TRASFORMISMO AND THE
ITALIAN COMMUNIST PARTY

Thesis for the Degree of M. A.
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY

Augustine Amaru

196-5

IHESIS

LIBRAR V

MiChigan S I; 11-; I):
University

 

The '
or politics
the parliam
the latter
of the prac
into the go-
What betm

The ;

were allow8(

ABSTRACT

TRASPORMISMO AND THE
ITALIAN COMMUNIST PARTY

 

by Augustine Amaru

The problem of this study centers around the Italian "style"

of politics, trasformismo. This practice involved agreement of

 

the parliamentary majority to share power with the opposition if
the latter ceased to function as an Opposition. The consequence.
of the practice is the ultimate assimilation of the Opposition
into the government and the disappearance of active parliamentary
combat between the two or more meaningful choices.

The function of this "style" prior to World War I was to
limit access to the political activist subculture to a certain
number of groups -- the nobility, the industrialists, the pro-
fessionals, the civil service and the merchants. New groups
were allowed access to the political system only to the extent
that they agreed to play the game of politics according to the
rules prescribed by those elites which were already a part of the
activist subculture.

Although the system sharpened the political comoat and
encouraged the aspiring urban and rural lower classes to seek

refuge and support among the proliferating revolutionary and

protest movements, it played an important role in evolving a

Augustine Amaru

regularized method for integrating new groups into the politi-
cal system.

Because willingness to accept the norms of the political
activist subculture was a prerequisite for participation, the
Communist Party of Italy encountered many difficulties as inter—
national pressures immediately after the Bolshevik revolution
prevented it from being responsive to the nativist orientation
to political action. This study traces the Communist Party's
transformation from a party that initially failed miserably be-
cause it did not recognize the accepted norms of political
competition, to one which not only learned them but became a
master of them through its varied political activities under-
ground during the Fascist period and the war, and Openly after
World War II.

Analysis of historical data, party pronouncements and
evaluation of the writings of the leading figures of Italian
Communism, Antonio Gramsci and Palmiro Togliatti, were the

chief techniques that guided the research.

TRASFORMISMO AND THE

 

ITALIAN COMMUNIST PARTY

BY

Augustine Amaru

A THESIS

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Department of Political Science

1966

Chapter I

ampWrII

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

TABLE 9: CONTENTS

 

INTRODIICTIONO0.00.00.00.00.0.00.00.00.00000000001

ITALIAN MARXISM RETREATS FROM TRASFORMISMO.....1h

 

Introduction

A.

B.
C.

Italian Marxism's Role in the Breakdown
of Italian Constitutional Government

The Split of the Italian Marxist Movement
The Formation of the Communist Party of
Italy

TOGLIAITI LEADS ITALIAN COMMUNISM BACK TO THE
ITALIAN STYLE OF POLITICS......................SO

Introduction

A.
B.

C.

Italian Marxism Reaches its Low Point
Launching of the "Italian Road to
Socialism" -- the PCI Becomes a Truly
Mass Party

Italianization of an.Alien Ideology --
Gramsci and Togliatti: the Polycentrists

THE PCI OF THE FUTURE: CONTINUATION OF A
PaARADOXICAL ROLE?O000......OOOCOOOOOOCOOOOCOOOOOBI

C'IDNCLUSIONOOOOOOOOOOOOO0....O0.0.0.000000000000098

BIBLImR—APHYOOO00......OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO0.00.00.00.00000000109

 

CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION

The break-up of the Roman Empire signaled the beginning of
a long series of invasions of Italian territory that were to re-
shape the face of Italy. Centuries of political domination by Huns,
Vandals, Goths, Lombards, Franks, Normans, Saracens, and Germans
slowly influenced the evolution of a new civilization. By the
twelfth century, despite the patchdwork quilt of medieval feudalism
that had replaced Roman centralization, a new Italian nation was
in the making. At this point in the history of EurOpe, D'Azeglio's
comment to his Piedmontese king in 1870, "Sire, we have made Italy,
now we must make Italians,"1 might very well have been applied to
France, Britain and Spain as well, for there was as much raw material
necessary for the forging of a modern nation state in Italy as had
been present in those aforementioned countries. However Italy was
not destined to enjoy the luxury of several centuries of political
and economic unification to create a truly viable nationalism;
After the twelfth century, fresh invasions by the Germans, French
and Spanish were to freeze regional differences into six:more cen-

turies of local parochialism; hence national disunity. Thus, upon

 

1Hentze, Margot, Pro-Fascist Italy,CLondon3 G. Allen and
Unwin, 1.141., 1939), p. 11.

