Ricerc@Sapienza

The life of Lelio Basso spans the history of the ‘short’ twentieth century – the aftermath of the First World War, the tragic decades of fascism, the post-war democratic reconstruction, the decline of party politics, the rise of international activism on human and peoples’ rights. His was an original, dissonant voice within the socialist tradition, with a view of socialism drawn from the history of the subaltern classes, that he put into practice in decades of high-profile political action. It is a lesson that today seems more relevant than ever.

Lelio Basso is without doubt a twentieth-century socialist. His interpretation of classical socialism is at times heretical, combining different elements of Marxist thought (while remaining faithful to it), the intellectual tradition of the labour movement, and early twentieth-century socialism

In this article, first of all, I point out the difference I perceive between the conception of social freedom Honneth delineates in Freedom’s Right and the one, inspired by the proto-socialists’ principle of fraternity, that I see operating in The Idea of Socialism (section I). Then, I discuss the advisability of envisaging the future socialist society, as Honneth does, in terms of a ‘fraternal coexistence’, in which a benevolent and fraternal attitude should guide everyone’s actions towards others (section II).

In this article, after retracing the main lines of Honneth’s The Idea of Socialism, I address two objections to it. Firstly, I question the marked substantiality of Honneth’s proposed socialist ‘community of fraternal life’, resulting from the conjunction of the idea of social freedom with the principle of fraternity he derives from the proto-socialists. On the basis of my objections, I then delineate an original theoretical model, denominated ‘socialism through convergence’ (STC). While based on Honneth’s concept of social freedom, STC can abstract from the element of fraternity.