In the concluding, third part of our story for the readers of Arktos Journal about the life and work of Italian thinker and political figure Giuseppe Mazzini, we will discuss the political-philosophical legacy of Mazzini, which is significant for the history of political thought in the nineteenth century and remains relevant today.
So, after the failure of the republican revolutions in the Italian states, Mazzini once again took refuge in London. During another period in London, he established the ‘Central European Democratic Committee’, setting a truly prophetic political task – the creation of the United States of Europe. According to Mazzini, nations freed from the tyranny of monarchs should exhibit a natural inclination towards international association, which would be an expression of the desire of nations to live in peace and harmony with each other and to develop methodically.
In addition to a political association similar in its principles to the modern European Union, Mazzini proposed the establishment of a single European Court, which could make legally justified decisions in the event of international disputes. It should be noted that the idea of the United States of Europe was proposed not by Mazzini, but by another Italian democrat – Carlo Cattaneo, the leader of the Milan uprising of 1848. However, it was Mazzini who took specific political actions aimed at achieving this goal.
It was in London that Mazzini published his most famous work – The Duties of Man (I doveri dell’uomo), which ensures his place in the history of political teachings.
This text, dedicated by the author to the workers of Italy, represents the quintessence of his political, social, and ethical thought. Mazzini touches upon ‘the most sacred of what we know – God, humanity, our country, and family’. He asserts that, although for over fifty years European nations have been fighting for national liberation against absolutist forms of government and hereditary aristocracy in the name of freedom and human rights, the primary focus should be on duty.
According to Mazzini, the political movements of the ninteenth century, which aimed at liberating nations, have not achieved any significant results in terms of improving the living conditions of the workers. He claims that recognising someone’s rights is pointless if people do not have a real opportunity to exercise those rights. What is the point of freedom of speech and equality in education if people have neither the time nor the opportunity to derive any meaning from it? What opportunities does the freedom of trade provide for someone who has nothing to trade? These are the fundamental questions to which Mazzini provides a direct and clear answer: ‘…the theory of rights might be enough to encourage people to overcome some barriers, but it is incapable when the task involves creating long-term harmonious relations between people from which a nation can grow.’
The result of adhering to the theory of rights, which prioritises the happiness of an individual as the highest good, is a society of egotists, driven by the same passions as in the declining era of monarchies. Thus, according to Mazzini, the primary objective becomes the education of nations; teaching that can foster a strong spirit and readiness for self-sacrifice in them. In other words, a sense of duty. People, being the children of one God, should follow a law universal for all. Their task should not be the egotistical pursuit of personal good but self-improvement in virtue and the betterment of those around them. Mazzini clarifies that he by no means calls for people to renounce their rights, but those rights can only be the result of a fulfilled duty. Pursuing purely material interests leads to catastrophic consequences.
In these reflections, Mazzini’s thought is noticeably influenced by Kantian universalist morality and Kant’s imperative thinking. Pursuit of material interests, in Mazzini’s terminology, resonates with Kant’s hypothetical imperative, which indicates a technical order of action that says nothing about morality. The categorical imperative, expressing the normative creativity of moral reason, is an ethical imperative, an imperative of obligation. In the Kantian model, people in themselves recognise the categorical imperative when they elevate themselves to the concepts of duty and law; Mazzini, without denying this, adds political meanings to it – a healthy national state should facilitate this process.
The first theme Mazzini delves into is the divine law. ‘God has given you life; thus, God has given you a law. God is the only genuine legislator for humanity’, writes the thinker. The divine law encompasses the foundation of all morality and duty. Without comprehending divine laws, people cannot claim any rights. For Mazzini, an individual’s self-awareness and the opinions of others are ‘two wings that elevate towards God’. Political movements that absolutise the former lead society to anarchy. Movements that sacrifice individual freedom for ‘social rights’ make societies stagnant, depriving them of mobility and any prospects for further progress. Here, Mazzini prophetically notes that if communism ever triumphs, giving the state monopoly over all means of production, it will result in a ‘static society’ and the ‘horrors of tyranny’.
‘Our conscience can convince us that the law exists; however, it cannot teach us the duty that stems from this law’, points out Mazzini. It requires a torch to illuminate the darkness, and that torch is human reason.
People live and die, but their good deeds, as well as the knowledge they acquire and pass on to descendants, remain eternal. A person learns as long as they live, but humanity’s education is infinite. For Mazzini, humanity is the ‘living word of God’. From era to era, humanity gains a better understanding of itself, its mission, and God’s laws. ‘As there is one God, there is also one of His laws’, writes Mazzini. ‘But we discover it line by line, through recognising the experiences of previous generations, in line with the increasing tendency for association of human races, nations, and individual persons’, continues the Italian author. No one can claim to have understood God’s law. Nevertheless, an individual’s primary duty is, together with others, to elevate humanity to that level of education and perfection predetermined by God and time. ‘I believe in humanity, the sole interpreter of God’s law on Earth’, concludes Mazzini.