 

the leaders t
taneously th
ed many of t
of the twent
It we
that the no
deveIOped.
(this term I
far as the
modem Ital
Statism toc‘
E
the fall 01
Afiost‘mo U
ters of th
(heDce the
smell of '
of the Opp
tic“ "hie

tical Pact,

 

 

the leaders of the "Risorgimento fell the task of creating simul-
taneously the new Italy and Italians, a reality which has confront-
ed.many of the new countries of Asia and Africa in the second half
of the twentieth century.2

It was in this athSphere of nation-building after 1870

that the modern political style of trasformismo (transformism)

 

developed. The persistence of provincialism.or campanilismo

 

(this term aptly illustrates the local feeling that goes just as
far as the bell's sound) was as serious a handicap to building a
modern Italy after 1870, as tribalimm is an obstacle to modern
statism.today in large portions of the underdeveloped world.

Trasformismo, sometimes called Giolittismo, was born after

 

 

the fall of the "right" (the successors to Cavour) in 1876.
Agostino Depretis and Francesco Crispi were the earlier articula-
tors of this parliamentary device, later perfected by Giolitti

(hence the interchange of names). Trasformismo was an intricate

 

system of political accomodation which was used to change members
of the apposition into supporters of the dominant party. Prac-
tices which sustained the system.included favors, bribery, poli-
tical pacts, electoral corruption and violence at the polls.3
Contemporary partisans of stable liberal democracy as
found in Great Britain and the united States have reassessed ear-

lier evaluations of Giolittismo in the light of the so-called

 

“.—

2Maurice F. Neufeld, Italy: School for.Awakening Countries;
the Italian Labor Movement in itsCPoIItICal, Social andIEconomic
Setting, 1800 - 1960 (Ithaca: Cornell University, 1961), p. 119.

 

3Ibid., p. 3.

guided democr
Their verdict

 

fact implicai
goverment 31
champions an:
demise of co
dem critics
stitutes a l

Salve
exile and as
the Anglo-3a

W‘s-Fascist

 

 

guided democracies in modern Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

 

Their verdict seems to vindicate Giolitti to some extent and in
fact implicates his detractors, whether enemies of parliamentary
government such as Gaetano Mosca and Vilfredo Pareto, or its
champions such as Gaetano Salvemini, as major contributors to the
demise of constitutional government in Italy in 1922. These mo-
dern critics can see that in retrospect Italy in.many ways con-
stitutes a living model or laboratory for the developing nation.

Salvemini himself, in 1915, after almost two decades in
exile and as a direct result of observing and participating in
the Anglo-Saxon democracy which he so admired and felt lacking in
pro-Fascist Italy, wrote:

For while we Italian crusaders at-
tacked him Giolitti from the Left
accusing him of being- and he was ~-
a corruptor of Italian democracy in
the making, others assailed him from
the right because he was even too
democratic for their taste. Our
criticism thus did not help to direct
the evolution of Italian public life
toward less imperfect forms of demo-
cracy, but rather toward the victory
of those militarist, nationalist, and
reactionary groups who had found even
Giolitti's democracy too perfect.

Trasformismo represented a style peculiar to Italian poli-

 

tics. As we look back we can see that it was a necessary stage in
lthe evolution of representative government. The turn from this

essentially positivistic approach to the passionate, revolution-

h Arcangelo William Salomone, Italy in the Giolittian Era,_Italian
Democracy in the Making, 1900 - l9lh, (PhiladéIphIa: UniFeEEItyCST
Pennsylvania Press, 1960):_p. XIX.

 

 

O

(7

. a - -

cry, violent
the slow pro;
Gioli'

World War I ,
ist movement
of Italy. 'I
merging woz
l8 essential
democracy 51
lliLking when
created an .
gradual pro
Ntreat. s
eradicated
degree of 1
class Colle
Eridualism
the? ralppz.<
had held 81
It ;
democracy I
It is, he“

mmd ne‘

5\
Nellfeld, C

 

any, violent and irrational movements after World War I arrested
the slow progress of Italian politics toward liberal democracy.
Giolitti, in the years between 1903 and the beginning of
World War I, had been aware that the emergence of a large Social-
ist movement was an unavoidable phase in the industrialization
of Italy. Therefore, he saw the need for some concessions to the
emerging working class organization, both political and economic,
as essential to the stability of the Italian state. A liberal
democracy'supported by moderate socialists was actually in the
making when the Great War broke out. The war and its aftermath
created an environment within which those who had been opposed to
gradual progress were able to force the gradualists into swift
retreat. Social democracy‘s demise within the Socialist movement
eradicated the progress that Giolitti had made in procuring some
degree of legitimization of working class claims among his ruling
class colleagues. The increase in militancy and the diminution of
gradualism.within the Italian Socialist party discouraged any fur-
ther rapprochement with the liberal-Conservative combination that
had held sway over Italian politics since 1876.

