Capital, socialism and cooperation. Louis Blanc: political, social and economic thought

The Industrial Revolution outlined radical changes in the social life of the population. People had passed in a very short time from a feudal-agrarian production system to another based on the use of machines and the exploitation of resources and of human beings. To the violence and abuse that followed, people answered with fights and revolts. The working class was born and the workers’ move ment, which was based on a workers’ thought, took shape. Work became the constitutive structure of life of the worker. Louis Blanc pursued throughout his life utopian ideas of reform and social liberation, based on democracy and socialism, economic cooperation and institutional cooperation. The book The Organization of work made him famous: 10 editions from 1839 to 1848. He proposed the principles of partnership and cooperation, inspired by the institutional action of the State. He fought for the creation of social workshops and the Ministry of Labour. Blanc was opposed by everyone: intellectuals, socialists, politicians, industrialists and economists. But he never dropped out of his ideas. In an era of crisis and social misery, Louis Blanc always turned his attention especially to the poor, the emarginated and the exploited people. His ideas about work organization had non only materialistic goals, but they were closely linked to the spirituality and dignity of every human being. This is a thought that need to be studied even today, in another era of crisis, different and complex, that still generates misery and poverty.

Keywords: Crisis, poverty, work

Paolo Coluccia, Capitale, socialismo e cooperazione. Louis Blanc: il pensiero politico, sociale ed economico in "RIVISTA TRIMESTRALE DI SCIENZA DELL’AMMINISTRAZIONE" 2/2014, pp 5-42, DOI: 10.3280/SA2014-002001