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Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to

Nihilism

Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

European Review / Volume 22 / Issue 02 / May 2014, pp 258 - 273

DOI: 10.1017/S106279871400009X, Published online: 13 May 2014

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S106279871400009X

How to cite this article:

Elisabetta Cassina Wolff (2014). Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism .
European Review, 22, pp 258-273 doi:10.1017/S106279871400009X

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 European Review, Vol. 22, No. 2, 258–273 © 2014 Academia Europæa
doi:10.1017/S106279871400009X

Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola

as Reaction to Nihilism

ELISABETTA CASSINA WOLFF

Department of Archaeology, Conservation and History, University of Oslo,
Norway. E-mail: e.c.wolff@iakh.uio.no

This article deals with the figure of Julius Evola, philosopher and well-known freelance
political commentator both during and after Italy’s Fascist dictatorship. My analysis of
his intellectual production and political role in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s is a case study
that focuses on both continuity and discontinuity of ideological issues in the crucial
historical period between the Fascist regime and the establishment of neo-fascism in post-
war Italy. Special attention will be paid to unchanging elements in Evola’s philosophy,
such as criticism of modern society, rejection of faith in progress, reference to traditional
values as reaction to nihilism and belief in the existence of a spiritual hierarchy. A central
issue is the ideological influence that Evola exercised on a young generation of neo-
fascists in Italy after the Second World War, based on the intention of offering them new
rules of conduct in a post-nihilist world. It is exactly this phenomenon that enables us to
put in question the declared apolitìa of Evola.

Introduction
Baron Giulio Cesare Andrea (Julius) Evola, born in 1898, was a leading intellectual
figure in Italy until his death in 1974; his ideas were controversial and fell in and out of
favour. Even the bibliography on this author does not always contain balanced
analyses of his philosophy.1 We can mention at least two opposing evaluations. In the
1980s, the political scientists Franco Ferraresi and Marco Revelli studied Evola’s
philosophy exclusively in terms of the part it played in inspiring and providing
cultural roots for the right-wing Italian terrorism of the 1970s.2 On the other hand,
the intellectuals Gianfranco de Turris and Adriano Romualdi published works
defending Evola; the philosopher was presented as an ‘apolitical’ writer, committed
more to a detached criticism of the contemporary world similar to Nietzsche’s
critique of nihilism than to political engagement.3 When defending Evola as an
‘apolitical’ writer, reference is often to one of his last works, Cavalcare la tigre (Ride
the tiger), published in 1961, where the author declares that, faced with general pro-
cesses of moral and political dissolution, the only sensible attitude is apolitìa: a total
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 259

disinterest and detachment ‘from everything that is “politics” today’4 while remaining
faithful exclusively to oneself.
It is my intention here to study the development of Evola’s intellectual production
from the early 1930s until the late 1950s, paying special attention to his response to
the diagnosis of nihilism of the modern world coming from Friedrich Nietzsche.
Within the scope of this special Focus, and precisely in order to better enlighten the
concept of, and theoretical elaborations around, nihilism, I intend to draw attention
to an anti-nihilist author who was most influential in specific political circles in Italy
before and after the war. In terms of method and sources, I intend to give emphasis to
press items, which have been so long underestimated by Evola scholars, instead of
published books, because I consider them more genuine and less influenced by
‘marketing’ considerations. I will focus on the manner in which Evola’s message was
metamorphosed in order to fit into the new political situation in Italy after 1945.
I intend to show how the inner core of his political philosophy – to find alternative
ways to both modernity and nihilism – remained unchanged, although some specific
topics disappeared from his post-war writings. It is interesting that in Italy a precise
definition of the expression ‘radical right’ (New Right) comes from Evola, who, in the
years after the war, was searching for a new ideological identity, one that was not
compromised by the Fascist experience of the past but, at the same time, was still
opposed to democracy and modernity. In the second part of my article, I go on
to examine the intellectual connections between Evola and a group of young Italian
neo-fascists during the 1950s. Evola became an icon for those who regarded his
theories as true fascist doctrine. His only apparent individualism coloured by ‘inner
rebellion’ must be studied together with his deep political engagement and intellectual
work directed to make the young responsible for a change in Italy after the war.
Through a detailed analysis of his and his followers’ post-war articles, I intend to
provide support to the view that insists on the practical and political consequences of
his philosophical message, in spite of Evola’s personal choice for apolitìa.5

Revolt against the Modern World, Spiritual Racism and Anti-Semitism

As a very young poet and painter, the Sicilian aristocrat Evola was interested in
Marinetti’s futurism, the decadence of Oscar Wilde and Gabriele D’Annunzio, and in
the Dada movement. During the First World War Evola served as an officer, but in
1914 he had asked for intervention on the side of the Triple Alliance favouring
typically Prussian principles such as discipline and hierarchy. After a few years during
which he devoted himself to alchemy, mysticism, metaphysics, esotericism and
oriental philosophy, taking the initiative in 1927 of setting up of his own magical order,
the UR group, he turned to political philosophy. In 1925 he published both Saggi
sull’idealismo magico (Essays on Magical Idealism),6 where he presented his idealist
position, and a political article critical of both Fascism and democracy, entitled ‘Stato,
potenza, libertà’ (‘State, Power, Freedom’)7 in which he expressed his contempt for the
masses. In 1928 he published Imperialismo Pagano (Pagan Imperialism)8 in which he
attacked Christianity and the Catholic Church. Later he started to contribute to
260 Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