It is not intended to pass Giolittismo off as liberal

 

democracy as it exists in the United States and Great Britain.

It is, however, a central theme of this paper, that Giolittismo

 

allowed "ever-expanding political democracy and liberty."5

 

sNeufeld, 92. 23-30, D. 201.

1‘

r-

This expansion of liberal democracy, slow as it was, did provide
a continuity of parliamentary government that could have served
as a firm foundation upon which the newly-enfranchised.worker
and peasant classes could settle into a system more truly repre-
sentative of the majority.

The eXperience of the more modern developing nation has
shown that if it survives the transitional phase immediately fol-
lowing independence of one party rule, without succumbing to to-
talitarianism, the possibility of democratic government is
greatly enhanced. Concessions of the dominant political groups
to ascendant political forces help to expand the appeal of the
dominant groups. As a result, the stability of the emerging na-
tion is not easily threatened by foreign and domestic crises.

In Italy the liberal-conservative coalition was unwilling
to grant even the slightest concessions. But on the other hand,

neither was the extreme sinistra willing to structure its demands

 

through the existing political system, because it remained aloof
for the most part from collaboration with any political elements
even remotely committed to the old order. Thus Giolitti's
balancing skills met with failure when the full force of the work-
ing class in numbers began to exert its influence on the politi-
cal scene. Both the old liberal-conservative combination and its

new Extrema Sinistra Opposition, failed to sense the possible

 

consequences of the political vacuum which they conspired to
create by'their unwillingness to compromise with each other. On

the other hand, Mussolini astutely sensed the significance of

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this vacuum.
the pre-Fasc
hastily re-c

trasfomism

 

but a neces
society in

Sign
the Marxist
Policies or
into its 01
the PCI (-3.
been dist:
th”more, '
tingllishab
Emir”, 1
to Italian
mtended t

The
PartiES Rm
elements a
laTriage t

of Gi°litt

 

this vacuum. His dictatorship was to teach the successors to
the pre-Fascist political groupings, who took their places in the
hastily re-organized parliamentary system after werld‘War II, that

trasformismo had been, by comparison, a mild form of repression

 

but a necessary one given the peculiar circumstances of Italian

society in the aftermath of the Risorgimento.

 

Significantly, the lesson of trasformismo was learned by

 

the Marxist parties in the post-Fascist era. Lack of clear-cut
policies and programs had been a major aspect of the earlier

trasformismo. ‘Willingness to incorporate the opposition's program

 

into its own was a cardinal rule of trasformismo. The appeals of

 

the PCI (Communist Party) and PSI (Socialist Party) have barely
been distinguishable for most of post World'War II's years. Fur-
thermore, both the PCI and the PSI have gradually become less dis-
tinguishable from the dominant Christian Democrat party'(DC).

However, it should be noted that the term.trasformismo, as applied

 

to Italian politics in the post-Fascist era in this study, is
intended to describe mainly ideological change and conversion.
There has been a cross-fertilization between the Marxist
partiesmnd the DC in that the latter has incorporated ideological
elements and prOgrams of the former. The PSI's more recent
marriage to the DC in the center-left government is reminiscent
of Giolittian tactics. The persistence of the highly centralized
system of local government continues to be an advantage to the

:modern day practitioners of trasformismo who have a hold on the

 

central administration.

 

The h
highly-centr
since unific
the patrioti
Piedmontese
to counterac
nation is o]

Impo
rest of Ita
Provinciali
weloomed, b
Olmers. Th
unification
location,6

The
amil-Histran
1mm; the
°°uraged t'r
Means 0f c:
was able tc
for the Org
Outside of

emplaxion ‘

The

\

$‘s p,

 

The historical relationship between trasformismo and the

 

highly-centralized unitary organization of Italian government
since unification bears some attention. Cavour had seized upon
the patriotic atmosphere of ardor for unification to stretch the
Piedmontese administration over the whole of Italy. The necessity
to counteract centuries of regional parochialism in an emerging
nation is obvious.