The second theme the thinker explores is the individual’s duty to humanity. ‘You are humans; this means you are rational and social beings, capable of intellectual development through association’, writes Mazzini. With their unique nature, people should not serve merely the interests of their family and country but must fulfil their duty to all of humanity – to educate and perfect themselves and those around them; to work not just for themselves but for the progress of all humanity. Mazzini proclaims the veracity of Christian postulates about one God and that all people are His children. From the understanding of one God, he derives the concept of one humanity. The life of nations in close collaboration with each other is how Mazzini defines the ideal to aspire to. ‘Brotherhood of the nations of Europe, and then – of the entire world’ is the goal formulated by the Italian thinker. When acting in the interests of one’s family and country, one should ponder how one’s actions might benefit all of humanity.
The subsequent issue is the individual’s duty to his homeland. By creating nations and nationalities, God provided a means for humans to amplify their strengths. For Mazzini, a country is a ‘union of free and equal people, bound by fraternal ties, pursuing a singular goal’. A country is not a mass but an association of individuals. Equality of people in rights and freedom from privileges form the basis of any country. Apart from the divine law, there should be ‘secondary laws’ regulating its life, and all citizens of that country should participate in their formulation. ‘The entire nation should partake in law-making’, asserts Mazzini. The thinker also notes that countries which recognise freedom only within their borders but systematically violate it internationally must pay for their selfishness.
Subsequently, Mazzini addresses the issue of freedom. A person deprived of freedom cannot fulfil his duty and cannot lead a genuinely moral life since he is not free in his choice between good and evil. Freedom is sacred. From these postulates, Mazzini concludes that everyone has the right to freedom and the right to pursue it by any means. The republic is the only logical and legitimate form of government precisely because its operations involve free citizens. One cannot deprive a person of freedom of movement, freedom of religion, freedom to have his opinion and express it in public, freedom of association with others, freedom of work, and freedom of trade. All these are sacred to Mazzini. However, freedom is a means, not an end. ‘Freedom is not the denial of all authorities; it is the denial of any authority that does not express the collective aim of a nation or seeks to assert itself against public consensus’, writes the thinker. According to Mazzini, freedom remains sacred as long as it is guided by the idea of duty and faith in universal betterment.
This is a significant theoretical innovation by Mazzini in the context of the evolution of political theory, the importance of which is often underestimated. The Italian thinker can undoubtedly be counted among the proponents of the modern and Enlightenment theory of natural rights, stemming from Hugo Grotius, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. However, Mazzini directly links the existence of rights per se with imperative obligations.
In other words, while postulating the necessity and state protection of natural rights and freedoms, he stipulates that all the aforementioned are a means, not an end in itself – a means to achieve the collective goals of a nation, for the healthy development of a national state. Such a limitation might seem ambiguous to liberal theorists who postulate the primacy of natural rights as a universal value. Still, Mazzini’s political system essentially appears coherent and consistent since he primarily proceeds from the values of human association and national unity, every representative of which should honour his duty to God and the homeland. This idealistic ‘addition’ of Mazzini to the inherently secular theory of natural rights makes his model original, and this element of Mazzini’s political creativity facilitated the convergence of Italian liberals and nationalists in the twentieth century.
Lastly, the author touches on economic matters. Mazzini addresses the impoverished representatives of the working class. The Italian thinker clearly understands that speaking to them about their duty to humanity and discussing political rights and freedom of speech is pointless since they are fighting fiercely for survival. However, he calls on them to become part of one large family, a single nation, where they, with fairer labour returns, will have more leisure time and opportunities for self-development. Labour is the foundation of any economy. Appealing to a sense of justice, Mazzini offers workers the idea of a national revolution capable of eliminating the tyranny of capital. At the same time, he stipulates that the right to property is as sacred as freedom itself and criticises utopian socialists. Mazzini notes that property distribution in his era is unjust, as much of it was acquired through violence and oppression. ‘We should not attempt to abolish property; we should merely create conditions where many can possess it’, the thinker concludes. He is confident that as soon as European societies finally abolish class distinctions, conditions for greater social justice will be established. According to Mazzini, economic justice means that everyone receives according to the results of their labour.