Giuseppe Bottai’s Critica fascista, but he never applied for membership of the Fascist
Party. In 1934, the publication of Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (Revolt against the
Modern World) made him widely known within intellectual circles. From 1934 to 1943
Evola was also responsible for ‘Diorama Filosofico’, the cultural page of Il Regime
Fascista, a daily owned by Roberto Farinacci. In the same period he published regularly
in Giovanni Preziosi’s La Vita Italiana and Carlo Costamagna’s Lo Stato.
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno gained him notoriety as the ‘philosopher of the
Tradition’. The book was meant as an answer to the question posed by Nietzsche:
how to find a meaning of life in the modern world and in the post-nihilist-epoch, after
the death of all ideals and values? How will the individual be able to live without
being annihilated? Where will he find new norms for his conduct in life? In a couple of
articles published in the 1950s and in the book Cavalcare la tigre, Evola confessed
that ‘the best Nietzsche’ represented the intellectual starting point of his own pro-
duction.9 By ‘the best Nietzsche’ he meant not the idea of the ‘superman’ or of ‘the
will to power’, which Evola understood as misunderstandings of the German author’s
real intentions, but rather the problem of overcoming the ‘European nihilism’ that
in the modern world was characterised by radical scepticism, relativism and total
mistrust in objective truth or in ethical rules with universal validity.10 Evola’s conception
of Tradition elaborated during the 1930s became the answer to the collapse of all values,
a counterforce the Italian philosopher posed against modernity and nihilism.
In Rivolta contro il mondo moderno, Evola understood the history of mankind as a
process of caste regression, from a traditional epoch characterized by a priestly caste
that held spiritual power, to an epoch dominated by the warrior caste and further to
the modern epoch that saw the emergence of the bourgeoisie and the Third State,
when power was handed down to the merchant caste. The breakdown in the tradi-
tional order, according to Evola, happened several centuries BC, and he saw the
Roman Empire and the reign of Charlemagne as unsuccessful efforts to reverse the
process of degeneration.11 The latter, characterised by a slowly but constant transi-
tion from traditional civilisations to modern ones, continued in European history and
can best be exemplified by the merchants of the communes of northern Italy who
rebelled against the authority of the German Emperor or, in recent decades, by the
liberal-democratic American civilisation and the communist civilisation of the Soviet
Union, both attached to values such as individualism and materialism (Ref. 11,
pp. 387–398). During this process, Tradition has survived only as a spiritual energy
that is made up of constant factors that remain unchanged over the centuries: the
ideas of Authority, Hierarchy, Order, Discipline and Obedience, the primacy of
quality over quantity, the differentiated personality, corporative solidarity in the
social field, justice that recognizes difference and inequality. Besides these absolute
and eternal values, there is also a set of virtues: honour, courage, loyalty, obedience,
sacrifice. According to Evola, the Roman Empire was the perfect example of warrior
virility and pagan ethics: it was the culture of auctoritas and imperium (Ref. 11,
pp. 306–321). The latter term is the second basic concept in Evola’s theory from the
1930s, beside Tradition. Imperium is understood, according to its original meaning, as
the authority and power to command and rule absolutely, not bound by inherited
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 261

office or formal ritual consecration. Such responsibility and a sort of natural right to
command comprise the very essence of the state.
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno placed Evola beside authors such as Arthur de
Gobineau and Houston Stewart Chamberlain.12 It is a work that can be compared
to Der Untergang des Abenlandes (The Decline of the West) by Oswald Spengler,
published in 1921, or to La crise du monde moderne (The Crisis of the Modern World)
by René Guénon, published in 1927 and translated into Italian by Evola himself, or to
Der Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts (The Myth of the Twentieth Century) by Alfred
Rosenberg, published in 1930. Evola himself, in an article from the 1950s, confesses
his intellectual debt to Spengler.13 Evola was then well connected with the community
of European intellectuals who propagated the political-philosophical ideas of
the Tradition as a reaction to the decadence expressed by the modern world. He
collaborated over a long period with Guénon, who shared Evola’s vision and whose
correspondence with him is most revealing, but he also had contact with tradition-
alists such as Edmond Dodsworth and with the ideologists of the Konservative
Revolution in Germany (Karl Anton Rohan, Wilhelm Stapel, Gottfried Benn and
Karl Wolfskehl). He was also acquainted with representatives of the Vienna school
(Othmar Spann and Walter Heinrich), conservatives (Charles Petrie, Gonzague De
Reynold, Paul Valéry and Friedrich Everling) and Austrian nationalist Catholics
(Hans Eibl and Friedrich Schreyvogel).14 Evola shared the positions of this cultural
stream; he was openly opposed to positivism, nationalism, modernity, the Enlight-
enment and any notion of human progress, but also to nihilism. In common with
other European authors, Evola also developed a traditionalist and conservative
interpretation of fascism as supranational phenomenon; it was a political movement,
situated on the far right and inspired by aristocratic, monarchic and military ideals.
In addition, Evola had a good knowledge of the theories of German ideologues of the
NSDAP such as Arthur Rosenberg and Walter Darré.15
As long as his philosophy was centred on the decadence of the western world, with
relatively pessimistic and catastrophic scenarios, it did not gain success in mid-1930s’
Fascist Italy. At this time, Fascism – the Italian Mussolinean regime – was still
predominantly optimistic, vitalist, futurist and modern. In Evola’s opinion, it was too
democratic as well. Two Fascist factions were dominant, the nationalist pragmatic
moderate right-wing group and the syndicalist left-wing group, both interested in
progress and modernity, although in different ways. Evola, who was regarded with
suspicion by the Fascist leadership, was a ‘lonely exponent of radical right-wing
Fascism with a traditionalist vision of the world’.16
At the end of the decade, though, Evola’s theories on race and Semitism attracted the
attention of Mussolini. The philosopher published some 80 articles devoted to racial
matters, in various Fascist press organs. Three essays were published in the late 1930s and
early 1940s: Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (Three Aspects of the Jewish Problem) in
1936, Il mito del sangue (The Myth of Blood) in 1937 and Sintesi di dottrina della razza
(Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race) in 1941. During the same period (1939–1942), he was
published in La difesa della razza, a periodical devoted entirely to racial topics and edited
by Telesio Interlandi, an intransigent and radical Fascist, racist and anti-Semite.17
262 Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

