L'Ordine Nuovo and other publications

I'm aware of Gramsci's involvement in setting up and being the editorial secretary on L'Ordine Nuovo and also of his contributions to ll Grido del Popolo and other publications but what did they consist of and how popular were they, I know L'Ordine Nuovo had a lot of subscribers but how available and popularly read was that -and the other publications that Gramsci had a hand in -beyond subscription?

L'Ordine Nuovo published texts by Lenin, Bela Kun and others as well as the writings of Gorky, Lunacharsky etc but who were the writers who specifically wrote for it and the other publications that Gramsci had a hand in and how much did Gramsci contribute to them as a writer?

Also is there anything of depth available online about them as my knowledge of them is just from what I've read from the timeline of Gramsci's life and bits from elsewhere.
Any other info would be great.

L'Ordine Nuovo was founded by Antonio Gramsci, Angelo Tasca, Umberto Terracini, and Palmiro Togliati. Tasca helped with the financial end of things while another member, Pia Carena, administrated it. There were contributions by an Anarcho-Communist too- Pietro Mosso, who wrote for the paper under the pseudonym Carlo Petri.


This was the staff of L'Ordine Nuovo in 1921

Originally L'Ordine Nuovo was actually geared towards cultural and social analysis and commentary. Gramsci in his years before while commenting on politics for Il Grido Del Popolo and Avanti! actually had a role as the paper's cultural critic. He reviews plays in particular, especially the works of Pirandello and Romain Rolland, which he viewed as "popular" plays, in the sense that they had a meaningful connection to the people.

To that end L'Ordine Nuovo was actually subtitled "Rassegna Settimanale di Cultura Socialista", or a "Review of Socialist Culture" originally.

As they saw the struggles of the Bolsheviks (Lenin's "Soviets" particularly interested Gramsci) and later the Red Years, they saw the need to provide an "intellectual" backing for the revolutionary workers' movement, the paper shifted gears considerably. A significant change at this point was the ouster of Angelo Tasca by Gramsci and Toglatti over Tasca's stance on trade unions, as the paper began to shift more into theoretical manners concerning "workers' democracy". They felt that they would provide the "tools" and what not for workers to liberate and organize themselves.

They provided their own commentary as well as commentary by Lenin and the Bolsheviks. Considering the state of Socialist politics at the time this was significant at the time, with many trying to push the positions of Mensheviks and Left SR's against that of the Bolsheviks. It created exposure to their ideals, and this was significant even more when you consider the way information traveled then.

Gramsci saw the workers' councils that were being formed at the time as comparable to the Soviets in Italy. He felt that these would be the "germs" of a future Communist society in Italy, that from these moments of workers' control would the grounds for a DOTP be created.

L'Ordine Nuovo got some success during this point, significant considering the relatively new nature of the paper. The Turin branch of FIOM adopted the ideas of the paper, as did the Turin branch of the PSI. Subscribers went up to 6,000 readers, but it seemed to have a wider scope when you incorporate how it influenced the FIOM and PSI branches. L'Ordine Nuovo, like other groups, had a hand in the popular sentiment, in the occupations and the General Strike that blew out in 1920. In September 1920 workers began to manage factories themselves, and some ideas of the paper were being acted out while at the same time the paper investigated innovations of the workers themselves.

Like I said he saw the councils as a part of something bigger, of the framework that would form the "New Order" once the revolution happened, the beginnings of a truly international
communist world. One that would be forged from the revolutionary workers' themselves.

Lenin in turn seemed to endorse L'Ordine Nuovo by stating in the Comintern meeting that they matched closely what he was expecting out of members of the Comintern.

Problems came up in a number of areas. Gramsci never really specified how to rectify the contradictions between a bottom-up democracy and a hierarchy of stronger councils over it. Or how it would be able to do workers' control and a global unified planned economy at the same time. Critics charged Gramsci for betraying a "syndicalist" mindset in his works by seemingly ignoring the role of the Communist Party in the revolution.

In the end though they did not go beyond Turin in influence. When the unions and the PSI pushed for an end to the strikes, Turin would obviously be isolated and could not go through it alone. Eventually by the end Gramsci was alone in his defense of Workers' Councils and eventually he backed down.

The thing that was significant about this experience is that it gave Gramsci a perspective on the bourgeois state and how it responded to a labor strike. What methods does a bourgeois state enforce and maintain itself? These things played into his later thoughts on hegemony.

L'Ordine Nuovo is coming up soon on the articles. Unfortunately the Foracs reader doesn't categorize them all under one heading (but they're there- just search for "L'ordine Nuovo" and you'll get to articles that were published in it, such as "Workers' Democracy") but I'll try to transcribe some of them from my reader. If you want to dig it up, I suggest "Gramsci Pre-Prison Writings" from the Cambridge Series in Political Science. Maybe floating around in a library somewhere. Just haven't had time to update much. I actually wrote a half-decent thing on Gramsci's bit on fascism in the early 1920s on the forums I may post later.

For more information I might bring up the pertinent sections in the summaries of L'Ordine Nuovo from the Hoare Prison Notebooks edition and the Pre-Prison writings. I'll have to transcribe those first though. In the mean time look at these:

This is a copy someone made of the Marxists.org collection of Gramsci's writings before copyright issues arose. It has most of his stuff though some of the links are broken now
http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Anton...msci/index.htm

I also have a .djvu file of the Prison Notebooks (like .pdf, but more compressed and nice quality. You need a different program for it. Google the extension) . I'll have to send that directly to you though.

