ABSTRACT: A text-interview, inserted in the column "Tales of the Transparty", where new members for 1994 motivate the reasons for joining. Lavaggi (1) provides two motivations: 1) "the events that influence our life today take place outside and beyond national borders"; 2) "the radical party is the only party, in Italy, that does a series of things no one else does". Lavaggi recalls his previous experiences with the party (1974, 1975, 1989), the contrasts with the radical campaigns on nuclear power plants and anti-militarism, and lastly the good relations during the period of time he spent working at the European Parliament. Lastly he makes fun of the difficult relations between the radicals and the republican party.

(1994 - IL QUOTIDIANO RADICALE, 25 October 1993)

Ottavio Lavaggi, republican MP, was elected treasurer of the Radical Party at the Sofia Assembly. He first joined the radical party in 1993, and announces he will join in 1994.

So you have decided to join for 1994 as well?

Yes, I'm joining the radical party for 1994 too because the reasons that lead me to join the radical party in 1993, after a few years of absence, are ever more valid.

And what are these reasons?

There are two reasons. The first is that I believe politics today is either transnational or provincial. Frankly I prefer the first option. The explanation is easy: the events that influence our lives today take place mostly outside and beyond the national borders. The second reasons I joined is that I believe the radical party is the only party in Italy to do a whole series of things no one else does, and which, if they were not done, would worsen the conditions of this country.

When you joined the radical party in 1993, was that your first contact with the party?

No, I have been a member of the radical party in 1989, during the attempt to create a lay federation. The project started with the best intentions, that of unifying the various factions, traditions and families of the movement of Italian liberal-democrats for the European elections.

The idea was not only presenting common lists at the European elections, but also give birth to a new political subject. I was among those who believed the project was timely and necessary, so being a member of the republican party I decided to join the radical party as well.

What sort of relations had you had with the radical party before this experience?

My first experience in cooperating with the radicals dates back to 1974. At the time I was secretary of the young Roman republicans. I came to the radical party's previous headquarters to interview Marco Pannella (2) on the subject of the legalization of abortion. The radicals were about to start gathering signatures on a petition to repeal the restrictive regulations that were in effect. During that interview, Marco Pannella convinced me so much that I decided to organize two stands to collect signatures on the radical petition together with my republican friends. I spent the subsequent three months of my life collecting signatures at a stand in Piazza Fiume, in Rome. In those weeks we collected 12,000 signatures: a lot. It was a tangible way of supporting the radical party's campaign.

Why didn't you join the party then?

At the time the radical party was not yet a transparty. Among its members there were militants and leaders of other formations, such as Loris Fortuna (3). But the radical party was basically not a transparty formation. At times it also took part in electoral competitions with its own symbol. The republican party did not allow its members to be members of another party as well. The adhesion to the radical party was either complete or nothing. On the other hand, there were other parts of the radical policy I was less convinced about.

Such as?

For instance, I have never believed in the need to carry out a strict, quasi-ideological battle against nuclear power. Moreover, I did not like the tone with which the radical party carried out its anti-militarist and non-violent campaign.

After the experience of the referendum on abortion, what relations have you had with the radical party?

I could add an episode which occurred in 1975, during the republican congress in Genua. On that occasion the republicans were to discuss, among other things, the presence in the republican party of Aristide Gunnella, the party's controversial leader in Sicily, who had been expelled by the arbiters and had been re-admitted during the congress at the proposal of Ugo La Malfa (4). Marco Pannella participated in the congress in his capacity as a journalist, but the republican leadership thought he was carrying out a detrimental work for the party. I "rescued" him in time: a group of angry friends of Mr Gunnella were about to assault him. After that I spent over ten years working at the European Parliament.

And what was your opinion of the radicals' federalist battles from the European Parliament?

I must say my activity in Brussels was essentially the activity of a federalist. I has close relations with Altiero Spinelli (5), and on this point the various radical parliamentarians who occupied positions on the European Parliament, starting from Marco Pannella, were extremely cooperative. I can testify that the radicals played an important role in Altiero Spinelli's unsuccessful federalist battle.

The republican party and the radicals: what are the reactions raised by the radicals' political campaigns and by Marco Pannella?

The republican party has always reacted very strongly to the radical movement and the personality of Marco Pannella. Reactions which are largely negative. The radical party is perceived as an antagonist in terms of style, methods, strategy and language. I believe this opinion is wrong. This stage of total rejection of the radical positions and for the personality of Marco Pannella itself have periodically given way to periods of intense partnership and cooperation.

What stage are we in now?

The courting stage.

Translator's notes

(1) OTTAVIO LAVAGGI. Treasurer of the Radical Party.

(2) MARCO PANNELLA. 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 he was elected 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) when he works as 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 p

arty succeeds in promoting (and winning) relevant civil rights battles, working for the introduction of divorce, conscientious objection, and important reforms of family law, etc, in Italy. He struggles for the abrogation of the Concordat between the Church and the Italian State. He was arrested in Sofia in 1968 as he was demonstrating in defence of Czechoslovakia, which had been invaded by the Russians. He opened up the party to the newly-born homosexual organizations (FUORI) and promoted the formation of the first environmentalist groups. The new radical party organized difficult campaigns, proposing several referendums (about twenty throughout the years) for the moralization of the country and of politics, against the public funding of political parties, against nuclear power plants, etc., but in particular for a thorough renewal of the administration of justice. Because of these battles, which were all carried out with strictly non-violent methods according to the Gandhian model - but Pannella's Gandhi i

s neither a mystic nor an ideologue; rather, an intransigent and yet flexible politician - he has been through trials which he has for the most part won. As of 1976, year in when he first ran for Parliament, he was always elected to the Chamber of Deputies, twice to the Senate and twice to the European Parliament. Several times candidate 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 hunger strike, not only in Italy but also in Europe, in particular during the international campaign against world hunger, for which he mobilized one hundred Nobel laureates and preminent 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 obtained the passage of a resolution in this sense by the European Parliament, and after it several other similar bills in the Italian

and Belgian Parliament. In January 1987 he ran for President of the European Parliament, obtaining 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 the federal development of the United States of Europe and with the objective of promoting civil rights throughout the world.

(3) LORIS FORTUNA. (Breno 1924 - Udine 1985). Italian politician. In 1965 he sponsored the bill on divorce which was passed by Parliament after years of initiatives and campaigns carried out in cooperation with the Radical Party in 1970. He also sponsored bills on abortion and passive euthanasia (the latter was not approved). Minister of civil defence and community affairs.

(4) LA MALFA UGO. (Palermo 1903 - Rome 1979). Italian politician. Among the founders of the Partito d'Azione (1942), he then joined the Republican Party (1948), transforming it in an attempt to make it into a modern liberal party connected to the productive forces. He was secretary of the same between 1965 and 1975, and then President. Former minister and deputy Prime Minister (1974-76). One of the fathers of the liberalization of trade after the war.

(5) ALTIERO SPINELLI ( Rome 1907 - 1982). Italian politician. During fascism, from 1929 to 1942, he was imprisoned as leader of the Italian Communist Youth. In 1942 co-author, with Ernesto Rossi, of the "Manifesto of Ventotene", which states that only a federal Europe can avert the return of fratricidal wars in the European continent and restore its international role. At the end of the war together with Rossi, Eugenio Colorni and others, he founded the European federalist Movement. After the crisis of the European Defence Community (1956), he became member of the European Commission, and followed the evolution of the Community structures. In 1979 he was elected member of the European Parliament on the list of the Italian Communist Party (PCI), becoming the mastermind of the realization of the draft treaty adopted by the European Parliament in 1984 and which goes under the name of "Spinelli Project".