Alessandro Orsini is professor of political sociology in the Faculty of Political Science, LUISS University of Rome "Guido Carli." He also teaches at the University of Rome "Tor Vergata" and is the author of several books in Italian.

Introduction1. The Pedagogy of Intolerance
The Revolutionary Vocation

Violence as the Only Way

The "Binary Code" Mentality

Political Violence and Social Marginality

Eschatological Politics2. The Sacralization of Politics
The "Fanaticism of a New Religion"

Radical Catastrophism

The Revolutionary Sect and the Obsession with Purity

The Hatred of Reformists3. Toward the Bloodshed
Daily Life in a Revolutionary Sect

The Red Brigades' Organization Plan

The Blood Crime and Its "Story"

The Path to Bloodshed

Shedding Blood and the Role of the Revolutionary Sect

The Detachment from the Surrounding World4. The Genesis of the Red Brigades
The Red Brigades' Social Roots

The "Cultural Lag" Theory

When Were the Red Brigades Born?

The Red Brigades: "Imbeciles" or Real Revolutionaries?

Antonio Gramsci and "the Hour of Redemption"

The Italian Communist Party's Role in the Genesis of the Red Brigades

An Oxymoron: The "Leninist-Reformist" Party5. The Masters of the Red Brigades
Illustrious Predecessors: Thomas Müntzer

John of Leiden, King and Revolutionary

The English Revolution and the Puritan Movement

The French Revolution and the Jacobin Experiment

Babeuf: "The world has plunged into chaos"

Karl Marx's Pantoclastic Dream

The Revolutionary Tradition of Russian Populism6. The Purifiers of the World in Power
Lenin and State Terrorism

The Bolshevik Revolution and the "Victims of the Victims"

The Gulag, or The Promise Kept

Mao and the Myth of the "New Man"

The Cambodian RevolutionNot a Conclusion: Portrait of a Red BrigadistAppendix: Red Brigades and Black BrigadesA Note on Method

Bibliography

Index