ABSTRACT: In reconstructing the radical party's history, the author describes the development and growth of political nonviolence in Italy, and the constant comparison with the culture of violence that is typical of all the other political families.

(Papers of the meeting "The radicals and nonviolence: a method, a hope, Rome 29-30 April 1988)

I believe there is a common feeling that leads us, or rather forces us, to thank with all our heart Laura Terni and Laura Arconti and the Associations that are offering us this opportunity, or rather forcing us to a moment of pause and reflexion, which helps us understand and realize the dangers that threaten us when we are not sufficiently lucid in pin-pointing precisely the problems we are dealing with here, which are the key problems of the radical party, but are also - otherwise we would not be radicals - the key problems of the political and social life, for which we exist as a radical party.

I must say I feel extremely inadequate in speaking, because I cannot have the clarity of ideas which I consider necessary even just to express, to formulate, to define the doubts and the alternatives we have. One thing I could do is express a series of considerations on some of the points that are characteristic of the radical party, in its nonviolent relationship with the cultures and the trends of the Italian political life throughout the history of our party.

In this sense, it seems to me that Bandinelli's (1) speech before and now Giovanni's speech have defined what I had jotted down as the two fundamental points: the relation between nonviolence and liberalism - which has been, so to say, the guideline of Angiolo's address - precisely in terms of theory and understanding of nonviolence in the radical party's history, thought and praxis: which is different compared to other forms of nonviolence; nonviolence as the basis for a new liberalism and - on the other hand - that which Giovanni was saying just now: nonviolence as the place of the ghetto, the radical ghetto. This applies to the entire history of the Radical Party. I was very much impressed by Angiolo's example, of that symbol of the early sixties: while everything else was changing, the radical party clung to a series of values, indications and intuitions; all around, the world changed in such a way as to totally alter the context, today, compared to what it was at the beginning of the sixties; and these

radicals who remained steadfast albeit not sclerotic, with respect to the indication. Some say that history proves we are right: and I believe that precisely at a moment in which it is proving we are wrong - because under certain aspects it is proving we are wrong, and we continue to remain in that ghetto - history has proven (and to what extent!) that we were right; so that those indications and those values which we valid then are still valid and central now, and even more so.

If we think of the radical history - and I believe it is important to refer to the early sixties - and if we refer to what Angiolo was saying on the relationship between liberalism, culture, values, political culture (not the abstract culture of books, but the liberal political culture) and nonviolence, this is precisely the field in which the radical party of Pannella (2), Bandinelli, the Rendi brothers (3) and Spadaccia, operates a schism with the liberal and radical culture of that period, and becomes "closed in the ghetto": the radical party of those young people separates itself from the great radical, radical-liberal cultural current, the current of Pannunzio's (4) "Mondo", the current of Salvemini (5) and of Ernesto Rossi (6). I remember the surprise I felt, I who was used to reading "Il Mondo", I who was a radical by culture, who had formed myself by reading "Il Mondo", when for the first time I found myself reading a bulletin called "Radical Left"...I remember the bewilderment, because I found compl

etely different things in this bulletin, which was published by a group of young people whom I had never even heard about, I who had lived close to the radical area. The first reaction, I remember, was "who are these people, what have they to do with the radical party, with that culture?!" And yet, I found those thing that were so remote from me fascinating...I was immediately fascinated.

Because the culture of the liberal-radical democratic Left was a culture in which - with the isolated and ghettoized example of Aldo Capitini - the themes of nonviolence and the foundation of liberalism starting from nonviolence had neither space nor legitimacy. It was a culture whose great historical myths (and we will see how much the myths, the models of reference count precisely in building the reactions, in interpreting the situations) lay in the Resistance; the Resistance also extolled the fighting, not the violence, but the duty of taking up weapons...there was the great tradition of the Partito d'Azione (7) (including that of 1943-47, but especially that of the nineteenth century): the action, there, wanted to take up weapons, Garibaldi's (8) action against Cavour; the followers of Garibaldi, the left and the radicals were those who said "war immediately, armed insurrection now"...the tradition of the radical culture was of that kind. To this we should add another thing: ridiculing and questioning no

nviolence was typical of practically all the left-wing culture, but also of the radical culture of the period. Or rather, not of the word 'nonviolence' in a single word, as we say, but of 'non-violence' in two separate words (i.e. the non-use pf violence) of the left and in particular of socialism and of the reformist socialism vis-à-vis fascism. How many times have we read in books of the most varied orientation, that the serious fault of socialism is that of having been passive, and of not having reacted...reacted in what way? Reacting with violence to violence, against fascism. It was the fault of this nonviolence of Turati (9), of these passive people, of these good people, that they hadn't reacted by organizing the popular, democratic counter-violence. I'm not saying these things in terms of ridicule: but there is no doubt that these were the values. And this leads us to something that was valid until very recently, if you think of it...the word "reformism" was considered almost a swearword: today Craxi

