Rinaldo Rigola
Secretary General of the General Confederation of Labour
In office
1906–1918
Personal details
Born2 February 1868
Biella, Kingdom of Italy
Died10 January 1954(1954-01-10) (aged 85)
Milan, Italy
Political party
OccupationMetal worker

Rinaldo Rigola (2 February 1868 – 10 January 1954) was an Italian socialist politician who served as the founding secretary general of the General Confederation of Labour in 1906.

Biography

Rigola was born in Biella 2 February 1868.[1] He was a metal worker.[2] He became a member of the Italian Workers' Party in 1886.[1] He left the party and joined the Italian Socialist Party in 1893.[2] In the party Rigola was part of its reformist faction.[2] He served as the municipal councilor in Biella in 1895 and as the director of the newspaper Corriere Biellese in 1896.[1] The same year he was forced to exile and settled in Switzerland where he stayed until 1900.[1] Shortly after his return to Italy he was elected a deputy being the first Italian worker at the Parliament.[1][3] He wrote about trade union topics in the newspaper Avanti and then directed a magazine entitled Vita workeria.[1]

In 1903 Rigola lost his sight completely as a result of an accident during his youth.[1] In 1906 he became founding secretary general of the General Confederation of Labour.[1] Rigola resigned from the post in 1918.[1] In 1922 he cofounded the Unitary Socialist Party.[1][2] Rigola launched a magazine entitled Il Lavoro in Biella in 1924.[1] He also headed a cultural organization, the National Association for the Questions of Labour, which was associated with the magazine.[4] He retired from public life in 1940 and died in Milan on 10 January 1954.[1]

Views and legacy

Rigola was a supporter of the guild socialism developed by G.D.H. Cole.[4] He did not openly approve the Fascist corporatism.[4] In 2012 a biography of Rigola was published, Rinaldo Rigola. Una biografia politica, by Paolo Mattera.[5]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 "Rinaldo Rigola (Biella 1868 – Milano 1954)" (in Italian). Museo Torino. Retrieved 31 July 2022.
  2. 1 2 3 4 John Riddell, ed. (2015). To the Masses. Proceedings of the Third Congress of the Communist International, 1921. Vol. 91. Leiden; Boston: Brill. p. 1230. doi:10.1163/9789004288034_038. ISBN 9789004288034.
  3. ↑ "Rigola, Rinaldo" (in Italian). Centro Rete Biellese. Retrieved 31 July 2022.
  4. 1 2 3 Laura Cerasi (January–April 2019). "From corporatism to the "foundation of labour": notes on political cultures across Fascist and Republican Italy". Tempo. 25 (1): 239–255. doi:10.1590/TEM-1980-542X2018v250113. hdl:10278/3707324. S2CID 150951480.
  5. ↑ "La biografia politica di Rinaldo Rigola" (in Italian). Futura Editrice. Retrieved 31 July 2022.
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