The radicals provide the "public service" of information

ABSTRACT: Summarizes the various stages of the radicals' commitment in providing information; from the first "Agenzia Radicale" to "Liberazione" and "Il partito Nuovo" to "1994, il quotidiano Radicale"; from Radio Radicale, which is a means in constant evolution, to "Agorà". Why are the radicals so concerned about communications? Because they want to affirm, as a 'political' value, the fact that non-violent militants can, if they wish, abolish the first of all barriers of communications: the different languages".

Underlines the function of Radio Radicale's audio archive, which offers an extraordinary "portrait of the Italian political and cultural language".

(1994 - IL QUOTIDIANO Radicale, 11 November 1993)

"Agenzia Radicale" was the first journalistic intermediary between the party, citizens and information. It was also the support of the written testimonies of the radical theory and praxis, which allowed members and non-members to exchange ideas with those of others, to get in touch with all those who shared the single objectives, the countless radical campaigns, to voice the needs of all those, individuals or associations, who could find no other way to make their voices heard.

That first publication was the first of a series of newspapers: "Liberazione" in 1973, "Il Partito Nuovo" of 1991: published in fifteen languages with this publication the radical party assumes a primary commitment: circulating "denied" or buried information, addresses, telephone numbers and ideas of minorities ready to join the radicals of 1994.

1976 was a decisive year for the Radical Party as the party of communication. It marked the birth of Radio Radicale on the basis of a first embryo in the form of a Rome-based station; in a few weeks' time, with makeshift connections and rudimentary air-links, the radicals managed to put together a private station that covered almost all the national territory from Palermo to Turin, with stations connected in Bari, Naples, Rome, Florence, Bologna, Genua and Milan.

Marco Pannella (2) conducted a phone-in show that lasted 60 consecutive hours on that first radio during the last hours of the campaign for the general election of 1976. They were decisive moments to ensure the election to Parliament, with a handful of votes, of the first four radical members of Parliament.

The party had struggled first against the public financing of the parties. A receiver, under this bill, of a share of financing proportional to the number of its elected representatives, the party decided to invest that money on Radio Radicale to turn it into a major public information service for citizens.

Radio Radicale thus started airing live from the Senate and from the Chamber. It broadcast the entire sessions, so that Italian could hear what the representatives of the people were saying and doing in Parliament, for the first time offered in the integral truth of their behaviours to the judgment of the citizens. Then came the airings of the party congresses, from the PCI to the MSI (Radio Radicale was the first station to broadcast the assemblies of the Northern League); then came a long series of political trials, from the first against the mafia of Raffaele Cutolo to that against the group of 7 April to the Moro (3) and Tortora (4) trials.

Some programmes were of tremendous relevance: the live broadcasting on the obstructionism of the radical deputies for the referendum on abortion, or against the Cossiga decrees on public order; the long-distance dialogue with the Red Brigades, which lead to the release of Judge D'Urso (5), who had been kidnapped by the terrorists; "Radio Parolaccia" ("radio dirty talk", transl.), the non-stop programme that documented the existence of ethnic violence (North vs. South and vice versa), of sexual distortion, of repressed instincts expressed by the Italians, perhaps an early symptom of the political degeneration that emerged a few years later.

In 1990, in the face of the decision to close the Radio by want of funds, the majority of all parliamentary groups of the Chamber and Senate voted a bill that allocated 20 billion lire una tantum to Radio Radicale to allow it to continue to carry out its "public" information service with complete independence.

The provision was voted with the highest number of inter-group consents of all parliamentary bills.

With the decision of 1991 congress of transforming the party into a transnational party, the radicals "invented" a modern communication means, which reflected the nature of the party: Agorà.

What is the meaning of this relentless radical commitment to communications and information, so strong as to require al almost excessive use of money and human resources? It affirms, as "political" value, that it is possible for non-violent militants, to abolish the first of all communications barriers: the difference of languages. A person who talks and listens to other people becomes a material act of renunciation of violence. Beside the differences, the contrasts, the ideal conflicts, the "logos" becomes the ideal space in which to achieve a composition that transcends and frees them from the remains of irrationality. Communication is the first of all political liberties.

An unparalleled acquisition for the national historical patrimony is Radio Radicale's audio archive: some 150,000 tapes of recordings of parliamentary sessions, party congresses, demonstrations of associations, public trials, speeches of ordinary citizens and comments on political events, documentation of international bodies, from the United Nations to the European Parliament, live testimonies of historical facts, from the collapse of the Berlin Wall to Sarajevo. From 1976, a unique and extraordinary portrait of the political and cultural language.

Translator's notes

(1) MELEGA GIANLUIGI. (Milan 1935). Journalist, editor of "L'Europeo", head of the political section of "L'Espresso". He was fired by "L'Europeo" for his inquiries on Vatican property speculation in Rome. With his press campaign on the Lockheed scandal, he contributed to forcing the President of the Republic Giovanni Leone to resign.

(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) MORO ALDO. (Maglie 1916 - Rome 1978). Italian politician. Secretary of the Christian Democratic Party (1959-65), mastermind of the Centre-Left policy. Several times minister as of 1956, Prime Minister (1963-68, 1974-76) president of the Christian Democratic Party as of 1956, he favoured the participation of the Communist Party (PCI) in the government, outlining the hypothesis of a so-called "third stage" (after those of "centrism" and "centre-left") of the political system. He was kidnapped by the Red Brigades on 16 March 1978 in Rome and found dead on 9 May of the same year.

(4) 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.

(5) D'URSO GIOVANNI. Italian judge. Kidnapped by the Red Brigades on 12 December 1980. The kidnapping, which closely resembled that of Aldo Moro, stirred a vicious political and press controversy, during which some proposed the formation of a an "emergency" government formed by technicians alone. The Radical Party played an important role - thanks also to the action of the writer Leonardo Sciascia - in obtaining the judge's release and in opposing any authoritarian solution. The judge was released on 15 December 1981.