ABSTRACT: An editorial to illustrate the editorial project published on issue n. 1 of "1994, the radical daily newspaper". It outlines the characteristics of the initiative, with the request to the advertisement experts, the frenzy work to realize it, the attention for topical events but also the rediscovery of the entire history of the radical party and of its campaigns - both successful and non - "which the media covered, deformed and violated". Maybe it's not a nice newspaper, but a useful one...one that should not be thrown away but kept with trust and confidence..."

(1994 - IL QUOTIDIANO RADICALE, 25 October 1993)

Eight pages, for twenty days. No more. Little, to be a "daily newspaper". All that was possible today for the 37.000 member-strong radical party. With their enrolments and their money, these members have allowed us to carry out this editorial project. We could not do more. Therefore, 160 pages of newspapers.

160 pages in less than a month, to convince the 37.000-plus people to renew their commitment - signing a cheque, sending a postal order or using a credit card (failing which, in the February campaign we would have failed) - and give strength and resources for another year ("and possibly promote other memberships"). We compiled them in two or three weeks, with our energies and perhaps with a little despair: shall we make it? Other companions and militants - those of the Liste Pannella (1) - were working frenzily to prepare the November electoral campaign, allow the organization of the referendums to wipe out the party regime and allow the birth of the "Democratic Party". Who could we ask for help, for trust? Marco suggested: "Let's try with the advertisement experts, the photographs who can create images". Tano D'Amico is helping us select the pictures. One day Oliviero Toscani came to our headquarters, listened to our requests and then decided to give us a hand. And then came the others, Giancarlo Livraghi,

Sanna, Pirella, Mortaroli, Muccini, Vincino, Staino, the cartoonists...So many we had managed to convince. A long, extraordinary list, a solidarity which is more than just personal support.

But the newspaper essentially consist of politics, and topical news. It's an account of the projects, initiatives, campaigns. Luckily there are countless of them. Emma (2) gave a brief account of her "holidays". A few more accounts and the newspaper becomes thick and rich in facts, events, projects. Also, we shouldn't forget the past. This is also - incredibly - part of today's life. Obviously no one remembers after thirty years, thousands of days, of faces, of facts subtracted or hidden by the media. We need to rediscover this history...divorce, conscientious objection, Tortora (3), the referendums, Leone impeached, the ad hoc tribunal, the dialogue with Boutros Ghali. And Scalfaro (4). But also Toni Negri (5), Cicciolina (6), the referendums lost, the bitterness of apparently wasted days, the misunderstandings, the failures. Who knows all this? Who can read this unitarian and unique history, who can interpret it, recognize its protagonists, its authors?

The daily newspaper "1994 - The radical newspaper" was born and conceived, piece by piece, beyond the hopes and the fears. Maybe it's not a nice newspaper, but perhaps it's useful, and not just to obtain 37.000 members, but also to keep the collective memory and conscience alive. A newspaper that should not be thrown away but kept with a sense of trust and love for ourselves and the future.

Translator's notes

(1) 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.

(2) BONINO EMMA. (Bra 1948). President of the Radical Party, former member of the European Parliament, as of 1976 member of the Italian Parliament. Among the promoters of the CISA (Information Centre on Sterilization and Abortion) and active militant in the campaign against clandestine abortion. She was tried and acquitted in Florence. Participated in the conduction, on a national and international scale, of the campaign on World Hunger. Among the founding members of "Food and Disarmament International", promoted the circulation of the Manifesto of Nobel Laureates.

(3) TORTORA ENZO. (Genua 1928 - Milan 1988). Journalist and popular TV compere, arrested for alleged drug dealing. Elected member of the European Parliament (1984) on the Radical Party ticket, he underwent a trial during which he was convicted and later acquitted at the appeal. The occasion and the symbol of the most important radical campaign for the reform of the justice system.

(4) SCALFARO OSCAR LUIGI. (Novara 1918). Italian politician, Christian Democrat. Lawyer, former minister of transport, minister of artistic property, minister of the Interior. Man of great integrity, he enjoys the esteem of the laics as well.

(5) NEGRI TONI. (Padua 1933). Italian writer and philosopher, exponent of the laborite and revolutionary extreme Left, was convicted as the architect of the assassination of ing. Saronio. Ran on the Radical Party ticket (provided he waive his parliamentary immunity and accepted the trial), he was elected member of Parliament in 1983. He escaped his trial by fleeing clandestinely to France, where he currently lives.

(6) STALLER ILONA (Elena Anna). (Budapest 1951). Best known as Cicciolina, porn actress, elected member of Parliament in 1987 on the radical party ticket.