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Overview
"Storming Heaven" is the first comprehensive survey of Italian autonomist theory, from its origins in the anti-Stalinist and workerist left of the 1950s to its heyday twenty years later. Autonomist marxism was a political tendency which privileged themes - self-organization, construction of identity, grassroots politics, subjects in struggle - which in many ways can be seen as the precursor of today's debates around social movements and popular direct action protest. Emphasizing the dynamic nature of class struggle as the distinguishing feature of autonomist thought, Wright explores the manner in which its understanding of class politics developed alongside emerging social movements.Offering a critical and historical exploration of the tendency's emergence in post-war Italy, "Storming Heaven" moves beyond the crisis of traditional analytical frameworks on the left, and assesses the strengths and limitations of autonomist Marxism as first developed by Antonio Negri, Mario Tronti, Sergio Bologna and others.
Editorials
Nick Dyer-Witheford
Over the last several years, the emergence of a new wave of anti-capitalist activism on the streets of Seattle, Prague and Genoa has been accompanied by a growing interest in "autonomist Marxism." Steve Wright's study brilliantly illuminates the history, complexity and internal debates of this tradition. In doing so, it fills a void in English language scholarship and makes a vital, lucid contribution to understanding how the red threads of Marxism are being rewoven into the fabric of twenty-first century radicalism.Booknews
Italian "workerism" (or ), an anti-statist Marxist tendency that developed in the 1960s and 1970s, saw itself as storming the "heavens" of class rule. Wright (research fellow, School of Information Management and Systems, Monash U., Australia) explores the theoretical and thematic elements of as it developed in the revolutionary group Potere Operaio (Worker's Power). Focusing on more famous thinkers, such as Antonio Negri, as well as lesser-known advocates of , Wright explores how the movement's concept of class underwent changes, separating into different tendencies, but leaving important lessons "to those who continue to seek a world without bosses." Distributed by Stylus. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)Book Details
Published
February 20, 2002
Publisher
London ; Pluto Press, 2002.
Pages
272
Format
Paperback
ISBN
9780745316062