(10) has re-discovered the term, but until very recently not only the communists, but even some of our most eminent representatives were against this reformism, which they denounced as passive compared to the strong, rigorous revolutionism. And now, now that reformism is popular again (because now everyone is reformist, and there are no revolutionaries...) now it is significant that in re-discovering reformism and Turati and the others, the only thing which has not been re-discovered and has not become part of the political culture is this aspect of a truly nonviolent culture, which was typical of the best part of that reformism. That reformism which did not know how to translate into terms of nonviolent method, of nonviolent indication in our sense, but which nonetheless in some of its best exponents realized perfectly the fundamental link between means and ends: and there is the fact of educating oneself to a relationship of non-violence (in two words), of non-overwhelming, as the constitutive element of

the socialist objectives; there is almost a religiousness of nonviolence, in that reformism, which has not been re-discovered.

All this to say, to recall, that the radical culture, the radicalism of the new, nonviolent radical party, operated a separation precisely on this point, and was isolated, shut into a ghetto of incomprehension with respect to the very radical culture of the time: and this is one of the most important points of the history of this party. In the sixties, the radical party was seen as a party that was organically formed by intellectuals: the radical party of "Il Mondo" was the party of the intellectuals, it was sociologically intellectual; the new radical party - our party - was born precisely on this, operating a separation from its social roots. There is a long schism - which lasted for a long time, for decades - between the radical party and the intellectuals as a category; and one of the nodes, perhaps the key point on which this schism was carried out, is precisely the way in which we formulated the link between liberalism and nonviolence: so that those liberal intellectuals, of whom Bobbio (11) is the mos

t outstanding living representative, did not understand the radical method.

And therefore we have nonviolence as a ghettoizing choice, in which we felt isolated, misunderstood, ridiculed by "that" part and also by the other part, in the other major part of political culture we referred to; because the schism between Pannunzio's radical party and Pannella's radical party has meant the affirmation of the socialist choice as well as the affirmation of the nonviolent choice. Today we have lost trace of this, but the radical left refounded the radical liberalism proclaiming itself socialist: this radical party, whose members started to call each other "comrades". In Pannunzio's party they did not call each other "comrades"....here too, when I picked up "Radical Left"...I thought: do the radicals call each other "comrades"? What's this got to do with it? Why? But once that socialist choice was being made, these values of nonviolent liberalism were brought into the socialist field, in the area that was culturally hegemonic of the Italian society: so that, once again, we were opening a dial

ogue and facing a barrier. This is the difference, that those other liberal-democrats who made the socialist choice after the dissolution of the Partito d'Azione (Lombardi (12), Foa, who were members of the Partito d'Azione and then joined the socialist party, while others joined the communist party) and joined the socialist party, found themselves isolated; whereas we, who are also on the socialist side, are in the left, we have no enemies in the left, we want the refoundation of the left with all the force of the socialist requests, we who proposed this political method, and precisely because we were proposing a method, not a theory, a way of conducting politics, we found a wall of incommunicability.

Therefore: "this" method of conducting and conceiving politics is the one that placed us in a ghetto, with the countless difficulties, every time, even just to convey what we wanted or wanted to do, and why, and how we wanted to do it. There was the effort to explain, years to make people understand us...they mistook us for "something else", they didn't understand our language: and obviously this is something that disturbs, when one carries out an action which is communication, when politics means acting by communicating, and one is ridiculed, misunderstood, teased. The ironies on Pannella "who eats at night"...all this disturbs, makes you feel in a ghetto: however, I have to say that this isolation was an element of fascination and strength together, it was perceiving this difference of ours according to the belief of being right. The belief in this peculiarity, in this essentialness, in the preciousness of the relation, which came from radical politics, was one of those elements that enabled the enthusiasm

