The reception of Robert Owen’s thought in ninteenth- and twentieth-century Italy

This article examines the reception of Owen’s thought in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Italy. The articles shows that while Owen attracted the attentionof Piedmontese liberals in the early 1820s, such as Giovanni Arrivabene, and were integrated into the wider Risorgimento, they were, as the Guiseppe Manzzini’s work demonstrated, eclipsed by what were considered more the immediate political objectives of the Risorgimento. Where Owen’s ideas did attract widespread interest was on the question of educational reform. This was because education was very much bound up with questions of individual independence, autonomy, and self-governance that were also integral to the political objectives of the Risorgimento. The article traces the impact of Owen’s educational thought not only in the nineteenth-century Italian context but in the twentieth century as well. It shows how Owen’s reflections on the role of education in character formation would prove important to twentieth-century Italian political and social thought.