Imposition of Piedmont's centralized bureaucracy over the
rest of Italy between 1860 and 1870, although a threat to the
provincialism.of all members of a region, was accepted, and even
welcomed, by the landowners, businessmen and other large property
owners. These privileged groups took solace in the fact that
unification had been consummated with a minimum of social dis-
location.6

The major consequence of the exteneion of the Piedmontese
administration was the establishment of the prefect system, fol-
lowing the French example. This highly centralized system en-
couraged the use of patronage and favors by the government as a

means of control; it is through this system.that trasformismo

 

was able to flourish. Furthermore, the system.served as a model
for the organizations at other public and private institutions
outside of government, regardless of their political or economic
complexion.

The prefect became the agent of the central government in

the province (the equivalent of the department in France) of

 

6Ibid., p. 76.

(J

......
' llblk‘

which there 1.
two. The pm
local electi
prefect cool
he achieved
national f0}

YBmini info:

 

 

which there were sixty-nine at first; presently there are ninetyb
two. The prefect was used to control and shape the progress of
local elections by Giolitti and other transformers. 'What the
prefect could not accomplish by cajoling, bribery and promises,
he achieved through his control of the local police, which was a
national force responsible to the Minister of the Interior. Sal-
vemini informs us:

Under Giolitti's rule, the interference
of the prefects with local government
and elections reached unprecedented
heights of brutality. ‘Where the elec-
torate was refractory to pressure and
the elected mayors and town councillors
refused to bow, the prefect not only
dismissed them, but managed local and
national elections. If an election
had to be carried out, the police in
league with the government supporters,
enrolled the scum of the constituen-
cies and the underworld of the neigh-
boring districts. In the last weeks
before the polls, the opponents were
threatened, bludgeoned, besieged in
their homes. Their leaders were de-
barred from addressing meetings or
even thrown into p ison until elec-
tion day was over.

Management of elections by Giolitti was most rampant where
public opinion was almost lacking; this condition prevailed
mostly in the South. But Giolitti's solid block of deputies from
the half of the peninsula south of Rome, together with about half
of the northern deputies who were independently elected, gave
him a working majority. The remaining freelybelected northerners

initially remained in opposition, but the futility of Opposition

88810010116, 5120 9-1-20, pe XIX.

under the ci
came obvious
dependence f
The ;
the already
decreased.
petuated so:
ticularly b
has made it
of Giolitti

Giolittism

under the circumstances of an assured, "managed," majority soon be-
i.
came obvious to the hold-outs and they eventually traded their in-

dependence for political favors; in other words, were transformed.

 

The power of the prefect under Fascism was increased and
the already limited power of local elected government was further
decreased. The postdwar Christian Democratic government has per-
petuated some of these centralizing measures of the Fascists, par-
ticularly by retaining the expanded role of the prefect; this
has made it possible for the ruling party to employ a modification

of Giolitti's trasformismo. The major objectives of latter-day

 

Giolittism have been to:

l. Prevent the revolutionary left from
achieving power (as long as it remains
revolutionary).

2. Preserve the status of major tradi-
tional ruling groups such as the
landowners, the industrialists,
the Civil Service and the Church.

3. Permit the recruitment of new per-
sonnel for the deveIOping economy
without abrupt change or displace-
ment of traditional institutions.

h. Gradually satisfy demands for better
living conditions without precipi-
tous changes in the structure of
society.

5. Continue to control the central seat
of government in Rome through elec-
toral dominance in more backward rural
areas and in small communes (particu-
larly in the South, as in Giolitti's
C880).

6. Restrict the influence of the revo-
lutionary-left in those local areas
where it is dominant through control
of the central seat of government.

To be
than in pre'
1y used. T‘;
parties, wi
communities
edly "deliv

lowingtos

 

10

To be sure, the power of the prefect today, although greater
than in pre-Fascist days, is more subtly though just as effective-
ly used. The extension of suffrage and the expansion of mass
parties, with a consequent creation of party'bureaucracy in most
communities, has made it impossible for the prefect to singlehand-
edly "deliver" the election. However, Norman Kogan has the fol-
lowing to say about the prefect:

The prefect still plays a role in the
elections . . . working out campaign
strategy with local progovernment lea-
ders and ecclesiastics, raising whatever
influence he has to make a favorable in-
pression on the local voters. Again,
this influence is most effective in rup
ral areas where the shrewd allocation of
public works can change voting patterns.
Close relations between the prefects and
the state agencies purveying publis
works is the logical consequence.