Thank you for the info.I find these early Socialist and revolutionary publications interesting not just in terms of the writers and their writings but also the printing,publishing,distribution etc.I did'nt realise how successful and influential L'Ordine Nuovo became for a time in Turin.

The last time I looked at the site you gave the link to the majority of the links were broken but there seems to be more available now than previously especially Gramsci's writing for the publications we're talking about,Ive also found the writing's in the Forgacs reader now so I'll get on to them later.As I said earlier I could only find small bits of information from different places and the Wikipedia page on L'Ordine Nuovo is in Italian and using google translate it does'nt make a lot of sense.

Thank you for the info.I find these early Socialist and revolutionary publications interesting not just in terms of the writers and their writings but also the printing,publishing,distribution etc.I did'nt realise how successful and influential L'Ordine Nuovo became for a time in Turin.

The last time I looked at the site you gave the link to the majority of the links were broken but there seems to be more available now than previously especially Gramsci's writing for the publications we're talking about,Ive also found the writing's in the Forgacs reader now so I'll get on to them later.As I said earlier I could only find small bits of information from different places and the Wikipedia page on L'Ordine Nuovo is in Italian and using google translate it does'nt make a lot of sense.

Yeah, it was successful in Turin- most of Gramsci's early start was because of his activities in Turin- Leading a Communist grouping there of the PSI branch and later to lead them into PCd'I is all possible from that. L'ON really tapped into the revolutionary energy at the time and having what seemed to be Lenin's approval was a great help.

I'll try to see if there's a similar scan (.djvu) of the pre-prison writings edition I have. I like the Cambridge edition I have (was given it by a friend who studies PoliSci) and it's easy to read.

Personally I have that one and the Hoare Selections from the Prison Notebooks which between the two give you an excellent idea of his writings.

http://rapidshare.com/files/25932983...books.rar.html

Or

http://uploading.com/files/A1QR6XF7/...books.rar.html

Their qualities aren't as good as the .djvu I got.

Those contain a a scan of the Prison Notebooks by Hoare if you want to take a look. I recommended it in this case because its introduction is a nice condensation of a biography really.

And for the Cambridge pre-prison writings:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=EEYFXHU0

Quality isn't great though. Trying to find a better one or a .djvu.

Thank you for the links.I've just downloaded the Hoare selections and If you can find a .djvu of the Cambridge pre-prison writings some time that'll be great.I'll take a look at your scan of the prison notebooks some time down the line. I'll have to get back to you on that.

I found Gramsci's article "Newspapers and the Workers" which he wrote for Avanti! in 1916 to be a great introduction to how he saw the importance and the role to play that Socialist publications such as the ones he was involved in, have in opposing the Bourgeois press and revolutionising the working class.It's still as relevant today as it was then.

I've read that in 1916 while he was writing for various papers that Gramsci gave talks to study groups in Turin on- among other things- The Paris commune and the French revolution did he write anything specifically about them?

If you want to share "Newspapers and the Workers" with us, that'd be great. I can't remember it so I'll have to take a look at it.

Regarding the Paris Commune and the French Revolution: Gramsci didn't seem to comment much on the two during his rise to fame in years after WW I beyond what was the standard Marxist opinion on the events. However one thing I noticed in his earlier writings is the way he employed the term "Jacobin" as a pejorative.

He takes more time to look at them when he wrote his prison notebooks. I recall he wrote a lot more concerning the French Revolution than the Paris Commune- for obvious reasons due to the more overtly "socialist" reputation of the latter to the censors. He takes a different view on the Jacobins at this point, viewing them as a more "progressive" element. What interested him the most was how the Jacobins, representing the "bourgeois" in revolution, were able to recruit Frenchmen in the rural areas to the Liberal Republican cause. He felt that this had many advantages- most immediately in that it gave the fledging revolution much more strength and power, and prevented the Vendee armies from becoming an even bigger threat had they left the rural masses to them. More importantly though, it began to shift the mantle of the ruling class towards the bourgeois from the old monarchists. Even in the subsequent restoration of the monarchy and Napoleon III's empire, it is unquestionable that there was indeed a true "liberal" development occuring, not a restoration to the Ancein Regime. It fed into the concept of his "National-Popular" Bloc that the "Modern Prince" (ie The Communist Party) had to form in order to have a successful revolution. Mainly that a the Proletariat had to form its own "hegemony" over the rural peasant and other downtrodden social segments of society to their cause- a true meaning cooperation the revolution when it comes, and a real "state of mind" that will make the DOTP easier to create after the revolution.

One thing that would make this particular event of the class seeking to achieve power is by the nature of the proletariat- the proletariat isn't interested in exploitation or selfish concerns but the revolution, something it has in common with the other peoples that come under its banner. It will be a cooperative rather than manipulative endeavour. Hopefully.

In the "Newspapers and the workers" Gramsci is basically saying that the newspapers the working class read are serving the interests of the bourgeoisie by feeding them news and ideas that are specifically aimed to keep them oppressed.And so the money that the working class give to the newspaper sellers is in fact unbeknownst to them- through their innocently believing that the press reports facts-is actually being used as a weapon against them through their being subtly lied to and used to serve the dominant bourgeois class. It's kinda like the saying "I read it in the paper so it must be true".So It's through the socialist media-in this case newspapers- that the truth will be told and the proletariat be enlightened.Therefore the bourgeois media must be boycotted.

http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Anton...newspapers.htm.

Yes, that thought represents an early stage in his development of the relations between the state and civil society and what means, directly and indirectly, do the interests of the ruling class become the "common sense" of the nation.

The national-popular block that Gramsci discussed is essentially that- for the proletariat to pose an alternate and meaningful social and cultural bloc to oppose the ruling class.