Evola developed his own racial theory, which he named ‘totalitarian’ or ‘tradi-
tional’ racism. In short, Evola claimed that in every human being the character (one’s
style, way of being and way of behaving) and the spirit (spirituality or one’s attitude
to the world, to life and to action) are of greater value than ‘corporeal’ characteristics
defined by the criteria of anthropological racism. Superior races are then defined by
their members’ straightforwardness, strong inner characters and the ability to dominate
passion and follow the values and virtues of Tradition. The totalitarian racism of Evola
aimed to show how a super-race, capable of dominating the world, should be selected,
and how to find its leaders (capi).18 The Italian philosopher’s main intellectual concerns
were of course based on deep anthropological pessimism, elitism and contempt for the
weak, for men and women of lesser intellectual capacity, or lesser strength of character.
He had a general distrust of human beings; they were selfish and hypocritical.
We understand that Evola’s racial theory was heavily influenced by Ludwig Ferdinand
Clauss’ book Rasse und Seele (Race and Soul) published in 1926, but we should not
underestimate the influence that came, once again, from Nietzsche.
In line with his theory of race, Evola also provided a ‘totalitarian’ and ‘spiritual’
interpretation of Semitism. The latter was not only biologically and racially founded.
It was primarily an instinct, an attitude, a vision of the world and life, a style, a way of
being and thinking, and a spiritual category. As such, it represented a total antithesis
to the values of Tradition and Aryanism. Hebraism was a life-style that precisely
corresponded to the ‘worst’ and ‘most decadent’ traits of the modern spirit, traits such
as equality, democracy, sensuality and materialism.
At that point of time – the end of the 1930s – Evola was fully committed to political
engagement. Mussolini was fascinated by his theories.19 The super-race Evola had written
about was, of course, identified not with the Aryan-German race, but with an Aryan-
Roman race. Evola’s spiritual theory of ‘race of Mussolini’s man’20 meshed perfectly with
the Fascist project of combating the Italian bourgeoisie and all of its weaknesses, a
campaign that was launched at the end of the 1930s.21 Evola’s spiritually-oriented racism
and anti-Semitism were intended to be Italian versions of racism and anti-Semitism that
could easily be integrated with the highly politicised Fascist totalitarian project of shaping
a new generation of Italians. Evola’s totalitarian racism involved a ‘process of racist
selection’ which would bring about a ‘purification’ of the Italian race.22 The leaders of a
purified Italian race would be an imaginary Fascist Order of the Italian Empire (Ordine
Fascista dell’Impero Italiano), modelled on Heinrich Himmler’s German SS.23
After July 25, 1943, Evola moved first to Berlin and later to Vienna. He was among
the party that welcomed Mussolini to Hitler’s headquarters in Rastenburg; this confirms
how close he was to inner Fascist circles. Evola, though, kept a distance from the final
years of the republican and social experience of Fascism (1943–1945). In Vienna he was
wounded by a bomb and crippled thereafter. He did not return to Rome until 1948.

Ideological Foundations of the Radical Right

In the post-war period, Evola reappeared under the pseudonym of ‘Arthos’, although
he was later to give his own signature to articles in different neo-fascist publications,
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 263

the most notable being Meridiano d’Italia and La Rivolta Ideale. Even if he did not
directly involve himself in politics, he continued to write. In 1950 he produced a
booklet with the significant title Orientamenti24 (Guidelines) in the neo-fascist
magazine Imperium and in 1953 he published a new book, again with a significant
title: Gli uomini e le rovine25 (Men among the Ruins). No mention of either spiritual
racism or anti-Semitism is to be found in Evola’s post-war output, with few excep-
tions. An important exception is formed by three articles published in 1951 where his
clear intention was to exonerate himself from any charge of anti-Semitism (Ref. 19).
Here, he described his interest in racial matters during the regime as purely
‘incidental’.26 However, this is an unconvincing defence. In the 1950s, Evola argued
that it was not the Semitic race, with its physical traits, that had caused the decadence
of the West, but the race of the weak-spirited that had been corrupted by modern
materialism.27 However, we can ask ourselves whether Evola’s interpretation of
Hebraism as a lifestyle is very far from crude anti-Semitism. Let us consider the
following statement:

… it is of little value to be ‘Aryan’ and ‘pure of race’ in body and blood if one
inwardly is a Jew, a Levantine or something like that in spirit and character.28

This insistence that a Jewish danger was still lying ‘inside us’ (Ref. 28, p. 108) shows
that even after the war Evola espoused a ferocious and destructive anti-Jewish racism.
A closer analysis of the other main issues Evola dealt with in the post-war period
reveals a subtle continuity in his philosophy. In the 1950s he focused on a revitali-
sation of the crucial concept of Tradition and a clarification of the concept of
Imperium.29 Again, Evola’s premise was an uncompromising rejection of any belief in
the progress of mankind – the ‘myth of progress’.30 Decadence and sickness remained
central concepts in his work. Enlightenment and rationalism, liberalism, democracy,
socialism and communism were all diseases of modernity that had affected European
civilization since the liberal revolutions in England. They were ‘toxins’ (Ref. 24,
p. 31), products of modernity that had poisoned culture, science, literature and
sociology. In the 1950s, Evola added that also Darwinism, psychoanalysis, exis-
tentialism and relativism were ‘toxins’ that the modern world had produced as a
consequence of what Nietzsche had described as ‘European nihilism’. Moreover, in
the articles published after the Second World War, Evola presented new arguments
that interpreted the history of the Western world through the centuries as a slow and
inexorable ‘decline of the idea of the state’.31 He asked whether the war had not
been the ultimate, desperate and ‘unfortunately’ unsuccessful attempt on the part of
Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan to restore the principle of authority
in the face of the coalition of the democracies. With an eye to this interpretation, we
can here mention, without any ambition to go deeper into the matter, another
important exception to the silence that covered any reference to racism in Evola’s
post-war intellectual production. In his autobiography Il cammino del cinabro
(The Cinnabar’s Path), published in 1963, Evola reflected on racism as the ultimate
means the spiritual forces of disorder used in order to discredit the Axis forces. Again,
Evola’s aim to camouflage his own racism sounds little convincing.32
264 Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

In view of developments in the contemporary Western world, Evola declared in

Orientamenti that the ultimate stage of decline had been reached since power had
fallen into the hands of the working class: the ‘servants’ caste’ or ‘the Fourth State’.
Values had become purely economic, and everything was seen in terms of profit,
production, wages and the material interests of the working class; social progress was
reduced to measurements of material well-being. Evola pointed out that conformism,
democratic levelling and the myth of production were values that were shared by both
American capitalism and Bolshevik communism (Ref. 24, p. 24).
Evola’s response in the 1950s was a firm belief that political action could counter
the process of the regression and decline of modern society, so he openly rejected any
temptation of pure intellectual rebellion:

The only thing that matters is this: today we are in the middle of a world of ruins. We
should ask ourselves: are there still any men remaining on their feet amid the ruins? Is
there anything they must do, anything they can still do? (Ref. 24, p. 18)