As the Christian Democrats have been the chief beneficiaries

of the new trasformismo, so have the Communists thus far been the

 

chief victims. The PCI has not been unmindful of the reality of
the Italian style. The quarantine that has prevented the party
from.participating in the central government has caused it to
gradually moderate its position. The PCI's electoral captivity‘
of local governments in centers such as Bologna and Modena in
central Italy, has not allowed it to create a red belt splitting
Italy in two. The legal relationship between the central and lo-

cal government, again, is crucial. Corruption, scandal, ineffi-

 

1oNorman Kogan, The Government of Italy, (New York: Thomas Y.
Crowell, 1962), p. 159.

 

ciency and 1
areas where

The j
tiny and di
functions ‘0
these super

exercised t

The
the abOVe
Ject to re
Partisan o
applying h

t“ left,“

ll

ciency and embezzlement of public funds are virtually unknown in
areas where the Communists control local government.

The provinces and communes are subject to immediate scru-
tiny and direction by national government not only in regard to
functions but also in the all-important area of finances. Most of
these supervisory prerogatives of the national government are
exercised through the prefect whose duties include:

1. Responsibility for maintaining law
and order in the province.

2. The power to veto any act of a pro-
vincial or communal government.

3. The power to suspend local govern-
ment personnel, from hired employees
to elected officials.

b. The power to dissolve communal or
provincial councils, or local
government agencies, and to appoint
prefectoral commissioners in place of
a dissolved body.

5. The power to approve the creation of
any ad hoc agency between two or more
locaI'givernments for limited pur-
poses.

The prefect has quite a bit of discretion in exercising
the above powers. Moreover, he is a political appointee, sub-
ject to removal at will by his superiors in Rome. Thus he is a
partisan official and is apt to be much more conscientious in
applying his controls against communes and provinces in which
the leftawing parties are in control and quite relaxed in exer-
cising authority against local governments that are dominated
by Christian Democratic alliance parties and rightdwing par-

ties.12

k

lb!bid., p. 155-156.

12!EI3., p. 156.

The w!
of the local
has been ins
nents of the
own movement
itself as a:
the same Haj
have been t]
formation.
Eanizationa'.
the opening
transfomat
abandonment
affiliation
the Christi
latity to t
tical style

How
at a tfine 1
Ghee, hilt 1
H6301- Q'dest

Quent aw

are

12

The weight that the central government holds over the head
of the local Communist governments through use of the prefects
has been instrumental in the party's incorporation of major ele-
ments of the majority coalition's doctrine and practice into its
own movement. In this manner, the PCI has been able to perpetuate
itself as an independent political organization. Yet, in much
the same way that the Social Democrats (PSDI) and later the PSI
have been transformed, the PCI is in the same process of trans-

formation. This process differs from Giolittismo in that the or-

 

ganizational lines of the transformed parties remain. However,
the Opening to the left has demonstrated that more than doctrinal

transformation has occurred in contemporary trasformismo. The

 

abandonment of the PCI by prominent Communists and subsequent
affiliation with the PSI after Nenni contracted his alliance with
the Christian Democrats, suggests that more than a passing simi-
larity to the 19th century and early 20th century Italian poli-
tical style exists.

How the Marxist movement in Italy failed to be transformed
at a time that this was most crucial, not only to its own exist-
ence, but to the very existence of parliamentary government, is a
major question that this study will endeavor to answer. Subse-
quent awareness by the PCI of the realities of Italian politics
led to important changes in doctrine and practice. These changes
are an important preoccupation of this study. Finally, the di-
lemma that confronts the Communist party of the future is analy-

zed. Can the party be transformed even further without erasing

the lines bet
the PSI and P:
temporary §i_o_
government.
political ale
a vain attemp
ed rather tha
that p
a party of pr
“98113 by whic
extricate it:
played throug
‘0! the PCI 1

"Welling to 1

13

the lines between it and other political parties in Italy, such as
the PSI and PSDI, which appear to have struck a bargain with con-

temporary Giolittismo, as the price for participation in the

 

government. Is the PCI position comparable to that of the northern

political elements during the Giolitti era, which, having made

a vain attempt to play an independent role, chose to be transform-

ed rather than be relegated to a status of permanent opposition?
‘What prospects are there for the party to become more than

a party of protest? Is a modern brand of trasformismo the only

 

means by which this large mass movement (the PCI) can hOpe to
extricate itself from the role of permanent apposition it has
played throughout its whole history. Is it possible and desirable
for the PCI to go the way of the Nenni Socialists in a future

"opening to the left"?