Examining The Duties of Man in the context of Mazzini’s life and the evolution of his thought, and against the background of his earlier works, it can be inferred that his political and social ideal remained unchanged – it is a republican state system guaranteeing maximum rights and freedoms but also placing on its citizens a moral and ethical duty aimed at self-improvement and pursuing national development goals. Mazzini’s statements show significant influence on the political ontology of German classical idealism – both Hegel’s philosophy of history (regarding self-recognition of God through the progress of freedom consciousness) and Kant’s ethics (morality aimed at duty, not existence). Compared to his earlier works, the increased role of the religious factor (appeals to divine laws from which the thinker derives his political ontology) is noticeable. Still, Mazzini remains consistent – he declares the same fervent commitment to the republican ideal as in the days of Young Italy. The thinker adapts his political theory to the new challenges of the time – for instance, the clearly manifested threat of communism. Nevertheless, in the fundamental positions of his political thought, Mazzini remains a convinced liberal and nationalist, advocating a free and independent united Italy.
It would seem that he was fortunate enough in his lifetime to see a vivid embodiment of his dream. In 1861, King Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia proclaimed a unified Italian state – the Kingdom of Italy; in 1870, after the final defeat of the forces of Pope Pius IX and the capture of Rome, the process of uniting the Italian lands was successfully completed. However, the relationship between the republican Mazzini and the victorious monarchy did not go well. In 1862, the thinker even declined an offered mandate as a deputy. In 1872, Mazzini passed away in Pisa. He was escorted on his final journey by over a hundred thousand people.
It should be noted that many of those who lived to see the culmination of the Risorgimento were disappointed with its outcomes. Economically and politically, the country unified, but the spiritual and intellectual unity dreamt of by Mazzini and Italian idealists was not observed. The emerging Italian national consciousness harboured the idea that the Risorgimento promised much but did not fulfil all its promises. In the twentieth century, radical representatives of the Italian political field, including fascists, actively speculated on this notion. The fascists were particularly critical of the institution of parliamentarianism that emerged in Italy thanks to the Risorgimento and, in their view, had no positive influence on national development. While Marxists (e.g., Antionio Gramsci) characterised the Risorgimento as a ‘passive revolution’ (rivoluzione passiva), right-wing radicals often used the term ‘failed revolution’ (rivoluzione mancata).
Mazzini became one of the main heroes of the Risorgimento period for Italy; he is still revered as one of the fathers of the nation, alongside Garibaldi and Victor Emmanuel II. His nationalism and vehement rejection of socialism served as the basis for many radical thinkers, both of the pre-fascist period and the fascist era, to consider him one of their main mentors.
For instance, syndicalist Sergio Panunzio, in 1920, in an article written for Mussolini’s newspaper Il Popolo d’Italia, called on everyone to study Mazzini – ‘the greatest Italian since Dante’. At the same time, Panunzio noted that Mazzini’s work needed to be ‘cleansed of religious ballast’, retaining only the ‘living elements – association, education, the mission of the nation’. Another prominent syndicalist, Angelo Oliviero Olivetti, called out, ‘Forward, to the Italian people foreseen by Mazzini!’ As David Roberts notes, ‘For the syndicalists, Mazzini represented the unbridled promise given by the Risorgimento, as he aspired to a different type of Italian unity, a popular community with close psychological ties and profound social obligations.’
Regarding the ‘fascist era’, Mazzini’s influence is evident in several key figures of that epoch. For the philosopher Giovanni Gentile, Mazzini was a great idealist, a true warrior of the idea, who clearly distinguished between good and evil and fought relentlessly against the latter. He argued that Mazzini was the true prophet of Italian nationalism, and the religious foundations permeating his political teaching only strengthened his belief in a free and strong Italian nation. Giuseppe Bottai, founder of the journal Fascist Critique, also portrayed Mazzini as a proto-fascist. Within the context of consensus economic theory, he was described as a precursor to corporatism. The fascist leader Benito Mussolini also held Mazzini in high esteem – several volumes of his works were always on Mussolini’s desk.
However, it would be a profound mistake to think that Mazzini mainly influenced the right – his impact on the left (on liberals, on socialists) was equally profound. Firstly, during his lifetime, Chancellor Metternich himself called him ‘the most dangerous man in Europe’. Secondly, he was very popular in England, where he spent a significant part of his life. Thirdly, many anti-fascist forces, both based in Italy and abroad (like the Massachusetts Mazzini Society, active in the interwar period), held in high esteem the Enlightenment and democratic elements in his legacy. Fourthly, Mazzini’s thought inspired many ‘freedom fighters’ of ‘new nations’, such as Sun Yat-sen and Mahatma Gandhi.
Despite the diversity of Mazzini’s thought and legacy, we can be certain of one thing – thanks to this thinker and others like him during the Risorgimento era, the mere conceptualisation of Italy as a sovereign state and the consideration of Italians as a unified nation became possible.
Thanks to this merit, widely recognised in Italy to this day, Mazzini has entered not only the history of European political thought but also the pantheon of national heroes of the Italian people. His eventful and active life remains an inspiration for many dreamers of a better future to this very day.