, the devotion, the richness which enabled the Radical party, with the few dozens and hundreds of members, of being itself and doing the things it did. And one of the elements of fascination we had, also in reading those miserable, home-made bulletins, and hearing the speeches of Giuliano Rendi - it is a name that should be mentioned, when evoking our roots, it is an important name in the history of the Italian political culture, if we accept the fact that the radical party has given an important contribution to Italian politics - is the sense we had of being, in Italy, the point of reference and the spearhead of a hope of a new left. We represented the point of contact with the British pacifists, with certain forms of struggle, of groups and minority organizations, which were the new left; the relations with the beat movement, these pre-1968 movements, the Dutch, the British, in some cases the Germans, the Americans...and if we read the first Organ of the transnational Radical party, that extraordinary pres

s organ represented by the "Radical Agency" of the early sixties - at a moment in which the Radical Party was made of thirty or forty people - there was an agency in which one could read the things which those thirty or ten/twelve active radicals did, but at the same time, in the same context, one could read the news (and it was the only office, in Italy, where something of the kind occurred) of the international and transnational action of the new movements of the left.

This is an element of extraordinary fascination, it is one of the reasons for which I told myself: here there is really something for which it is worth joining a party that does not exist, which is possibly only a hope.

All this changes radically with 1968; twenty years have gone by, everyone is talking about it, and 1968 is an important chapter of our history, and of the radical history as well: because 1968 was the year of the explosion of the new left in Italy, and that movement which was formed of a few groups suddenly exploded. Except that in very little time it became exactly the contrary of the reasons for which we looked toward the new left; because it becomes the contrary of nonviolence and the challenge of the existing reality, of the totalizing state in the name of liberalism, which was our position. I must say there is an important remark to make: the '68 of the transgression, that revolution which '68 achieved, which is a deep cultural revolution...(after '68 everything changed, even the way of dressing; I'm the only one who continues to wear the same things)...as I was saying, '68 meant transgression, not civil disobedience: it was the exact contrary of civil disobedience. Civil disobedience the way we underst

and it and the way we try to practice it, means disobedience to affirm the law; when a nonviolent radical disobeys, he is affirming the sacredness of the law, he is drawing attention on the value of the law, he is saying "I'm violating this law, which I do not accept, but - precisely because it is a law - I ask you to apply it. This is the value, in this I affirm the need for rules, for Law".

I remember the occupation of the classrooms in the schools, in the university. I participated in the first occupation at the State university of Milan, where we occupied a classroom for one hour. We broke the lock...yes, we broke the lock! But, precisely for this reason, I immediately organized a delegation, and we went to see the director and we self-denounced ourselves in writing. I'm saying this because I think something of this kind, in the history of the Milanese '68, never happened again; the contrary happened: the violation of the law became forcing the law; it became relation of force which aimed to deny, bury and cancel the law. If you think about it, and you read that book - a sample of the worst of 1968 - by Mario Capanna...the value he affirmed in it was that occupying was lawful, that it was a right: 1968 achieved a relation of force against the law; and, faced to the few times in which some authority wanted to apply the law, the reaction was a reaction of scandal: "What, aren't you ashamed? Fas

cists!"

Even popular democracies are the final exaltation of this type of democracy, of a certain type of democracy, which cancels - with the strength of the facts committed - and replaces the dimensions of the law with a pure relation of force. Therefore, the contract of nonviolence. And in this the nonviolent radicals have once again been swept away, canceled, ridiculed: we were ridiculous, with our things, in that context. When there is enthusiasm for this culture, for this way of carrying out politics; when the entire radical culture and the radical intellectuals who were no longer in the radical party, but who were radical history and tradition, found themselves approving "this" democracy, we were really ridiculous with our...."things"...which were divorce, on which everyone ultimately was forced to agree: but I remember we were in Corso di Porta Vigentina 15/a, and we sent telegrams to obtain the meeting of the Justice Committee, and in the meanwhile there was the festival of the revolution....we were pitiful!

But this continued to represent our force, this fact of being isolated, of being in conflict. And there is another fact: it would be useful, I believe, to reconstruct the various stages...

