#WORLD #WORLDWIDE #ITALY #ANARCHISM #News #Journal #Update - (en) #Italy, FDCA - Il Cantiere #10-8: Internationalism and irredentism. A clash still current - Armando Sestani (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 At the conclusion of one of the central chapters of the History of Italian

Anarchists (1) Pier Carlo Masini wrote about the irredentist manifestations that
had crossed the country in the summer of 1878 and the response of the
internationalists, referring, in a note, to his report to Florence during a
conference in January 1963, which had as its theme the historiographical balance
and the historical problems of the workers and socialist movement whose acts were
subsequently published in 1965 (2). In that report, centered on the birth and
development of the International in Italy, Masini devoted a part to the "national
question", explaining how the internationalists approached the nascent
irredentism. This political movement was officially born in 1877 and claimed
territories belonging to Austria-Hungary inhabited by Italian-speaking
populations to the Italian state; they were Trentino, compactly Italian-speaking,
and cities and regions such as Trieste, Istria and Dalmatia where
Italian-speaking populations had lived for centuries in close contact with
Slovenes and Croats. A motto was born, today we would say a catchphrase, which
would influence Italian political and social life for decades, symbolized by the
name of the two most important cities of these territories: Trento and Trieste.
Istria and Dalmatia where Italian-speaking populations lived for centuries in
close contact with Slovenes and Croats. A motto was born, today we would say a
catchphrase, which would influence Italian political and social life for decades,
symbolized by the name of the two most important cities of these territories:
Trento and Trieste. Istria and Dalmatia where Italian-speaking populations lived
for centuries in close contact with Slovenes and Croats. A motto was born, today
we would say a catchphrase, which would influence Italian political and social
life for decades, symbolized by the name of the two most important cities of
these territories: Trento and Trieste.

Irredentism conquered the pages of newspapers in the summer of 1878, as already
mentioned, to protest against the deliberations reached by the European powers
during the Berlin Congress which ended on 13 July. This congress rectified the
decisions of the previous Peace of Saint Stephen stipulated after the
Russo-Turkish war which ended with the victory of the Russian arms. Bismarck
opposed that treaty because Russia was too strengthened. Therefore he called a
new congress to redesign Europe. Italy hoped that some territorial advantage
could arise from this meeting, as Austria-Hungary expanded to the east. But the
Habsburg empire replied spades: it was expanding but not yielding any territory
to Italy. Hence the irredentist protests.

In the Florence conference Masini recalled those moments and quoted a manifesto,
which he had already published the year before in a collection of official
documents of the Italian International, a work of the Neapolitan Federation (3).
Those militants criticized the irredentist demonstrations by affirming "That the
workers of Trento and Trieste are slaves of the capitalists and the German cops
or of those of Italy is completely indifferent to them and to us" (4). However,
it was not the first time that Masini cited the intervention of the Neapolitan
internationalists. About fifteen years earlier he had remembered them by writing
a couple of articles published in the magazine "Will", which had as their topic
anarchists and national wars (5). The theme of the unredeemed lands, central to
the interventionist propaganda of 1915, it did not end with the end of the First
World War. The advent of fascism meant, especially for the Slavic populations who
found themselves becoming Italian citizens after the Paris Congress, decades of
oppression and violence. Fascism raged with ferocity against the Slovenes and
Croats who lived in Trieste, Rijeka and Istria, so much so that historiography
has coined the term "border fascism" to underline its peculiarity. After the
Second World War those lands were incorporated into the new socialist Yugoslavia,
while only Trieste remained for a few more years, until 1954, outside the Italian
borders. In fact, the "question of Trieste" remained at the center of the Italian
political debate in which anti-communist and neo-redentist themes alternated with
openly neo-fascist positions. The Trieste problem was also addressed by the GAAP
(anarchist groups of proletarian action) in a resolution of the national
committee published in the "Impulso". The document is dated on the eve of events
that occurred in Trieste in the first days of November 1953; street riots
promoted by nationalists that allegedly caused six deaths at the hands of the
Civil Police under English command (according to some neo-fascist historiography
those deaths are defined as the last martyrs of the Risorgimento) (6).

