Einaudi and Cooperative Education Association (MCE). Traces of a project for the elementary school (1966-67) = L’Einaudi e il Movimento di cooperazione educativa. Tracce di un progetto per la scuola elementare (1966-67)

The aim of this paper is to show the editorial relationship between the Einaudi publishing house and the Cooperative Education Association (MCE) during the
second half of the Sixties. The members of the Association were looking for an editor
willing to spread their pedagogical instances for the renewal of the Italian school and
they found it in Einaudi. Thanks to the study of the correspondence and the documentation preserved in the Giulio Einaudi Editore Historical Archive, it has been possible
to analyze a project of textbooks for the elementary school, made in collaboration with
relevant members of the Association such as Gianni Rodari, Mario Lodi, Giuseppe
Tamagnini and Bruno Ciari. The collections were never published, in part for financial
reasons, but also because of the rising debate around the textbooks. The opinion of the
Association in the late Sixties was changed: the point was not to renew the textbooks
but to abolish them. Understanding the reasons of the end of this project might help
to clarify the pedagogical impact of the cultural and social changes of that period, the
relationship between education and politics. Moreover, it is not by chance that from
the ashes of this project took shape The wrong country (Il paese sbagliato), a masterpiece written by Mario Lodi destined to become a classic for the history of education.