat. Where he differed was in his view that socialism was “liberalism in action” and his belief that socialism “means that liberty comes into the life of poor people.” Some traditional socialists and orthodox Marxists scorned the civil and political freedoms associated with classic liberalism, but to Rosselli these were necessary to maintain socialism’s humanistic character. Without them, socialism degenerates into the dictatorship of the party (not the proletariat) and oppression.

DL: Liberal Socialism was chided by numerous theorists as being “bourgeois,” “an oxymoron,” an attempt to “reconcile the irreconcilable,” “hypocritical,” “pseudointellectual,” “inconsistent,” “paradoxical,” and “hazy.” Was there any legitimacy to these criticisms?

SP: And those were the polite criticisms! Even Rosselli’s admirers are reluctant to claim any originality for his political theories. They are being too humble, however. No one else at the time was making the same arguments. In the context of his day — with classic nineteenth-century liberalism and socialism seen as bitter enemies — his theory of a liberal socialism did indeed seem paradoxical or oxymoronic. Yet it was neither pseudointellectual nor inconsistent.

DL: Rosselli’s greatest heresy was that he rejected many aspects of class analysis. He argued that “not all members of the bourgeoisie were exploiters” and that “there were segments of the bourgeoisie that could and did act as catalysts for the development of liberty.” An alliance should therefore be forged “between the proletariat and the enlightened elements of the bourgeoisie.” In addition, Rosselli believed that fascism “was not simply class reaction but moral crisis, a human crisis, and crisis of civilization.” How well do you think this analysis holds?

SP: Rosselli did not completely reject the element of class in his analysis of fascism. He recognized that the ruling class in Italy — the industrialists, the military, the Catholic Church and the bourgeoisie, supported fascism as a defense of their social and economic privileges. But even a cursory study of history would reveal that the “enlightened bourgeoisie” could be, and sometimes was, a catalyst for liberty and justice. The very leadership of the leftist parties in Europe was evidence of this. Except for the Italian anarchists, led by the worker Errico Malatesta, all the leftist parties were organized and directed by “bourgeois intellectuals.” Even Antonio Gramsci came from a petit-bourgeois family. In retrospect, I think Rosselli’s analysis of fascism holds up rather well. Even Benedetto Croce, who admired Rosselli yet strongly criticized the concept of a liberal socialism, eventually moved from an analysis of fascism as a “parenthesis” in Italian history to an analysis of fascism as a “moral sickness,” similar to Rosselli’s formulation. As we recede from the twentieth-century we can see fascism as a pathological attempt to deal with the myriad problems of modernity. This analysis does not deny that class interests had a role in the formation and evolution of fascism; it simply insists that class was one aspect of many that deserve study.

DL: Rosselli was a man of action. He constantly risked arrest by producing and disseminating literature in the streets of Italy. He was imprisoned for years; he escaped into exile; and, following the invasion of Ethiopia, he joined the frontlines in the war against Franco in Spain. The prophets, said Rosselli, “are no longer disarmed. And the descendants of the prophets, with rifle in hand, have acquired a new consciousness.” Yet, despite this hands-on approach to the struggle against fascism, Rosselli is still regarded by some as an elitist.

SP: This is ironic. While the Socialists were debating amongst themselves and the Communists were awaiting word from Moscow on how to proceed, Rosselli left Paris immediately upon the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War and went to Barcelona in defense of the Republic. Yet his opponents on the left, especially the Communists, were vicious in their criticism. Rosselli was a “bourgeois intellectual, “ a “dilettante,” even a “dissident fascist.” Palmiro Togliatti, leader of the Italian Communist Party, was particularly venomous in his criticism. This was because he saw Rosselli as a competitor for the allegiance of the Italian working class. Because Rosselli rejected a class-based analysis of fascism, he was open to charges of defending his own class interests. Heretically, he wrote that some segments of the proletariat supported fascism, not out of genuine conviction but from political immaturity and that the proletariat alone could not defeat fascism. This was counter to the usual glorification of the proletariat on Europe’s left at the time.

DL: You say that Rosselli’s books and journals never appealed much to working people and that his anti-fascist organizations had few working class members. On the other hand, there was an incredible outpouring of support for Rosselli at his trials, in the trenches, and at his funeral. Can you clarify how the working people of Italy regarded Rosselli?