ITALI
A. Italian M
stitution
Italia
had begun to
principle of
mouah the 1
role in the S
W °Ppositi
initiated E
Parad<
tional “11111;
can: a pa,
Working Clas;
Swat-me“.
WOrld
than! arms.
liamentary p:
rection of m
ideology bee;
Socialist lea

en the "lone

CHAPTER II

ITALIAN MARXISM RETREATS FROM TRASFORMISMO

 

A. Italian Marxismfis Role in the Breakdown of Italian Con-
stitutional Government

Italian Marxism in the last decade of the 19th century
had begun to evolve as a force only partially dedicated to the
principle of violent revolution. The Socialist party, mainly
through the influence of Filippo Turati, began to play a leading
role in the extrema sinistra, which was the first evidence of any
true opposition in Italian parliamentary politics since Depretis

initiated trasformismo in 1876.

 

Paradoxically, the p51 was learning the Italian style of

trasformismo even while it was building apposition to the tradi-

 

tional ruling forces in Italian society. It was successfully be-
coming a party of Opposition through its ability to articulate
working class interests within the framework of parliamentary
government.

‘World'War I and the Bolshevik revolution retarded and even-
tually arrested assimilation of the Socialists into Italian par-
liamentary politics. Transfonmation of PSI ideology in the di-
rection of reformism.diminished and a more militant revolutionary
ideology became more prominent. However the vast majority of the
Socialist leaders had ceased to be revolutionary activists; thus

when the moment for revolution was ripest, they decided to take ad-
1h

vantage of :
exposed the
Fascists to

vellasar

The .
hesive nati
Italian rep
331.; in 15
°f Parliame
Plies, this
version of
imminent
aSSimilatio
manta” gro

Unde
did not hav
“Ascent p01
Parlimnta
actifist Bu
eh“ whose
Master of t:
lianent 8t 4

titioner Of

_fl__-'
_.A__—-v—-—~— '—'q—'

 

 

 

 

15

vantage of it. Unwillingness to act in a revolutionary situation
exposed the basic weakness of the PSI. Said exposure enabled the
Fascists to eliminate the Marxists as a parliamentary threat as

well as a revolutionary one.

The late arrival of Italy into a community of large, co-
hesive nation states had dire consequences for the prospects of
Italian representative government. Termination of the Risorgi—
32222 in 1870 was followed by the evolution of a peculiar variety

of parliamentary government known as trasformismo. As the term im-

 

plies, this political technique involved transformation or cone
version of an Opposition party to the support of the majority or
government party. Conversion was almost always followed by total
assimilation of the minority opposition into the majority'parlia-
mentary group. ‘
under these conditions, a tradition of organized opposition
did not have an opportunity to become incorporated as part of a
nascent political culture in newlybunited Italy. The patterns of
parliamentary dictatorship restricted access to the political
activist subculture to those who accepted the norms of the small

elite whose power rested on a very narrow basis of support. The

master of trasformismo, who led the government group in the par-

 

liamentaat any given time, was more often than not an astute~prae~
titioner of a delicate art that required balancing of the com-
peting hierarchical forces that comprised the only politically
active segment of the total population. At the same time, this

arbitrator of elites was exhorted to keep mobility of the still-un-

’Y

enfranchised
minim.
Thus
“representai
who represe1
in continui'
existed in
longer able
was toppled
trusted wit
Vilege and
the Job of
situation 1
{hide
tical stage
I"3“3nta1‘enct
had the eff
Openings sc
Italian 80c

Centuries o

16

enfranchised masses, into the arena of political activity, to a
minimum.

Thus it can be seen that politics in the new Italy was
"representative" to the extent that the participants were those
who represented a mere fraction Of the population, with a stake
in continuing the essentially inequitable social structure which.
.existed. if? pre-unification days. ‘When a "combinazione" was no
longer able to successfully satisfy the needs Of the elites, it

was toppled from power and a new master Of "trasformismo was ens»

 

trusted with the responsibility Of guarding the bastions Of pri-
vilege and traditionalism. The new transformer would continue
the job Of making deals in order tO re-stabilize the political
situation in favor Of the traditional hierarchical forms.

Uhder these conditions, a leader could dominate the poli-
tical stage for periods Of ten years or more. Such periodic
re-entrenchment Of the dominant traditional-hierarchical forces
had the effect Of maintaining the size, however small, Of the
Openings so painfully chinked in the armor Of traditional
Italian social structure by the liberalizing currents Of the gig
sorgimento (as manifest by Cavour, Mazzini, Garibaldo and otheraL
Centuries Of political alienation were followed by decades after
1870 during which the bulk Of the population, unable tO widen the
Openings made by the heroes Of the reunification, remained so-
cially isolated from the political institutions Of the new Ital-
ian state.