At this point, a modified version of ‘spirituality’ is presented, at the same time when
Evola launched a sort of political manifesto taking on the responsibility of changing
the state of things in Italy. An important concept Evola developed in the post-war
period was that of the ‘real men’ (uomini veri) or ‘unbroken men’ (uomini non-
spezzati). These were the individuals who had special qualities (‘differentiated men’);
their actions would counter the inevitable decline of Western civilisation. In 1949, one
of Evola’s first articles in Meridiano d’Italia was entitled ‘Towards the Élite of an
Ideal Front’.33 He wrote that Italy needed to select those individuals who could
‘remain on their feet among the ruins’ and keep them apart from the ‘broken’
men (uomini spezzati). The leaders of men follow the values of Tradition and they
epitomise and exhibit Tradition in their actions. They possess the qualities of real
leaders, who can lead men because they have a sense of hierarchy and can instil this in
others. Leaders have strong characters and they can command. Evola, in post-war
Italy, wrote about the ‘legionary spirit’ that ‘is the custom of those who were able
to choose the hardest way, who dared to fight even knowing that the battle was
materially lost…’ (Ref. 24, p. 19).
Once ‘unbroken’ men have been selected, they need to be organized as an elite.
To Evola, the distinction between party and movement is important.34 Those who
belong to a party simply pursue a programme of practical and contingent social and
economic objectives. They remain loyal to the party to the extent that the party’s
ideas enable them to achieve specific goals. On the other hand, those who belong to a
movement have a vision of life, a style. They believe in ideas and principles to the
extent that changing them would involve a deep personal and existential crisis.
Finally, it is necessary that these organised elites are instilled with an idealistic
motivation. To Evola, it is evident that fascism, as an idea and a concept independent
of the historical contingency of the Italian Fascist regime, remains valid, in spite of a
military defeat that in his opinion was caused by the military – and not ideological –
superiority of the opponents. In Evola’s view, one key concept of fascism, or
idée-force, is the concept of the Right. From a purely ideological point of view, Evola
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 265

identifies fascism with the Right. By the ‘Right’ he does not mean liberalism, capit-
alism, plutocracy, the bourgeoisie or conservatism centred on the economic interests
of specific social classes. Evola’s idea of the Right is a conception of life and the state
that is inspired by the principles of Tradition: authority, hierarchy, and aristocracy.
They involve the values of heroism and quality and the supremacy of politics
over economics and society.35 In the 1950s, Evola still felt that he belonged to the
anti-democratic tradition (Plato in The Republic and Dante in De Monarchia, de
Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Mosca, Pareto and Michels). He
insisted on defining himself as an anti-democratic thinker, although he firmly denied
that he was a Fascist.36
Evola’s vision involved a total opposition to the political system established in
post-war Italy, which he saw as one in which petty politicians were merely engaged in
pursuing their interests. First, Evola condemned the Italian neo-fascist party founded
in 1946, the Movimento Sociale Italiano (MSI). At the end of the 1940s, the MSI was
divided into two main factions. There was a left-wing radical faction concerned
with corporative democracy and social issues such as socialization, the policy of
developing worker participation in management and profit-sharing (‘national socia-
lists’). There was also a moderate, nationalist and conservative centrist faction
engaged with European integration and political alliances with other parties on the
right (‘political realists’).37 Evola asked whether the MSI could be regarded as
the legitimate representative of Italian Fascism, and whether this party had the
power and the will to attract all forces that were ‘truly right-wing, that is, forces of
order, authority, reconstruction, and tradition’38 that could counter the process of
decadence. Evola recognized that the MSI had the intention of preserving the positive
Fascist legacy; however, he doubted whether it could truly represent the Right. In
fact, he claimed that a true ‘Right’ did not exist in Italy (Ref. 38, p. 36). In Evola’s
opinion, the MSI was too democratic or, at least, too keen to respect the rules of
democracy, just as Fascism had been too liberal. He had little understanding for the
left-wing representatives of the party and for the republican formulae of ‘social
nationalism’ or of ‘national socialism’ or even ‘corporative democracy’, concepts that
were extensively discussed in post-war neo-fascist circles. Secondly, Evola called for
action to defend the country from the threat of communism. An Order of real
men, inspired by the idea of fascism/Right, should be in a position to counter the
communist threat.

Evola’s Influence on the Younger Generation

The event that marked the beginning of Evola’s intellectual influence on the younger
generation of Italian post-war neo-fascists was the publication of an article entitled
‘For a Charter of Youth’.39 In this text, Evola listed the cardinal points of a (fascist)
doctrine that in his view should and could inspire the younger generation. The
Charter of Youth became a political and ideological manifesto for the young neo-
fascists of the 1950s, individuals who had not taken part in the war or who had only
been able to enlist in the Italian Social Republic just before the war ended. Some of
266 Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

