Let's Take It All! (Autonomia and the Italian 1970s)

For a decade in Italy, communism wasn't a future to wait for—it was all around them, ready to be cracked open.

"We want everything" was the slogan of Italian activists in the late 1960s. But by the 1970s, movements stopped demanding things of politicians and bosses and instead turned to each other and said, "Let's take it all!" For a while, it looked like they might.

Across Italy, a communist movement known as Autonomia exploded. For the autonomists, communism did not mean a distant future utopia planned by a central state. Instead, it was all around them, ready to be cracked open by people who turned their revolutionary energy toward the remaking of daily life and the defense of their ability to do so.

First published in French in 2011, Marcello Tarì's history of Autonomia is a kinetic narrative through this movement, taking readers through its tactical innovations, its strategic debates, its internal conflicts, and the depth of its transformation of everyday life—which left a lasting mark on communist theory and practice. Appearing for the first time in English, this book and the movement it recounts deserve to be discussed, debated, and mined for inspiration by those who are finished waiting for anyone to come save us.

In an original introduction, Idris Robinson explains why this movement's experience half a century ago is not so distant from ours today, and why Autonomia is a crucial reference from which to begin any realistic strategy for revolution now.