1968 was also the year of a major, historical defeat of nonviolence. Czechoslovakia: that country is one of the rare examples in the European history of a major nonviolent resistance; the resistance against the Soviet invasion has been exemplarily nonviolent, and turned out into an irreparable defeat. Therefore, even that was a historical phase in which the two models - but in fact there hasn't even been a significant debate - were compared: a defeat of nonviolence compared to the example of the victorious cultural revolution in China, and the glorious Vietnam; and the entire democratic culture accepted this kind of values. Think, for example, of an exemplary figure, who writes the preface to Capanna's book, saying he is the nicest politician...Camilla Cederna (13), a typical exponent of the radical culture, who has been close to us so many times, even after the dissolution of that Radical Party of which L'Espresso (14) was part of. The fascination of the victory of revolutionary violence as the basis of dem

ocracy: this is the essence of 1968.

And then there are pages of radical achievements: because the seventies are characterized by a slow - but resolute - advance of the radicals, starting from the fundamental stage of the hunger strikes carried out by Pannella in the early seventies, which for the first time implied the visibility of the nonviolent action, the dignity, the force of nonviolence as such, the recognizability of the impact of nonviolence with the institutions, also in the comparison and the challenge of the liberal-radical culture on the part of the others. Those hunger strikes carried out by Pannella, which corresponded to the opening of a debate, inadequate but in which Spadolini intervened, in which some of the great liberal intellectuals intervened on "Il Corriere della Sera" (15), who acknowledged, possibly misunderstanding it, nonviolence, and challenged it as the basis of liberalism. This is a page which is really a page of history: and precisely in that context lies the relation between Pasolini (16) and the radical party a

nd the radicals: with those extraordinary articles against the transgression of 1968, against that disobedience which was the contrary of the nonviolent person's civil disobedience, Pasolini affirmed the value of the "new obedience", mentioning the case of that policeman who, having failed in his task of checking on a prisoner who then escaped, desperate because of his negligence, committed suicide. This is the "new obedience" of an individual who has been ghettoized and isolated by this prevalent culture: and it is the definition of one of the two aspects of nonviolence, because nonviolence is more often that not obedience, and nonviolence is not necessarily civil disobedience.

In nonviolence, there is a moment of civil disobedience (the person who smokes hashish and denounces himself in order to go to prison): but also the person who undertakes a hunger strike to urge Parliament to pass a certain reform or law in due time (which Parliament must pass, if it wants to respect its own rules). That person is not disobeying anything, and this is the obedience to the law.

Precisely this stage marks the opening of the political-cultural debate - mainly through Pasolini, starting from the radical nonviolence - and the value of nonviolence is then either accepted or rejected, but has ceased to be a ridiculous thing, something which can be ridiculed: and this, at a moment in which terrorism was emerging, started the season of terrorism with all that ensued, i.e. the ultimate result of "that other version" of the new left.

Hence, slowly, we passed to a situation which, if you think about it, is the exact opposite of that of the sixties: because the cultures of the left, once hegemonic, which according to their values ridiculed the radical nonviolence, are dead, have disappeared, have been worn by the defeat of 1968 and of its followers.

Today, that the Red Brigades (17) are made of fifty, one hundred people, everyone says they have no consent, that they do not exist, today no one talks about revolution, not even Capanna, in his book; Capanna who - while sympathizing with the Capanna of the past - but without any self-critical reflexion...not even Capanna talks about revolution.

Even socialism has disappeared: that culture is finished, it is dead. Everyone is liberal today: in the left, everyone is liberal; in the communist party, in the socialist party, everyone claims to be liberal. I'm not saying this in polemic or mocking terms, because it is a fact of huge importance, this fact of recognizing oneself in the liberal values; and there is also a generalized recognition of nonviolence: if you remember that truly important text, the interview by Occhetto (18) to "La Repubblica" of some time ago, it contains the theoretical refoundation of the Communist Party the way it had never been, in terms which had never been proposed by others in the entire history of the communist parties, refusing in toto the ideal heritage of the Third International in order to refound (these really sound like "our" words) the Communist Party according to the link between democracy and nonviolence.