them had been engaged in clandestine activity.40 The smaller band of very young neo-
fascists, clustered around Julius Evola, comprised a third group within the party MSI,
one that can be defined as an intellectualist-aristocratic radical right-wing faction
(‘radical elitists’) (Ref. 37, p. 251). In the 1950s, these young neo-fascists were behind
the publication of magazines that were strongly inspired by Evola’s philosophy:
Imperium (1950–51; 1954) and La Sfida (The Challenge) (1948–49), both edited
by Enzo Erra, and Cantiere (Building Site) (1950–52), edited by Primo Siena.
Contributors to these magazines all played a leading role in neo-fascist circles in the
decades after the period covered by this article.
In the Charter of Youth, Evola exhorted the young to rise, to be reborn internally,
to organize themselves in an order. He urged them to ‘have character’. He invited
them to understand ‘Youth’ in terms of spiritual attitude, idealism, courage, enthusiasm,
generosity, keenness for action, ambition for renewal, contempt for the comforts of life
and rejection of materialism. Implicitly, he exhorted them to take responsibility for a
‘revolt’ against the modern world, against nihilism and all its sub-products or toxins.
Moreover, in more concrete terms, he stated that revolution meant first of all the will to
realize the [fascist] Idea; that the party system and quantitative democratic representation
had to be rejected. And finally, he stated that the political strategy of the New Right had
to focus on the establishment of a spiritual and national movement to train future cadres
for the country’s ruling class.41
Let us consider how Evola’s ideas inspired his youthful disciples. To begin with,
the young neo-fascists did not identify with the group of Salò veterans who supported
the three-part slogan of Italy-Republic-Socialization, the left-wing conception of
Italian fascism as a form of national and corporative socialism. On the contrary, they
totally embraced Evola’s interpretation of fascism as a supranational phenomenon
and a revolt against any modern and materialist approach to life, a revolt against the
principles of 1789. Fascism was the true and only incarnation of the Right, it
expressed the values of Tradition. They were convinced anti-democrats. In 1950, they
claimed they were a new phenomenon in Italy, a revolutionary solution to the
country’s political breakdown. By ‘revolutionary solution’ they meant a project of
absolute opposition to the mentality, the men and the institutions that the Allies and
the anti-fascist parties had imposed upon them.42
Second, like Evola, they rejected an atomistic, egalitarian and libertarian concept
of the individual, as well as any temptation of nihilism. They had a strong desire to
give a sense and a meaning to life, on both a political and a moral level.43 Their anti-
materialism defined their notion of freedom, which was conceived as man’s successful
control over instinct and passion.44 The man who achieved that freedom was a ‘total
man’.45 They clearly regarded the universal and metaphysical principle of ‘duty’ to be
far superior to the concept of ‘freedom’. The young neo-fascists rebelled against all
political theories, particularly American capitalist liberalism and Soviet Bolshevik
communism, as well as against passivity.
Third, they felt the responsibility to construct an ethical state, but not a paterna-
listic and demagogic one modelled on Giovanni Gentile’s philosophy. Their ethical
state was envisaged as a strong, authoritarian, hierarchic, anti-egalitarian, elitist state
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 267

that should not merely safeguard the economic and material interests of its citizens. It
should also have an ethical mission to educate the individual to overcome personal
selfishness and find a meaning in life. The neo-fascists understood freedom as a
possibility that might be granted within an organic system, but not something that
was guaranteed by aprioristic natural law.46 As far as the idea of the nation was
concerned, they saw it primarily as a spiritual community of all those who believe in
fascism as true Right, as Tradition. The idea of the nation as a geographic, cultural
and linguistic unit was a secondary concept.47
It is also interesting to consider their attitude towards Christianity. In a world
dominated by the philosophy of success, by activism at any cost, and by commercial
competition, the young neo-fascists asked how the religious spirit would be able to
survive. In their view, the only possibility would be if the Church returned to its old
intransigence and declared war on modernity and materialism.48 This call for a
greater intransigence on the part of the Church echoed their lack of compromise.
They believed that they possessed a moral integrity which elevated them above the
world’s mediocrity, and they were proud of their idealism and the fact that they were
a small minority.49 It is clear that they were united by a sense of elitism: ‘quantity does
not count, what counts is quality, the idea’.50 The neo-fascists declared that they felt
they were ‘of another race’.51 Although we are more interested in examining the
ideological battle that these young neo-fascists fought in response to the historical
events which they felt had betrayed them, we ought not to forget that many of them,
in the following years, literally fought against the system.52
The young ‘rebels’53 shared Evola’s idea of fascism as a spiritual revolution against
the materialist, hedonistic, libertarian, relativist and democratic modern world, the
world that had developed after 1789. They viewed revolution as being in opposition
to reformist positions, and they spoke as radicals:

We want nothing from the world. We only live to destroy it … We do not dream of
social reforms: we want total, complete, absolute revolution.54

In the post-war period, these young reactionary-revolutionary neo-fascists cherished

the illusion that they were the ‘unbroken’ men whom Evola had described, the elect
who were able to remain on their feet among the ruins. These young people were the
ideological ‘legion of true fanatics’55 of Italian post-war fascism.
How did the young neo-fascists plan to operate within Italy’s democratic political
system and what kind of political strategy did they intend to adopt in order to respond
to Italy’s new historical situation? It is important that we make a clear distinction
between the MSI political party and those elements of the radical right, inspired by
Evola, who operated both inside and outside the party. We have seen how, according
to Evola, the priority of the neo-fascists after the war should be the selection of
‘unbroken’ men, men who could remain on their feet among the ruins and epitomize
the values of Tradition. These men should be organized in an order. It was necessary
to arouse in them an idealistic motivation that was inspired by the idées-forces of
fascism. If there remained a cult of the leader in post-war Italian neo-fascism, it was
due to those theories of Evola that promoted the mystique of the ‘leaders of men’,
268 Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

those individuals who knew how to command with authority. How can this discourse
be squared with that of the political strategy of the MSI? In an article from 1951,
Evola examined the problem of the ‘men to guide’ (uomini-guida).56 He doubted
whether there were any such men able to guide the party and he held that one should
also search for such leaders outside of the party. In 1953, Evola clearly expressed
his views on what political strategy the MSI should follow: it should emulate the
Communist Party.57 Communism was an organized force, which had money, and
means, and the support of a foreign power; moreover, it had great electoral weight.
Communism clearly distinguished between tactics, which must be flexible, change-
able and adapted to circumstances, and strategy, which must be inflexible.
Communism had a set ideology and a particular vision of the world. In the early 1950s,
when Evola was still involved in the political struggle in Italy, he exhorted the leaders of
the MSI to be more intransigent and to move to ‘action’. What kind of action? Violent,
extra-parliamentary political action against the system? Evola did not go into detail.
However, he acknowledged that adopting an uncompromising ideological stance
would expose the MSI to the danger of breaking out in factions or being banned by the
constitutional and democratic parties. Consequently, the best strategy was to wait.
In the early 1950s, the young neo-fascists also discussed political strategy, since
they were fully aware that the final aim, after all, was to gain power.58 Erra, in line
with Evola, noted the contrast between (their) anti-democratic fascist theory and the
MSI’s formal, democratic organizational structure.59 However, Erra shared Evola’s
conclusion that such a conflict between theory and practice was inevitable, primarily
because a qualified and selected minority capable of leading the party was not yet
available.59
Evola’s articles written at the beginning of the 1950s must be read together with the
book Cavalvare la tigre, which was written simultaneously, but published ten years
later because Evola did not succeed in finding a publisher.60 The book is a description
of the state of corruption reached by modern societies, both on the communist and on
the capitalist side. Here, Evola openly refers to Nietzsche’s critique of European
nihilism as his point of departure and once again, as at the beginning of the 1930s,
rejects anarchism as his point of arrival. The Italian philosopher is only apparently
confined in a sort of metaphysical or moral rebellion. It is true that he wishes to invite
the few men who were still able to stand on their feet among the ruins and the
dissolution of the Western civilisation to keep their distance from everything
belonging to the contemporary era and the bourgeois society.61 At the same time,
though, he recognises that complete isolation as the perfect realization of apolitìa
would have required not only a very strong inner character, but also privileged
material conditions. So, the ‘traditional’ or ‘unbroken’ men, put in the situation of
having to do with a world destined to collapse, ‘might be better to contribute to the
fall’ (Ref. 61, p. 6) of the modern civilisation. Apolitìa as a consequence of total
rejection of the modern world becomes therefore only a new, free space ‘that could
eventually become the premise for a future, formative action’ (Ref. 61, p. 7). Action is
not only possible, but also requested, not on the level of ‘politics’ as conceived within
the modern world by ‘petty politicians’, but on another level. The tiger metaphor is
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 269