It is not surprising, therefore, that basic advantages

ffi

in Italian
evolved af1
emergence,
protest, wi'
giance to 1
jest became
Up in a det
giance for
for help t1
transfomm
chists com;
political 1
Church renc
1'13 sanctic
test, the 1
triots inje
are“ of ac

The
"8 family
Who aspire:
Rent instit
were those

he, French

something s

H
‘3“
a.

17

in Italian society were perpetuated by the political system that
evolved after 1870, and that Italy was fertile ground for the
emergence, growth, and success Of mass movements or parties Of
protest, with a strong ideological orientation. Rather than alle-
giance tO the state as citizen, compliance with the state as sub-
ject became the rule.13 The urban working man, unavoidably caught
up in a developing industrial society, reserved his life's alle-
giance for a revolutionary labor movement and transmitted his cries
for help through revolutionary parties that called for a radical
transformation Of society. Thus Marxists, Syndhcalists, and Anar-
chists competed for the loyalty Of the working class in both the
political and economic arenas. Somewhat belatedly, the Catholic
Church renounced its own voluntary isolation from Italian politics
and sanctioned the formation of another political movement Of pro-
test, the POpular Party. Finally, ultra-nationalists and super-pa-
triots injected still another fundamentalist protest group into .the
arena Of active politics; this took the form Of Fascism.

The peasant, particularly in the South, remained loyal to
1113 family and commune. Political activists Of whatever stripe,
echo aspired tO places Of prestige and power in the formal govern-
Inent institutions, were viewed as foreign and extraneous, just as
twere those who preceded them, whether Greek, Roman, Germanic, Ara-
taic, French,.Austrian, Spanish or Piedmontese. The government was

ssomething strange, remote, which periodically came, only tO take,

‘

13Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verbs, The Civic Culture: Political
fittitudes and Democracy in Five NatiOns, (Boston: Little, Brown

and—Cmpany, 1965f, p. 309313.

exploit and
“foreigners"
ministered t
Ital}
already exi:
and their 11
Emlment I
"great war"
giance lay .
brunt of th
Slightest e
1! war which
The
served to d
‘ Spires} to a
0‘43 terrai;
Petx‘eat, at
to”: undel
Iworker‘Pea:
“hie“ 8r:

thus furthe

18

exploit and legitimize the depredations of closer, more familiar
"foreigners" such as the land-owning nobility, and those who ad-
ministered their patrimony.

Italy's involvement in World War I widened the cleavage that
already existed between the great majority of the Italian people
and their leaders. The socially advantaged who controlled the
government alone, actively supported Italy's entrance into the
"great war" in 1915. However, it was the majority whose alle-
giance lay elsewhere than with the government who had to bear the
brunt of the war effort. The masses who had been granted only the
slightest economic and social concessions were called upon to fight
a war which had very little significance for them.

The nature of the fighting on the Italian front hardly
served to draw together rulers and masses that history had so con-
spired to separate. Morale of the troops in the rugged, mountain-
ous terrain between Italy and Austria then was quite low. The
retreat at Caporetto, one of the great military disasters of his-
tory, underscored the lack of common cause between the Italian
workerepeasant, now foot-soldier, and his government's efforts to
achieve greatness by participation in the war. Mass desertions
thus further complicated an already inept and mismanaged adminis-
tration of the war. Miraculously, with some help from the French
front, the Italians were able to stem.the advance of the Austro-
Hungarian armies for the duration of the war.

The damage that Caporetto had done to Italian morale and
the cause of national consciousness and unity was minor com-

pared to the Italian frustrations at the Versailles Conference.

Tbe hmiliat
injected a 1
cerbated di:
consequence:
1919 and 1?
them

The
nificant nc
ultra-natic
Parliament:
tablisbmen‘
disenfranc'
larged. T
ti“ (Part
“at! of
the Dal'nat
tP-ntoug ir

QTiCan .-

19

The humiliation of the Orlando government at the conference table
injected a further feeling of disenchantment with the war and exa-
cerbated disillusionment with the established order. Caporetto's
consequences were to reverberate in Italian society throughout
1919 and 1920 in the revolutionary movements that occurred at that
time.1h

