Giuseppe Mazzini in Britain and Italy: Divergent Legacies, 1837–1915

This chapter examines how Mazzini's exile in England, and his adoption by sections of the British radical movement, led to the more illiberal aspects of his thought, especially in connection to the nation, being overlooked. This is one important reason why Mazzini has often been hard to situate on the European political map. Whilst British radicals accentuated the progressive and democratic elements of Mazzini's political and social thought, and overlooked many ideas that they did not find congenial, in Italy it was his illiberal fusion of religion and politics as an instrument for creating a new unified Italy that arguably had a more enduring legacy. The chapter looks at how Mazzini's influence in Italy dwindled in the face of socialism in the years immediately following his death in 1872, but underwent a major revival after the turn of the century with the emergence of nationalism.