But in fact, precisely here lay the proposal, through nonviolence, of a global refoundation of politics. Giovanni Negri was right, when he said that probably the beginning of the new phase of difficulty we are experiencing is the defeat on the nonviolent struggle against mass starvation: but I do not agree entirely, when he says that the fundamental thing was the creation of a new relation between foreign politics and domestic politics. The victory on starvation was such, if that was the moment in which there was a general refoundation of politics, starting from the revolution of nonviolence; as to the link between foreign and domestic politics, this is the true aspect of the transnational dimension; the refusal of the category of "foreign politics". That defeat, i.e. the non-achievement of the objective of a refoundation of politics, lead to the fact that this uniformity in the recognition of liberalism and nonviolence prevailed: the terms is accepted, but not in the sense of "non-use of violence", not in t

he sense of non-violence in two separate words. But precisely the fact that non-violence in this sense is universally accepted, is what makes our true nonviolence unrecognizable, once again, and which makes it more difficult for us; under certain aspects, it was easier when we were in the ghetto, closed and isolated, recognized by none other than ourselves, and this is what gave us force...Now, the fact of being set in a context which on paper recognizes and accepts our values, ultimately homologates us to other people's values, makes it more difficult for us to be consistent with ourselves and with our premises. Much more than in the past, we could become our own enemies, when we are occupied by a culture which is very different from ours because it does not base liberalism as the place for the hopes and the values of freedom, but liberalism as a governmental technique in order to reinstate categories which were used once, versus liberalism as the religion of freedom.

Today everyone claims to be liberal, but this liberalism does not contain the great hopes, this liberalism isn't the affirmation of the values of liberty and law, it is not the place in which there are great tensions, great and strong political tensions. And this is the new ghetto in which we could be overwhelmed, the ghetto of the homologation for which we have trouble being our actual selves.

I would like to conclude saying that I think I can perceive the signs of a new epochal change, such as that of 1968, a new reversed '68, a black '68, of which Le Pen's success in France is a signal. In the context of today's world, with this besieged West, with the demographic crisis of the West, while the Third World keeps expanding, and with the fear that occupies (because this is the deep effect in our Western world), we could experience a deep change such as that of '68; I'm not saying the advance of a new Nazism - though this could happen - , but certainly a change of which Le Pen's success is a signal. A survey in Denmark or Norway highlighted the fact that if there were elections, a party like Le Pen's would harvest 25%; signs of this can be seen everywhere: in the United States, where protectionism advances, that is, a sign of closure, force as the "defence from the others". In an embryonic form, it is the refusal of the right of the individual as such: therefore, it is not nationalism, but something

even worse than the old nationalism, it is a new figure, the figure of the tragedy of a world that feels besieged and which reacts by killing itself...this is Lepenism. Faced to which there is the transnational dimension, which means anticipation, once again, intuition: it is true that the transnational dimension can become fashionable, because it is topical, and at the same time it is going against mainstream thought; transnational here means abolition of the distinction between foreign and domestic politics, it is the affirmation of the politics of liberal values, of the guarantee of the rights of the individual, starting from the right to life, everywhere and at all times.

The problem isn't "Europe otherwise we are weak"; the problem is Europe as the moment of conquest of this other and new dimension of politics, and it is here that we want to test our capacity to be ourselves completely.

I don't believe the problem lies in the fact that the transnational dimension is nonviolent, and the non-transnational dimension is violent...; the problem is succeeding in recovering our capacity to be ourselves, versus this danger of a homologation: as Bandinelli was saying, I don't want to add anything else.

If we conquer this, we necessarily conquer the transnational dimension: today it is impossible, with the theoretic clarity we have acquired, to once again truly be the radical party, without also becoming transnational radical party.

I apologize for this flood of words.

Translator's notes

(1) BANDINELLI ANGIOLO. (Chianciano 1927). Writer. Former member of the Partito d'Azione; secretary of the Radical Party in 1969, 1971 and 1972; he was also treasurer of the party for five years. In 1979 local councillor in Rome, deputy in the ninth legislature. For many years, editor of several radical publications ("La Prova Radicale", "Notizie Radicali", etc), author of essays and articles relative to the history and the theory of the party, many of which are contained in the book "Il radicale impunito". Writes for newspapers and magazines and for Radio Radicale with notes and editorials.

