demption ’, it was this group of ‘ visionaries ’ who ended up drafting and putting together a text that identified the historical need to unite and liberate Europe from dictatorships by means of reason and collective action , in a supranational framework capable of overcoming nationalist aporias towards perpetual peace : the project of a manifesto that was to mobilise the struggle for the freeing and unification of Europe .
The Crisis of Civilisation and the Manifesto Project
Whoever reads the Ventotene Manifesto today - whose precise title is Per un ’ Europa libera e unita . Progetto d ’ un manifesto [“ For a Free and United Europe . A Draft Manifesto ”] - is struck first and foremost by its style , especially if not guided by political convictions . It is hard not to think of the most famous of political manifestos , that of Marx and Engels published in 1848 . In the text , written for the most part by Spinelli , who came from the communist tradition , from which he had become autonomous , we find the same assertiveness , sculpted in dry sentences , peremptory statements , and cutting judgements .
There is also , especially in the first part ( The Crisis of Civilisation ), the skilful use of dialectical antithesis , which refers back to Marx ’ s judgement on the bourgeoisie unable to dominate the forces it has aroused and which will eventually sink it , similar to “ the sorcerer who can no longer dominate the subterranean powers he evokes ”. Here it is the national state that “ from being a powerful leaven of progress ” has turned into a “ divine entity ”, a totalitarian machine , a “ master who has relegated all his subjects into servitude ”. The liberal system itself , which became fully democratic with universal suffrage , has been emptied from within by the privileged classes to run the state machine to their own , exclusive advantage , under the guise of pursuing higher national interests ”. Finally , even the sciences and the critical approach , “ to which the greatest achieve-
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