SP: Justice and Liberty and its later incarnation, the Action Party, were criticized as “the party of intellectuals.” Although Rosselli and others devoted considerable attention to the problems of the peasants and proletariat, Justice and Liberty failed to transform itself into a mass party. This was Rosselli’s fault. He insisted that Justice and Liberty remain a “movement” rather than a “party.” He reached this conclusion after a brilliant analysis of the nature and evolution of the political party. He insisted that all party affiliations be abandoned in the struggle against fascism but could be re-established after the defeat of the regime. Justice and Liberty was meant to be an inclusive movement of all anti-fascists, from the Liberals on the right to the Socialists and even the Communists on the left. Unfortunately many of these theoretical debates fell on deaf ears and the working people under fascist Italy had more immediate concerns – like staying alive. Rosselli understood this, yet Justice and Liberty failed to reach the masses.

DL: I thought more attention could have been paid to Rosselli’s family, especially his brother Nello. I was fascinated by his mother, his two brothers, his wife, who assisted the anti-fascist struggle throughout, and his three children. Was it difficult to get information about Rosselli’s personal life?

SP: John Rosselli, Carlo’s eldest son, graciously granted me several interviews and we still correspond. Although I did ask some questions concerning Rosselli’s personal life, these were only to illuminate his personality and his struggle against fascism. He himself admitted that he was a poor father. There was some indication that he was something of a ladies’ man, but I did not pursue this. The small, personal foibles of an individual don’t belong in an intellectual biography.

I gave much thought to the particular problems associated with writing biography, where there is a tendency to engage in easy pop-psychology that I avoid. For example: Why did Rosselli abandon a comfortable life and a promising academic career to join the underground? His wealth and privilege might tempt a biographer to suggest that Rosselli felt some guilt over his privileged social and economic status. Perhaps. But I didn’t want to put Rosselli on the couch.

Because of space limitations, I couldn’t devote much attention to Rosselli’s mother, a truly formidable woman, or his wife, children, and brother. Nello devoted himself to historical scholarship, and in his works on the Risorgimento (the nineteenth-century movement for Italian unification) one detects an explicit condemnation of fascism. If I had the opportunity, I might have written a dual biography. Nello represents what in Germany came to be called the “inner emigration”; intellectuals such as Victor Klemperer and others who refused to acquiesce or collaborate with barbarism. And although the glory goes to the active participants such as Carlo, the passive resisters deserve to have their story told as well for their resistance, I now believe, was crucial for whatever success anti-fascism and anti-Nazism may have had.

DL: You downplay the fact that Rosselli was Jewish, and you imply that this fact was not particularly important in shaping his views or his sense of urgency. The book mentions little about Rosselli’s reaction to the anti-Semitism of Mussolini and Hitler. But Rosselli did say that many of the “universal values” that he defended actually had their roots in the “messianism of Israel.” In addition, he strongly urged the separation of church and state, and he was quite critical of the Catholic church. It seems to me that Rosselli’s religious background might have been a more significant factor in his life than you contend.

SP: Rosselli was a secular Jew. His criticism of the Catholic Church was strong and historically informed. As much as he may have recognized decent, sincere people in the Church, he saw the institution of the Church as corrupt and keeping the Italian people politically immature. I do argue, however, that Judaism played a role in his ethical and intellectual world-view. I detect the moral indignation of an Old Testament prophet in his condemnation of fascism and Nazism; his rhetoric rings like a prophet in the wilderness. He constantly invokes the themes of heresy, exile, martyrs for the faith, and the sacredness of sacrifice. Justice and Liberty became known as the “Jewish” movement because it did attract some well-known Jews. But all of them, like Rosselli, were secular, and it is important to recognize that their Judaism was cultural and ethical.

DL: On one occasion, Rosselli told his mother that he thought the family should give away their wealth and live “a poor life based only on what we earned.” His mother responded that it would be better to use the family’s money to achieve noble goals. Rosselli would go on to use his wealth to fund the publication of several journals, the printing of newsletters, and the renting of planes to disseminate information throughout Italy, and possibly even to make an assassination attempt on Mussolini. Was his mother vindicated?