(2) PANNELLA MARCO. Pannella Giacinto, known as Marco. (Teramo 1930). Currently President of the Radical Party's Federal Council, which he is one of the founders of. At twenty national university representative of the Liberal Party, at twenty-two President of the UGI, the union of lay university students, at twenty-three President of the UNURI, national union of Italian university students. At twenty-four he advocates, in the context of the students' movement and of the Liberal party, the foundation of the new radical party, which arises in 1954 following the confluence of prestigious intellectuals and minor democratic political groups. He is active in the party, except for a period (1960-1963) in which he is correspondent for "Il Giorno" in Paris, where he established contacts with the Algerian resistance. Back in Italy, he commits himself to the reconstruction of the radical Party, dissolved by its leadership following the advent of the centre-left. Under his indisputable leadership, the party succeeds in

promoting (and winning) relevant civil rights battles, working for the introduction of divorce, conscientious objection, important reforms of family law, etc, in Italy. He struggles for the abrogation of the Concordat between Church and State. Arrested in Sofia in 1968 as he is demonstrating in defence of Czechoslovakia, which has been invaded by Stalin. He opens the party to the newly-born homosexual organizations (FUORI), promotes the formation of the first environmentalist groups. The new radical party organizes difficult campaigns, proposing several referendums (about twenty throughout the years) for the moralization of the country and of politics, against public funds to the parties, against nuclear plants, etc., but in particular for a deep renewal of the administration of justice. Because of these battles, all carried out with strictly nonviolent methods according to the Gandhian model - but Pannella's Gandhi is neither a mystic nor an ideologue; rather, an intransigent and yet flexible politician - h

e has been through trials which he has for the most part won. As of 1976, year in which he first runs for Parliament, he is always elected at the Chamber of Deputies, twice at the Senate, twice at the European Parliament. Several times candidates and local councillor in Rome, Naples, Trieste, Catania, where he carried out exemplary and demonstrative campaigns and initiatives. Whenever necessary, he has resorted to the weapon of the hunger strike, not only in Italy but also in Europe, in particular during the major campaign against world hunger, for which he mobilized one hundred Nobel laureates and preeminent personalities in the fields of science and culture in order to obtain a radical change in the management of the funds allotted to developing countries. On 30 September 1981 he obtains at the European parliament the passage of a resolution in this sense, and after it several other similar laws in the Italian and Belgian Parliament. In January 1987 he runs for President of the European Parliament, obtaini

ng 61 votes. Currently, as the radical party has pledged to no longer compete with its own lists in national elections, he is striving for the creation of a "transnational" cross-party, in view of a federal development of the United States of Europe and with the objective of promoting civil rights throughout the world.

(3) RENDI ALOISIO. (1927 - 1979). University professor, writer, translator, among the founders of the radical party, wrote for "Agenzia Radicale", antimilitarist.

RENDI GIULIANO. (1927 - 1979). Brother of the above. Scholar, liberal and then radical militant, essayist. Among the founders of the Radical Party.

(4) PANNUNZIO MARIO. (Lucca 1910 - Rome 1968). Italian journalist, liberal. Editor of the daily newspaper "Risorgimento Liberale" between 1943 and 1947, he then established (1949) the newsmagazine "Il Mondo", which he was editor of for seventeen years, making into an unchallenged example of modern European journalism. Member of the Italian Liberal party, he was one of the founders of the Radical party, which he contributed to dissolving when the centre-left was formed.

(5) SALVEMINI GAETANO. (Molfetta 1873 - Sorrento 1957). Italian historian and politician. Socialist since 1893, he founded the weekly "L'Unità", which soon became an important seat of debates. In 1925 in Florence, together with the Rosselli brothers, he founded the clandestine antifascist publication "Non mollare". Subsequently he fled abroad (to the U.S.), where he promoted antifascist information campaigns.

(6) ROSSI ERNESTO. (Caserta 1897 - Rome 1967). Italian journalist and politician. Leader of "Giustizia e Libertà", in 1930 he was arrested by the fascist regime and remained in prison or exiled until the end of the war. Author, together with Spinelli, of the "Manifesto di Ventotene", and leader of the European Federalist Movement and of the battle for a united Europe. Among the founders of the Radical Party. Essayist and journalist, from "Il Mondo" he promoted vehement campaigns against clerical interference in the political life, against economic trusts, industrial and agrarian protectionism, private and public concentrations of power, etc. His articles were collected in famous books ("I padroni del vapore", etc). After the dissolution of the Radical Party in 1962, and the consequent split from the editor of "Il Mondo", M.Pannunzio, he founded "L'Astrolabio", whence he continued his polemics. In his last years he joined the "new" radical party, with which in 1967 he launched the "Anticlerical Year".

