THE BIOLOGY OF MARIO CANELLA: SCIENCE, POLITICS, AND RACISM IN THE AGE OF ITALIAN FASCISM

Abstract

Mario Francesco Canella was an Italian scientist active primarily before and during the Italian fascist period and the second world war. His writing is notable for an early period dedicated to a firm defense of Lamarckism and opposition to Darwinism, followed by an abrupt shift beginning in the 1940s to an almost exclusive focus on racial science and eugenics. Following the end of the war, his writing shifts again to a much narrower focus on microzoology, and does not revisit either of his earlier themes. At first, these shifts appear driven purely by political considerations, hinting that Canella repeatedly modified and abandoned his views to fit changing political climates. However, while his second shift away from racial science shows evidence of this being the case, the two other periods demonstrate much stronger theoretical links, and the original shift into racial science is much more firmly rooted in beliefs expressed within Canella’s earlier writing.