revealed in its strongly political meaning: the traditional man will let the forces and
processes of his epoch take their own course, but he will keep himself prepared
to intervene when ‘the tiger, which cannot leap on the person riding it, is tired of
running’ (Ref. 61, p. 10).

In Conclusion
Within the wider discourse on European nihilism and its intellectual expressions,
Evola undoubtedly represented an interesting and original position. He completely
shared Nietzsche’s diagnosis of the modern world, pointing to all traits of decadence
that affected the modern civilisation he was part of, but he was also strongly con-
cerned with offering a solution to such decay. Evola’s original contribution was to
elaborate a concept of Tradition and Autoritas that could counter the process of
degeneration. In relation to these concepts, we should not underestimate that Evola
in fact had a clear political project, which could be realised only when the young
accepted taking on the heavy responsibility of countering nihilism. In raw political
terms, duty in Evola means committing oneself to the establishment of a ‘new’
authoritarian, organic, hierarchic, anti-egalitarian and elitist political system, first in
Italy and, in his vision, later hopefully in all Europe.
Evola’s influence on young neo-fascists in post-war Italy is indisputable. Their
conception of the ‘total man’ was an updated version of Evola’s theory of a ‘super-
race’. Their project of a new ethical state in post-war Italy was a version of Evola’s
(and Mussolini’s) project of a new (Fascist) man in the ethical Fascist state. In Evola’s
writings, they could find a complete receipt for political action and strategy, far from
the alleged detachment that the philosopher seemed to propose. As a matter of fact,
the young neo-fascists became deeply involved in Italian politics. In 1952, on the
occasion of the national congress of the MSI, the youthful faction of ‘the Right’
within the party emerged and became known for its intransigence, inspired by Evola’s
traditionalist philosophy. In 1954, Pino Rauti founded The New Order Centre of
Studies (Centro Studi Ordine Nuovo) with the aim of diffusing the ideas of the right-
wing youth faction through lectures and other cultural events. In 1956, he left the MSI
to form the New Order movement (Ordine Nuovo: ON), taking with him the radical
Evolian right. And more could be said – even more should be the object of academic
research – on the several extra-parliamentary groups or movements that, along the
1960s and 1970s, were set up in order to carry out revolutionary acts, sometimes
violent ones, against the democratic system.
Evola must be considered the most consistent radical anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal,
anti-democratic and anti-popular Italian intellectual of the last century, as is briefly
said by Franco Ferraresi.62 He has also been labelled ‘the most important [Italian]
theoretician of the Conservative Revolution’63 in response to Nietzsche’s critique of
nihilism. Both under the Fascist regime and in republican Italy, Evola’s under-
standing of fascism as a supranational phenomenon was radical and right-wing, from
the point of view of a traditionalist thinker. Our analysis has shown how his main
intellectual concerns remained unchanged from the pre-war to the post-war period.
270 Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

The doctrine of the Aryan-Roman ‘super-race’ was transformed into a doctrine of the
‘leaders of men’. However, both expressed not only a strong need for action, but also
the same crude spiritual racism, which was even worse than anthropological racism
because it involved all human beings with alleged weaknesses and all representatives
of modern society who believe in values such as democracy and equality.
Should we locate Evola’s ideas in a confined, meta-political universe, as is argued
by those who intend to free him from any connection to both the Holocaust and the
terrorist actions of the 1970s? His writings are meta-political, in that they express his
idealism as a theorist of Tradition. However, they are also deeply political, as they
referred to contemporary events, both in the 1930s and in the post-war period,
and because they openly offered political guidelines to young neo-fascists in post-
war Italy. The influence Evola exercised on the young was primarily ideological.
However, it also had indirect consequences that were practical and political.

References and Notes

1. For an exhaustive bibliography on Evola, see R. del Ponte (1995) Julius Evola:
una bibliografia 1920–1994. Futuro Presente, 6, pp. 27–70. For a short biography,
see L. Lo Bianco (1993) Evola, Giulio Cesare Andrea. In: Dizionario biografico degli
italiani (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani). A recent and excellent
work on Evola is P. Furlong (2011) Social and Political Thought of Julius Evola
(Extremism and Democracy) (Abingdon, Oxford: Taylor & Francis).
2. F. Ferraresi and M. Revelli (eds) (1984) La destra radicale (Milan: Feltrinelli).
English translation: (1987) The Radical Right in Italy (London: Polity Press);
F. Ferraresi (1995) Minacce alla democrazia: la destra radicale e la strategia della
tensione in Italia nel dopoguerra (Milan: Feltrinelli). English translation: (1996)
Threats to Democracy. The Radical Right in Italy after the War (Princeton,
New Jersey: Princeton University Press).
3. G. de Turris (1973) Testimonianze su Evola (Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee),
G. de Turris (1997) Elogio e difesa di Julius Evola. Il Barone e i terroristi (Rome:
Edizioni Mediterranee); A. Romualdi (1979) [1968] Julius Evola: l’uomo e l’opera
(Rome: Giovanni Volpe Editore).
4. J. Evola (2003) Ride the Tiger (Vermont: Inner Traditions International), p. 173.
Original edition: J. Evola (1961) Cavalcare la tigre (Milano: Vanni Scheiwiller,
1961).
5. F. Germinario (2001) Razza del sangue, razza dello spirito. Julius Evola,
l’antisemitismo e il nazionalismo (1930–43) (Turin: Bollati Boringhieri),
F. Cassata (2003) A destra del fascismo. Profilo politico di Julius Evola (Turin:
Bollati Boringhieri); G. S. Rossi (2007) Il razzista totalitario. Evola e la leggenda
dellʼantisemitismo spirituale (Soveria Mannelli: Rubettino).
6. J. Evola (1925) Saggi sull’idealismo magico (Rome: Atanòr).
7. The article was published in Lo Stato democratico, 1 May 1925. For an analysis
of Evola’s relation to Fascism after the march on Rome, see M. Rossi (1989) Lo
Stato democratico (1925) e l’antifascismo antidemocratico di Julius Evola. Storia
contemporanea, XX(1), pp. 5–43.
8. J. Evola (1928) Imperialismo pagano. Il fascismo dinanzi al pericolo euro-cristiano
(Rome: Atanòr).
9. J. Evola (1953) Il ‘miglior’ Nietzsche. Meridiano d’Italia, 3 May, now in
J. Evola (2002). I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, (Padova: Ar), pp. 152–153.
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 271

