Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Map of Italy showing regional borders and capitals
- 1 The political context
- 2 The Christian Democrats: The indispensable center?
- 3 The Communists' struggle for legitimacy and acceptance
- 4 The ambiguous role of the Socialists
- 5 The small parties: The lay forces and the extremes
- 6 Parliament, prime minister, and president
- 7 Public administration and sottogoverno
- 8 The administration of justice
- 9 Dangers to the state: Plots, terrorism, and the mafia
- 10 Economic and social transformation
- 11 Regional devolution and the problem of the South
- 12 The changing relations between church and state
- 13 Foreign and security policy
- 14 “But it does move” – a summing up
- Appendixes
- Bibliography
- Index
3 - The Communists' struggle for legitimacy and acceptance
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 May 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Map of Italy showing regional borders and capitals
- 1 The political context
- 2 The Christian Democrats: The indispensable center?
- 3 The Communists' struggle for legitimacy and acceptance
- 4 The ambiguous role of the Socialists
- 5 The small parties: The lay forces and the extremes
- 6 Parliament, prime minister, and president
- 7 Public administration and sottogoverno
- 8 The administration of justice
- 9 Dangers to the state: Plots, terrorism, and the mafia
- 10 Economic and social transformation
- 11 Regional devolution and the problem of the South
- 12 The changing relations between church and state
- 13 Foreign and security policy
- 14 “But it does move” – a summing up
- Appendixes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
It is not easy to take the measure of the Italian Communist party. It has been in such continuous transition that what is true of it at any particular moment is not necessarily true at another. Moreover it is a party that has lived between two worlds – the ideological world of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin and the practical political world of Western parliamentarism and pluralism. And it is a party that has always been internally divided between those to whom democracy and those to whom socialism is more important. Consequently its historic course has been marked by continuity, change, contradiction, and ambiguity in almost equal measure. Even today, after an evolution of decades, the party presents two faces: One was born of the Bolshevik revolution, insists that it is intrinsically different from other parties, rejects social democracy, and advocates a transformation of the economic and social system. The other was shaped by Italy's free political and economic system which the party has supported as loyally as any institution and more than some. Which face is real? Or are both real? Or is one a mask for the other?
No other questions about postwar Italy have so engaged politicians, journalists, scholars, diplomatists, and the business community – not to mention the simple Italian voter. The issue is anything but hypothetical. The party has long been the country's second political force, could become the largest, and may someday participate in the national government and even lead it.
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- ItalyA Difficult Democracy: A Survey of Italian Politics, pp. 41 - 67Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1986