The 1920 factory occupations were a defensive employer-imposed confrontation

Evidence

In September 1920, as the Italian delegates were returning from the Comintern Congress, the occupation of the factories broke out in Milan, and quickly spread throughout the country. As Gramsci was to stress subsequently, this confrontation was one chosen by the employers, however impressive the proletarian response may have been. Upon the threat of a lockout, workers at the Romeo plant occupied the factory. The unions encouraged the spread of this tactic to other factories, as a defensive move in the industrial struggle. But the movement soon assumed a scale and character which far exceeded anybody’s expectations, the unions’ most of all. It was now that the real impact of Ordine Nuovo’s ideas and agitation made itself felt. Factory councils sprang up everywhere, not merely in Turin, and not merely in the engineering industry. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 104

Categorization

• XREF: Grounds the historic Italian factory-occupation moment that Gramsci’s theory of worker councils responds to — relevant background for understanding the stakes of hegemony arguments. — connects to: The 1920 depression fragmented union solidarity into defensive per-industry retreat — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 412; The 1920 Italian factory occupations emerged spontaneously beyond union or employer intent — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 551; Workers’ control of industry climaxed as a core demand in 1919-1920 — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 382