An active member of theItalian Communist Party (PCI) during the 1950s, he was, along withRaniero Panzieri, amongst the founders of theQuaderni Rossi (Red Notebooks) review from which he split in 1963 to establish theClasse Operaia (Working Class) review.[2] This evolving journey progressively distanced him from the PCI, without him ever formally leaving, and engaged him in the radical experiences of operaismo. Such experience, considered by many to be the matrix of Italian autonomist Marxism in the 1960s, was characterised by challenging the roles of the traditional organisations of the workers' movement (the unions and the parties) and the direct engagement, without intermediaries, with the working class itself and to the struggles in the factories.[citation needed]
Influenced by the work ofGalvano Della Volpe which led him to distance himself from the thinking ofAntonio Gramsci, Tronti dedicated himself to the formulation of a politics basing theory on practice, which could renew traditional Marxism and contribute to re-opening the revolutionary road in the West.[citation needed]
Faced with mass revolt by Western workers in the 1960s, Tronti's operaismo was able to propose a modern analysis of class relations and above all, refocus attention of the subjective factor, claiming the central political role of the working class. His ideas found an echo in 1966, with the publication ofOperai e capitale (Workers and Capital),[2] a book that would exercise a notable influence on the protests of the youth and more generally, on the wave of mobilisation that was initiated in the following years. Tronti served as a member of the PCI Central Committee in the 1980s.[2]
Tronti died on 7 August 2023, at the age of 92.[3]
Tra materialismo dialettico e filosofia della prassi. Gramsci e Labriola, in A. Caracciolo et G. Scalia (éd.),La città futura. Saggi sulla figura e il pensiero di Antonio Gramsci, Feltrinelli, Milano, 1959
(éd.),Scritti inediti di economia politica diMarx,Editori Riuniti, Roma, 1963
Baldi, Camillo, in A.M. Ghisalberti (éd.),Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani5, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, Roma, 1963
Operai e capitale, Einaudi, Torino, 1966 (DeriveApprodi, Roma, 2006)
Alcaro M.,Dellavolpismo e nuova sinistra, Dedalo, Bari, 1977 ;
Basso C., Gozzini C. et Sguazzino D. (éd.),Bibliografia delle opere e degli scritti di Mario Tronti, Dipartimento di Filosofia-Università degli Studi di Siena, Sienne, 2001 ;
Borio G., Pozzi F., Roggero G.,Futuro anteriore : dai Quaderni rossi ai movimenti globali. Ricchezze e limiti dell'operaismo italiano, DeriveApprodi, Rome, 2002 ;
Leo R., "Per una storia di Classe Operaia", dans la revueBailamme, n° 26, giugno 2000 ;
Gobbi R.,Com'eri bella, classe operaia. Storia fatti e misfatti dell'operaismo italiano, Longanesi, Milano, 1989 ;
Mezzadra S.,Operaismo, inR. Esposito et C. Galli (éd.),Enciclopedia del pensiero politico. Autori, concetti, dottrine, Laterza, Roma-Bari, 2000 ;
Peduzzi A.,Lo spirito della politica e il suo destino. L'autonomia del politico, il suo tempo, Ediesse-Crs, Roma, 2006 ;
Preve C.,La teoria in pezzi. La dissoluzione del paradigma teorico operaista, Dedalo, Bari, 1984 ;
Turchetto M.,De l'ouvrier masse à l'entrepreneurialité commune : la trajectoire déconcertante de l'opéraïsme italien, in J. Bidet et E, Kouvélakis (éd.),Dictionnaire Marx contemporain, PUF, Paris, 2001 ;
Wright S.,Storming Heaven. Class Composition and Struggle in Italian Autonomist Marxism, Pluto Press, London, 2002.
Michele Filippini,Leaping Forward. Mario Tronti and the History of Political Workerism (Jan Van Eyck AcademieISBN90-72076-68-0)
Anastasi, A.,The Weapon of Organisation: Mario Tronti's Political Revolution in Marxism. Common Notions. 2020.