10. J. Evola (1953) Nichilismo europeo. Meridiano d’Italia, 5 July, now in

J. Evola (2002). I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, pp. 154–155.
11. J. Evola (1998, IV edition) Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (Rome: Edizioni
Mediterranee), pp. 100–134. Original edition: J. Evola (1934) Rivolta contro il
mondo moderno (Milan: Hoepli).
12. The comparison is found in Mircea Eliade’s review of Evola’s 1934 work, now in
J. Evola (1998) Rivolta contro il mondo moderno, pp. 445–446.
13. J. Evola (1953) Il caso ‘Spengler’. Meridiano d’Italia, October 25, now in
J. Evola (2002). I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, pp. 158–159.
14. F. Cassata (2003) A destra del fascismo. Profilo politico di Julius Evola,
pp. 151–189; R. del Ponte (1995) Gli orizzonti europei del tradizionalismo nel
Diorama filosofico, 1934–1943. In: M. Bernardi Guardi and M. Rossi (eds) Delle
rovine e oltre. Saggi su Julius Evola (Rome: Pellicani), p. 185.
15. N. Cospito and H. Werner Neulen (eds) (1986) Julius Evola nei documenti segreti
del Terzo Reich (Rome: Settimo Sigillo), pp. 9–10; G. Galli (1995) Evola e la
Germania nazional-socialista. In: M. Bernardi Guardi and M. Rossi (eds) Delle
rovine e oltre. Saggi su Julius Evola (Rome: Pellicani), p. 201.
16. F. Germinario (2001) Razza del sangue, razza dello spirito. Julius Evola,
l’antisemitismo e il nazionalismo (1930–43), p. 24.
17. The entire collection is to be found in J. Evola (2001) I testi de ‘La difesa della
razza’, edited by P. Di Vona (Padova: Edizioni di Ar); and in J. Evola (2002)
La nobiltà della stirpe (1932–1938), La Difesa della Razza (1939–1942), edited
by G. F. Lami (Rome: Fondazione Julius Evola).
18. Julius Evola disseminated his theory in a series of articles published on La difesa
della razza: J. Evola (1939) I tre gradi del problema della razza, January 5, no. II/
5; J. Evola (1941) Andare avanti sul fronte razzista, February 20, no. IV/8;
J. Evola (1941) Le selezioni razziali, April 20, no. IV/12; J. Evola (1941)
Diseguaglianza degli esseri umani, September 20, no. IV/22; J. Evola (1941) La
razza e i Capi, October 20, no. IV/24; J. Evola (1942) Razza, eredità, personalità,
April 5, J. Evolano. V/11.
19. Evola reported the content of some conversations with il Duce in three articles
published in the post-war period on Meridiano d’Italia: J. Evola (1951) Mussolini
e il razzismo, December 16, no. VI/49; J. Evola (1951) Il mito della nuova Italia,
December 23, no. VI/50; J. Evola (1951) Sangue e spirito, December 30, no. VI/51.
20. The expression is the title of one of Evola’s articles from the 1940s: J. Evola
(1940) La razza dell’uomo di Mussolini, Il regime fascista, January 18.
21. Sintesi di dottrina della razza was published in Germany with a title that referred
to Mussolini’s approval of Evola’s doctrine: J. Evola (1942) Grundrisse der
Faschistichen Rassenlehre (Berlin: Runge Verlag).
22. J. Evola (1941) Andare avanti sul fronte razzista. La difesa della razza,
February 20, no. IV/8.
23. J. Evola (1994) Sintesi di dottrina della razza (Padova: Edizioni di Ar), p. 144, pp.
170–171. Original edition: J. Evola (1941) Sintesi di dottrina della razza (Milan:
Hoepli).
24. J. Evola (2000) [1950] Orientamenti (Padova: Ar).
25. J. Evola (2002) Gli uomini e le rovine (Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee). Original
edition: J. Evola (1953) Gli uomini e le rovine (Rome: Edizioni Dell’ascia).
26. J. Evola (1951) Sangue e spirito. Meridiano d’Italia, December 30, no. VI/51, now in
J. Evola (2002) I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, p. 111.
27. J. Evola (1952) Sfaldamento dell’anima italiana. la Rivolta Ideale, June 12, now
in J. Evola (2003) testi de la Rivolta Ideale (Padova: Ar), pp. 67–69.
272 Elisabetta Cassina Wolff

