Giovanni Gentile
Philosopher of fascism
Gave the movement its theory of the total state.
Traditional FascistOne of 729 ideologies · enter the Fascist hall →- Role
- Philosopher
- Era
- 1875–1944
- Region
- Italy
- Social band
- Traditional
- Placement
- +68 · +92 · −55
§ Where Giovanni Gentile stands
3 axesGentile was no economist, but his ethical state subordinated economic life to national purpose while leaving private property and enterprise intact. The Doctrine of Fascism, whose philosophical half he wrote, rejected both laissez-faire liberalism and Marxist class struggle, and he endorsed the corporative system that organised employers and workers under state arbitration after the 1927 Labour Charter. That is a market economy under political discipline, well right of centre.
Gentile theorised the 'ethical state', in which the individual finds true freedom only by identifying with the state, and he embraced the word totalitarian to describe it. He drafted the 1925 Manifesto of the Fascist Intellectuals in defence of the regime as it dismantled parliamentary democracy, and in 1943 he rallied to the Nazi-backed Italian Social Republic.
Gentile's traditionalism was idealist rather than clerical. His 1923 school reform restored Catholic religious teaching to elementary schools and built an elite secondary system around the classical liceo, and he treated the nation and its history as the highest moral end. Yet he remained a secular philosopher who saw religion as a stage in the life of the spirit, which keeps him short of the reactionary pole.
How close are you to Giovanni Gentile?
Three statements, one per axis. Answer them and we’ll drop you on the compass next to them.
§ The story
HistoricalGiovanni Gentile (1875–1944) was an Italian philosopher, the leading theorist of fascism and one of the most influential Italian thinkers of the early twentieth century. Born in Castelvetrano in Sicily and trained at the Scuola Normale in Pisa, he developed 'actual idealism', which holds that reality exists only in the living act of thought, and for two decades worked alongside Benedetto Croce on the journal La Critica. He held chairs at Palermo, Pisa and Rome, and in 1922 became Mussolini's minister of education.
Gentile joined the Fascist Party in 1923 and gave the regime its philosophical vocabulary: the 1925 Manifesto of the Fascist Intellectuals, the Enciclopedia Italiana he directed, and the first half of The Doctrine of Fascism (1932), published under Mussolini's name. His break with Croce, who answered with a counter-manifesto, split Italian culture. Loyal to the end, he backed Mussolini's Salò republic and presided over the Academy of Italy, and on 15 April 1944 communist partisans shot him dead outside his home in Florence.
Notable for
- 01'The Doctrine of Fascism'
- 02Reformed Italian education
- 03Theory of the ethical state
Key works & moments
- 1903Begins two decades as Benedetto Croce's chief collaborator on the journal La Critica.
- 1916Publishes Teoria generale dello spirito come atto puro, the core statement of his actual idealism.
- 1923As education minister, enacts the Gentile Reform of Italian schools and joins the Fascist Party.
- 1925Drafts the Manifesto of the Fascist Intellectuals; Croce replies with a counter-manifesto.
- 1932Writes the philosophical first half of The Doctrine of Fascism, published under Mussolini's name.
- 1944Shot dead by communist partisans outside his home in Florence on 15 April.
§ Minds closest to Giovanni Gentile
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§ Also in the Fascist hall
Enter the hall →§ Common questions
4 answersWhat was Giovanni Gentile's political ideology?
Giovanni Gentile was the philosopher of Italian fascism: on the 99ideologies three-axis compass, a Traditional Fascist. Economically he sat well right of centre (+68), accepting private property within a corporative economy subordinated to the nation. On governance he was near the authoritarian extreme (+92) as the theorist of the all-encompassing ethical state, and socially he was traditionalist (−55), restoring religious teaching in schools and exalting the nation, though as a secular idealist rather than a clerical reactionary.
Was Giovanni Gentile left-wing or right-wing?
Right-wing. Gentile was a conservative nationalist who moved into fascism in the early 1920s, joining Mussolini's government and party and supplying its philosophy. His ethical state rejected both liberal individualism and Marxist class struggle, but it preserved private property and hierarchy and demanded the subordination of the individual to the nation, the core commitments of the authoritarian right. He stayed loyal to Mussolini through the Salò republic.
Did Giovanni Gentile write The Doctrine of Fascism?
Partly. The Doctrine of Fascism appeared in 1932 in the Enciclopedia Italiana under Benito Mussolini's name, but historians agree that Gentile wrote its first section, on fundamental ideas, which sets out the philosophy of the ethical state, while Mussolini wrote the second, on political and social doctrine. The essay's insistence that nothing human or spiritual has value outside the state carries Gentile's idealist stamp, and it remains the best-known official statement of what fascism claimed to be.
Which minds are closest to Giovanni Gentile?
On the 99ideologies three-axis compass, the minds closest to Giovanni Gentile are Homelander (99% alike), Oswald Mosley (96% alike) and Engelbert Dollfuss (95% alike). The furthest is Emma Goldman (0% alike).