SP: I alluded to the possibility that Rosselli’s wealth was the catalyst for his anti-fascism. But there were other reasons. His participation in the First World War, for example, brought him into contact with the Italian masses — workers, craftsmen and peasants.

DL: Rosselli reminded me at times of George Orwell, who was also regarded as a “socialist heretic” and fought against Franco’s fascism in Spain. You mention Orwell only fleetingly in the book. Do you know if Rosselli and Orwell were familiar with each other, or if they met while fighting in Spain?

SP: I was hoping to find evidence that the two met in Spain, but I could find no proof of any dialogue between the two. I did find two passages — one from Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia, the other from Rosselli’s diary from the front – that were almost identical.

DL: The book is somewhat suspenseful, so I don’t want to entirely give away the circumstances surrounding the assassination of the Rosselli brothers and the trials that ensued. But in your opinion, having researched the events extensively, was Mussolini directly involved?

SP: There is no “smoking gun.” Yet in such situations we shouldn’t be surprised. Mussolini was no fool, and men in power wouldn’t leave such evidence behind. It boils down to how one conceives of the fascist dictatorship: was Mussolini the “totalitarian” leader supremely in command or was his a “weak dictatorship” as some social historians have claimed? I believe that Mussolini may have received news that Rosselli was planning on expanding the Spanish Civil War into Italy with a corresponding assassination attempt on Mussolini himself. This was to be a revolutionary, European-wide war against fascism and nazism. Much of this is speculation, but I think it corresponds with Rosselli’s thinking at the time.

The Rosselli assassinations are critical to an understanding of the true nature of fascism. Alberto Moravia and Bernardo Bertolucci understood this; Moravia’s The Conformist (1951) and Bertolucci’s film of the novel (1970) are based loosely on the assassination of Carlo Rosselli. Ironically, because of Hitler, National Socialism and the Holocaust, Mussolini and fascism have “gotten off the hook,” so to speak, in the twentieth-century. Everyone readily concedes that Mussolini and fascism were relatively ‘mild’ compared to the German variant of fascism, but that shouldn’t obscure the fact that opponents of Italian fascism were arrested (Gramsci), beaten (Piero Gobetti and Giovanni Amendola), and assassinated (Giacomo Matteotti and the Rosselli brothers).

DL: Between 100,000 and 200,000 people attended the funeral of the Rosselli brothers, and they were laid to rest in the magnificent Sala dei Duecento of the Palazzo Vecchio. A torch still burns at their gravesite, and many streets are named after them in Italy. For many years, however, Rosselli’s views receded into obscurity. Why do you think that happened?

SP: This has to do with the particular intellectual and political situation of post-war Italy. The Christian Democrats and the Communists came to dominate cultural and political life. Those who saw themselves in the tradition of “liberal socialism” gravitated to smaller parties or were independent leftists. In Cold War Italy, there was no room for the humane socialism of Rosselli; it wasn’t until the 1970s and “Eurocommunism,” and now with the end of the Cold War, that scholars and politicians have returned to this tradition. Ironically, while Rosselli was almost ignored in the post-war period, today everyone — including the descendants of the Communists — are claiming him as a political and intellectual ancestor.

DL: You write that Rosselli was plagued by the “critical demon” of “doubt and relativism” which pushes “socialists into action rather than into passivity, induces a respect for their adversaries, and demands a continuous revision of their theoretical positions and practical actions.” This also seems to be the case with many exchanges I have heard at DSA meetings or read in Democratic Left, Socialist Forum and on DSANet. You write that many themes in the book are reminiscent of DSA’s founder, Michael Harrington. What lessons do you think DSAers will learn from reading this book?

SP: I would like to think that members of DSA will recognize many of their concerns in Rosselli’s writings and actions. And that, notwithstanding the triumphal cries of “the end of history” and the final victory of neo-liberalism, there is a solution that may appear temporarily defeated but which harbors a great hope — perhaps the only hope left — for a truly humanistic and civilized society.

Stanislao G. Pugliese is Assistant Professor of History at Hofstra University. He recently won the 2000 International Ignazio Silone Prize for his book, Carlo Rosselli:
Socialist Heretic and Antifascist Exile.

Solveig Wilder is DSA’s Membership Services Coordinator, and Managing Editor of Democratic Left.