Revolutionary syndicalism and fascism: Edmondo Rossoni in the making of corporatism and his view on Vargas Era (1922-1939)

• Grant number: 18/02242-5
• Support type: Scholarships abroad - Research
• Effective date (Start): March 01, 2019
• Effective date (End): June 30, 2019
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - History
• Principal researcher: Edilene Teresinha Toledo
• Grantee: Edilene Teresinha Toledo
• Host: Maria Rosaria Stabili
• Home Institution: Escola de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (EFLCH). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus Guarulhos. Guarulhos , SP, Brazil
• Research place: Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Italy

Abstract

This research project has the main objective of investigating and analyzing the participation of former revolutionary syndicalist Edmondo Rossoni, who worked in São Paulo and elsewhere in the world, helping to promote the organization of workers, the fascist syndicalism and corporatism. The aim of the project is to understand what ideas of revolutionary syndicalism, and how, were mobilized and instrumented in the corporatist project, with which fascism tried to present itself to the Italians and the world as a "third way" alternative to both capitalism and socialism, so as to make a "new state" and a new model of society that would reconcile an authoritarian state with the diversity and plurality of interests present in society, expressed, above all, by trade union organizations. This research focuses Rossoni's life path so as to consider the strong links between the experience of immigration and the making of syndicalist and nationalist ideas that explain, in part, the choices of some militants who, like him, tortuously, went into the arms of Fascism. Thus, a reflection on revolutionary syndicalism and fascism and the real or fictitious relations established between them becomes central to the project. I want to examine how the corporatist experience in Brazil during the Vargas administration was perceived by Rossoni and other subjects of fascist Italy. The chronological cut of the project accompanies the debates and practice of corporatism from the rise of fascism to power at the outbreak of World War II, when the preparation of Italian participation in the conflict absorbed the energies, channeling the ideological and political tensions present throughout the history of the fascism. This project is part of a broader project that intends to compare the ideas and practices of the corporatist project in Italy and Brazil in Vargas, as well as the circulation of ideas about corporatism.