Fabio Frosini
Università degli Studi di Urbino (fabio.frosini@uniurb.it; Orcid: 0000000249772314)
Abstract: The article reconstructs Antonio Gramsci’s evolving engagement with Niccolò Machiavelli, from his early writings to the Prison Notebooks. As early as 1917, Gramsci framed Machiavelli as a critical alternative to Italian cultural fragmentation, juxtaposing him against the “stenterellesque” bourgeoisie. In the Prison Notebooks, he advances a radical reinterpretation of Machiavellian thought, portraying The Prince as a political project aimed at establishing a bourgeois national state through an urban-rural alliance. He casts Machiavelli as a “jacobin” ante litteram and a forerunner of a “philosophy of praxis” grounded in historical immanence and concrete practical action. Gramsci contrasts this reading with both the Fascist appropriation of Machiavelli as a theorist of force and Benedetto Croce’s liberal interpretation, which asserts the autonomy of politics from morality. From this perspective, Machiavelli and Marx emerge as convergent theorists of historical transformation and the construction of popular hegemony.
Keywords: Machiavellianism; Hegemony; Nationalism; Political Realism; Praxis.