28. J. Evola (1951) Il mito della nuova Italia. Meridiano d’Italia, December 23,
no. VI/50, now in J. Evola (2002) I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, p. 108.
29. J. Evola (1950) Il senso dell’imperium. Imperium, May, no. I/1; J. Evola (1950)
Impero e civiltà. Imperium, June, no. I/2; J. Evola (1951) ‘Imperium’, simboli e
persone. la Rivolta Ideale, January 18, now in J. Evola (2003) I testi de la Rivolta
Ideale, pp. 50–51.
30. J. Evola under pseudonym Arthos (1949) La ‘Storia’ e il suo senso. Meridiano
d’Italia, October 30, now in J. Evola (2002). I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, p. 42.
31. J. Evola (1950) Il senso dell’imperium. Imperium, May, no. I/1.
32. J. Evola (1963) Il cammino del cinabro (Milan: Vanni Scheiwiller).
33. J. Evola under pseudonym Arthos (1949) Verso l’ ‘élite’ di un fronte ideale.
Meridiano d’Italia, September 18, now in J. Evola (2002) I testi del Meridiano
d’Italia, pp. 37–38 and appendix.
34. J. Evola (1951) Partito e movimento. Meridiano d’Italia, January 7, now in
J. Evola (2002) I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, pp. 89–91; J. Evola (1953) Uomini
dei partiti e uomini dei movimenti. la Rivolta Ideale, April 19, now in J. Evola
(2003) I testi de la Rivolta Ideale, pp. 92–93; J. Evola (1953) Considerazioni
antielettorali. la Rivolta Ideale, June 21–28, now in J. Evola (2003) I testi de la
Rivolta Ideale, pp. 94–95.
35. J. Evola (1952) La Destra: sbagliato complesso d’angoscia. la Rivolta Ideale,
March 27, now in J. Evola (2003) I testi de la Rivolta Ideale, p. 60.
36. J. Evola (1951) La legge contro le idee. Meridiano d’Italia, September 23, now in
J. Evola (2002) I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, pp. 103–104; J. Evola (1952) Il
coraggio di dirsi antidemocratici non equivale necessariamente a dichiararsi
fascisti. la Rivolta Ideale, January 17, now in J. Evola (2003) I testi de la Rivolta
Ideale, pp. 56–58.
37. E. C. Wolff (2008) Starting from the End. Fascist Ideology in Post-War Italy
(1945–1953) (Oslo: Acta Humaniora)), p. 251. Italian version: E. C. Wolff
(2012) L’inchiostro dei vinti. Stampa e ideologia neofascista (1945–1953) (Milan:
Mursia).
38. J. Evola under pseudonym Arthos (1949) Questa inesistente Destra. la Rivolta
Ideale, November 17, now in J. Evola (2003). I testi de la Rivolta Ideale, p. 36.
39. P. Siena (1997) Genesi di un documento evoliano. In J. Evola. Idee per una
Destra (Rome: Fondazione Julius Evola)), pp. 61–64.
40. See F. Giorgino and N. Rao (1995) L’un contro l’altro armati (Milan: Mursia);
N. Rao (1999) Neofascisti! La Destra italiana da Salò a Fiuggi nel ricordo dei
protagonisti (Rome: Settimo Sigillo); A. Carioti (2008) Gli orfani di Salò.
Il ‘Sessantotto nero’ dei giovani neofascisti nel dopoguerra, 1945–1951 (Milan:
Mursia).
41. J. Evola (1951) Per una Carta della Gioventù. Cantiere, March–April, no. II/3.
42. Asso (1950) Gli ex fascisti. Asso di bastoni, May 21, no. III/21.
43. [E. Erra] (1948) Il fatto nuovo. La Sfida, January 16, no. I/2.
44. E. Erra (1948) Stato etico. La Sfida, May 15, no. I/8.
45. P. Maresi (1950) Personalismo e totalità. Cantiere, November–December,
no. I/3–4; B. Tomasich (1951) L’uomo ‘totale’ nella società e nello stato.
Cantiere, January, no. II/1.
46. G. Rauti (1949) Dell’eguaglianza. La Sfida, January 5, no. II/1; E. Erra (1948)
Stato etico. La Sfida, May 15, no. I/8.
47. G. Rauti (1949) L’Ordine nuovo. Rivoluzione europea. La Sfida, April 4, no. II/5;
G. Rauti (1950) Il vero male dell’Occidente. Asso di bastoni, August 6, no. III/32.
48. G. Rauti (1948) Dove va la Chiesa? La Sfida, December 20, no. I/6.
 Apolitìa and Tradition in Julius Evola as Reaction to Nihilism 273

49. Asso (1950) Il punto sugli ex fascisti. Asso di bastoni, June 25, no. III/26.
50. P. Rauti (1948) Numero chiuso e minoranza. La Sfida, January 1, no. I/1.
51. P. Rauti (1948) Mondo moderno. La Sfida, May 15, no. I/8.
52. See F. Ferraresi (1996) Threats to Democracy. The Radical Right in Italy after the
War; A. Cento Bull (2007) Italian Neo-fascism: The Strategy of Tension and the
Politics of Nonreconciliation (New York: Berghahn Books).
53. G. Rauti (1949) Più che ribelli. La Sfida, April 11, no. II/6.
54. M. Severi (1948) Avanti. La Sfida, May 15, no. I/8; see also the editorial (1948)
Nostra rivoluzione. La Sfida, February 16, no. I/4, and (article without author)
(1950) Rivoluzione. Cantiere, September, no. I/1.
55. E. Erra (1950) Stile. Imperium, August-September, no. I/4-5.
56. J. Evola (1951) Partito e movimento. Meridiano d’Italia, January 7, now in
J. Evola (2002) I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, p. 90.
57. J. Evola (1953) Imparare dal comunismo. Meridiano d’Italia, April 12, now in
J. Evola (2002) I testi del Meridiano d’Italia, pp. 150–151.
58. E. Erra (1949) L’idea e la nazione. La Sfida, March 28, no. II/4.
59. E. Erra (1952) Bloccare la democrazia. Asso di bastoni, January 20, no. V/3.
60. P. Furlong (2011) Social and Political Thought of Julius Evola (London and
New York: Routledge), p. 90.
61. J. Evola (2003 [1961]) Ride the Tiger, p. 3.
62. F. Ferraresi (1987) Julius Evola: tradition, reaction, and the radical right.
European Journal of Sociology, 28, p. 109.
63. M. Veneziani (1994) La rivoluzione conservatrice in Italia. Genesi e sviluppo della
‘ideologia italiana’ fino ai nostri giorni (Carnago: SugarCo), p. 214.

About the Author

Elisabetta Cassina Wolff is Associate Professor in Modern and Contemporary His-
tory at the University of Oslo, author of several articles on Italian fascism, political
developments after 1945, and Italian political culture. She has recently published
‘L'inchiostro dei vinti. Stampa e ideologia neofascista 1945–1953’ (2012).