(7) PARTITO D'AZIONE. Italian political party established 1942 following the confluence of the liberalsocialist movements and of "Giustizia e Libertà". During the Resistance it played an important role, but was dissolved after the electoral defeat of 1946. Represented the last historical occasion to form a pragmatic type of party, reformist but non ideologized, strictly lay, etc. The name comes from the party of the followers of G. Mazzini (1853-1870), with a republican and revolutionary program.

(8) GARIBALDI GIUSEPPE. (Nizza 1807 - Caprera 1882). Patriot, conspirator and revolutionary for the unity and independence of Italy. Fled to South America, where he struggled for the independence of Uruguay. In 1849 he participated, with Mazzini, in the defence of the Roman Republic from the French troops. In 1860, supported by Cavour, he embarked on the conquest of Sicily (Expedition of the Thousand) which subtracted Naples to the Bourbons and gave it over to the Savoia. He carried out attempts to free Rome from the Pope, which were unsuccessful. In 1870 he fought for France against Prussia. Deputy of the Italian parliament, he promoted the growth in Italy of democratic forces and of the International.

(9) TURATI FILIPPO. (Canzo 1857 - Paris 1932). One of the founders of the Italian Socialist Party (1892). Prestigious and unquestioned figure, reformist and gradualist. Member of Parliament. Antifascist, confined and then exile in France in 1926.

(10) CRAXI BETTINO. (Milan 1934). Italian politician. Socialist, deputy since 1968. Appointed secretary of the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) in 1976, he operated important changes in the party's phisiognomy, turning it into the core of a wide project of institutional and other reforms and of unity of the socialist forces.

(11) BOBBIO NORBERTO. (Turin 1909). Italian jurist and philosopher. Theorist of the bases of the juridical science from a standpoint which is very close to juridical neopositivism, exponent of a liberalism which perceives the rigorous respect of the procedures as the very basis of freedom. Senator for life. Writes for "La Stampa".

(12) LOMBARDI RICCARDO. (Regalbuto 1901 - 1984). Italian politician. Among the founders of the Partito d'Azione, later joined the Italian Socialist Party (PSI), which he became president of in 1980.

(13) CEDERNA CAMILLA. (Milan 1911). Italian journalist and writer. A bright observer of society, in particular the Milanese one, on "L'espresso" she conducted campaigns and controversies at the time of the terrorist attack of Piazza Fontana and then of the death of G. Feltrinelli.

(14) L'ESPRESSO. Rome-based political and cultural weekly magazine, established in 1955 by Arrigo Benedetti, with a radical orientation. During the first years it carried out important moralization campaigns.

(15) CORRIERE DELLA SERA (IL). Daily newspaper established in Milan in 1876. Long considered the most authoritative Italian paper. Conservative.

(16) PASOLINI PIERPAOLO. (Bologna 1922 - Rome 1975). Italian writer and director. Novels ("Ragazzi di vita", 1955; "Una vita violenta", 1959), verse ("Le ceneri di Gramsci", 1957, etc.), plays, cinema ("Accattone", 1961, "Il Vangelo secondo Matteo", 1964, etc.), but especially powerful polemist and moralist, he denounced the evils of the "bourgeoisie" and severely criticized the Italian Left for its shortcomings. Sympathizer of the Radical Party, on the subject of which he wrote some beautiful pages, the day after his death he was supposed to go to Florence to take part in a congress of the party.

(17) RED BRIGADES. (Known as BR). Clandestine terrorist organization of the extreme Left, born and operating in Italy as of 1969. By proclaiming the revolution of the working classes, the organization tried to open several fronts of armed revolt against the State and the political establishment, carrying out a series of attempts, wounding, kidnapping and assassinationg politicians, journalists, magistrates and industrial executives. Its leader was Renato Curcio. In 1978 the organization kidnapped and assassinated Aldo Moro.

(18) OCCHETTO ACHILLE. (Turin 1936). Italian politician. At first exponent of Ingrao's group, he then shifted to Berlinguer's centre. He became secretary of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) in 1988, succeeding Alessandro Natta. After launching the idea of a major "Constituent" of the left with all reformist forces, he then decided to change only the name of the party ("Democratic Party of the Left").