The text, very articulated, tackled the problem of Trieste from its origins
calling it "the bloody chimera of the Italian people". Precisely in the first
part the resolution of 1878 "the work of a group of Neapolitan anarchists" was
mentioned (and here we see the contribution of Masini). The serious
responsibilities of the Italian ruling classes were not lacking in the historical
reconstruction, but there was no discount to the Yugoslav government defined as
"a national-communist state ... which is pleased to draw inspiration from the
partisan struggle, anti-fascism, the struggle against Italian imperialism" while
Yugoslavia was defined as "... vulgar socialist disguise of a bourgeois policy of
robbery and territorial grabbing".

Reproposing the resolution of the Neapolitan internationalists almost one hundred
and fifty years later does not only mean the publication of a historical
document, an exercise that is always useful, but also a warning to all those who
take a stand for unlikely popular republics in the war being fought in Eastern
Europe: being exploited in the Dombass mines by Ukrainian or Russian masters, or
any other nationality, makes no difference.

International Association of Workers - Neapolitan Federation

Companions!

The Redemption of the Irredent Lands is the theme of the current agitations of
the bourgeois of Italy who in solemn rallies try to draw the people to
participate in their efforts. But let's leave them alone. We also show that
finally taught by so many disappointments, we understand the value of such
mystifications.

Companions!

That the workers of Trento and Trieste are slaves of the capitalists and of the
German cops or of those of Italy is completely indifferent to them and to us. The
only ones who can profit from bringing us under the Austrian cannon are our
bourgeois, who perhaps would see the field extended to their lordship by some
miles with our blood. And yet we, instead of making ourselves instruments of
their ambitions, waste our strengths, let's dedicate them to the true redemption
of all lands - the Redeemer and the Irredent - let's dedicate them to demolish
the edifice of our oppression - the States - and to order ourselves freely. with
the principles of anarchist socialism.

Companions!

This is the revolution that affects workers everywhere. Every agitation on the
other hand only tends to reaffirm the chains of which the bourgeois hold us
loads, and to immerse us more and more in misery and ignorance: therefore, let us
have the welcome it deserves.

Naples, July 1878. For the Federation:

Francesco Saverio Merlino, Giovanni Buonfantini, Niccolò Converti, Giovanni
Domanico, Francesco Siciliani, Tommaso Schettino.

Note

1) Masini Pier Carlo, History of the anarchists from Bakunin to Malatesta
1862-1892, Rizzoli, Milan 1969,

pp. 148-149.

2) AA.VV, The Labor and Socialist Movement. Historical balance and historical
problems. Florence Conference, January 18-20, 1963, Edizioni del Gallo, Milan
1965. The intervention of

PC Masini is: The First International in Italy. Problems of a Historiographic
Review, pp. 85-143. The same intervention will be reprinted in Masini Pier Carlo,
Eresie dell'ottocento, New Editorial, Milan 1978, pp. 157-253.

3) Pier Carlo Masini edited by, Official acts 1871-1880. The Italian Federation
of the International Workers' Association, Edizioni Avanti!, Milan 1964.

4) Pier Carlo Masini edited by, Official acts 1871-1880. The Italian Federation
of the International Workers' Association, Edizioni Avanti!, Milan 1964.

5) Pier Carlo Masini edited by, Official Acts 1871-1880. The Italian Federation
of the International Workers' Association, Edizioni Avanti!, Milan 1964.

6) 10 points of the Trieste question. Enough with the propaganda of hate! We
don't want any more cemeteries at

borders! Long live proletarian and peaceful Trieste! The document is found in:
Bertolucci Franco edited by, Anarchist Groups of Proletarian Action. The ideas,
the militants, the organization. 1 From the popular front to the "fraud law": the
political and organizational crisis of anarchism, BFS edizioni and Edizioni
Pantarei, 2017, pp. 481-485. The

street clashes took place in Trieste between 3 and

November 6. The document is dated 30 October 1953 and was published in l
'"Impulso" on 15 November.
---
Taken from Il Cantiere n. September 10, 2022

Libertarian Alternative / Federation of Anarchist Communists

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Il Cantiere n. 10 Settembre 2022
Alternativa Libertaria/Federazione dei Comunisti Anarchici
ilcantiere@autistici.org
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