Giuseppe Mazzini and the socialism

The birth of the First (Socialist) International in 1864 will provide the opportunity for three political thinkers of the Nineteenth Century, each with their own specific societal vision, to cohabit and work together in the same organization. The three historical figures were Karl Marx, Mikhail Bakunin and Giuseppe Mazzini. The association of a democratic republican like Mazzini with the other two personalities, known as the „grey eminences” of the organized socialism, could surprise, but right from his first writings, Mazzini used to pay attention to the social problems of his time, conceiving politics as an activity that could not be dissociated from the economic and social order. The International was the playground of a skirmish between the three historical figures, an ideological debate on concepts like „private property”, „dialectical materialism” or „nationality”. The dispute was between Mazzini on one side, and Marx and Bakunin on the other, till 1868 when a cleavage was noticed even between the last two.