Most importantly, the British and Italian states’ command over the two pillars of capitalist accumulation— private ownership of the means of production and wage relations— had the fundamental eff ect of politicizing their economies. Indeed, it exposed how relations of production could be a terrain of political contestation, thus prone to social change. Th e British and Italian workers were in the best position to grasp the full meaning of such an unprecedented turn of events. Th eir governments had tightened the exploitative grip on the workers; but unlike the grip of the invisible hand, the state’s chokehold was visible and could thus be subverted.

Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, loc. 216