[Rezension zu George D. Herron: The Revival of Italy]

Eugen Peter Schwiedland, [Rezension zu George D. Herron: The Revival of Italy] (1922)

Schwiedland’s review of Herron’s 1921 book moves from Italian collective renewal to a historical intervention on industrial organization. It identifies Herron’s governing conviction:

Verfasser vertraut dem Genius Italiens, daß er in kulturlichen Krisen Exzesse des Individualismus überwinden und gemeinschaftliches Handeln veranlassen wird.

English translation: The author trusts in the genius of Italy, that in cultural crises it will overcome excesses of individualism and bring about communal action.

This “Totalismus” connects cultural aspiration with political mediation: Italy’s conciliatory foreign policy, Giolitti’s proposed compulsory works councils, and tolerance of returning soldiers’ and agricultural workers’ occupation of large estates. The account also credits the Fascists with restoring order against communist activity, while qualifying that claim:

Endlich haben die Faszisten gegenüber kommunistischen Umtrieben aus Eigenem die Ordnung wieder hergestellt, — allerdings ohne sich bisher wieder aufgelöst zu haben.

English translation: Finally, in the face of communist machinations, the Fascists restored order on their own initiative — though without having since dissolved themselves again.

The qualification registers their continued existence without developing a broader critique. Schwiedland passes briefly over Herron’s treatment of intellectual, social, and artistic movements to question the novelty of Giolitti’s industrial proposals.

Bezüglich der sozialpolitischen Pläne des Ministeriums Giolitti ist jedoch darauf hinzuweisen, daß der Gedanke einer Organisation der Großindustrien von oben her nicht neu ist.

English translation: With regard to the social-policy plans of the Giolitti ministry it must, however, be pointed out that the idea of an organisation of the large industries from above is not new.

Schwiedland recalls his own advocacy of compulsory workers’ committees in 1891 and Emil Steinbach’s Austrian legislative plans for large industry and mining. Their defeat by an alliance of old-style bureaucrats, industrial representatives, and Social Democratic labor leaders supplies the central historical comparison; only mining received a corresponding organization in 1896. His closing hope that Italy will respond more sympathetically to Giolitti makes the review an endorsement of institutional reform. Its distinctive contribution places Herron’s vision of national renewal within an earlier history of industrial organization from above and the resistance it encountered.