The concept of the "lost" or "mutilated" victory is sig-
nificant not only because it later became a rallying point for
ultra-nationalists and Fascists in the swiftening breakdown of
parliamentary government, but also because it prevented the es—
tablishment of effective government now that Openings into the long
disenfranchised lower socio-economic strata had finally been en-
larged. The rebuttal of the SonninO-Orlando negotiating combinae
tion (particularly the Big Threels refusal to honor the secret
treaty of London of 1915, which had dangled before Italy's eyes
the Dalmatian coast as well as Trentino and Trieste), proved por-
tentous in the revolutionary atmosphere of 1919-1920.15 Anglo-Amp
erican -- French roughshod treatment of Italian national aspira-
tions served as fodder for the Marxian dictum that the capitalists
eventually devour each other in internecine warfare. Also, the
abject helplessness of Italy in the face of such treatment at the
hands of her allies gave confidence to and encouraged the mass

movement” in Italy, the leaders of which were now Convinced of the

 

lbw. Hilton Young, The Italian Left: A Short History of Political
Socialism in Italy, (Eondon: Longmans,_Green and’Company, l9h9);

8h.
Rslbid., p. 85.

 

 

basic bankn
Capo:
socialist n
ber Revolut
Socialist 1
horted the
capitalist
as this fav
demic econo
the Marxist
Priate occa
Beta
power in 19
"eating in
that approx
1919 Has th
able to m
that electi
emer‘Eed as
out or appr

late‘al‘rifi

inn—pawnmh t .r Wfi .

 

 

20

basic bankruptcy and weakness of the traditional ruling groups.

Caporetto had been the first real Opportunity for a
socialist revolution in Italy, coinciding as it did with the Octo-
ber Revolution in Russia. At the time of the great retreat, some
Socialist leaders in Italy, following the example of Lenin, ex-
horted the Italian infantryman to turn his rifle against his
capitalist exploiters. The revolution in Italy didn't materialize,
as this favorable Opportunity slipped by. Partly because of en-
demic economic crises, resulting in unemployment and inflation,
the Marxist leadership was to be furnished with another appro-
priate occasion to implement the revolution.

Between the armistice of 1919 and the Fascist seizurec of
power in 1922, Italian politics were in a constant state of flux,
creating instability. For the first time, Italy had an electorate
that approximated universal manhood suffrage. The election of
1919 was the first election in which the workers and peasants were
able to make their true force in numbers felt at the polls. In
that election, the Socialist party (which was still a united party)
emerged as the most powerful party in Italy, capturing 157 seats
out of approximately 500. The second most powerful party was the
late-arriving Partito Populare (a brand of Catholic socialism
which today survives in the extreme leftdwing of the Christian

Democratic Party), which won 100 seats.16 The Socialist and popu-

lar parties together controlled just a little bit better than half

 

iéH. Stuart Hughes, The United States and Italy, (Cambridge;
Massachusetts: HarvardiUniversity Press, 1956), p.6h.

 

 

of the seat
parties; tc
eleotorate‘
bright. 'n':
coalition 1
disagreemei
words, the
Another pr.

*0 agree a

of coaliti

fierce ant
cmment
eluded any
fox-tel?
It
which had
had not. de
“Pt of vi
1919: 8h0r
”t defini
°f 311333;.

r$33011; to

21

of the seats in the Chamber of Deputies. They were both truly mass
parties; together they represented a majority of the Italian
electorate. The prospects for true parliamentary democracy seemed
bright. What prevented the emergence of an articulate and unified
coalition representative of the working man? One problem lay in
disagreements that rent the Marxist movement in Italy. In other
words, the Socialists did not function as a cohesive unit.

Another problem was that the Socialists, even had they been able

. to agree among themselves, would have considered the possibility

of coalition with the POpulari out of the question. Not only the
fierce anti-clericalism of the Socialists, but also Socialist
commitment to revolution as an instrument of social change, ex-
cluded any attempt to use parliamentary techniques for social re-
forms.17

It is significant that until the electoral refonm of 1919
which had created a mass electorate, the Socialist party of Italy
had not decisively incorporated in its official program, the con-
cept of violent revolution. At the Bologna Conference of October,
1919, shortly before the parliamentary elections, the party came
out definitely in favor of violent revolution based on the model
of Russia. The new declaration stated "The Proletariat must
resort to use of violence to defend itself against bourgeois

violence, to conquer power, and to consolidate revolutionary con-

 

17G. D. H. Cole, Socialist Thought: Communism and Social Demo-

crac%, 19lh-1931,“PartI., (London: Macmillan andwCOmpany,
9 s P0 3720 V

 

quests.“-8
The E
old "Program
the Congress
revolution 1:
allow partic
done in orde
order to car
principles a
The c
chiefly res};
tion, person
with much pr
little among
"ml maliti
Plehly enfr
a“ support
°°ndition3 r
tion in 1892
On the other
from the Vie
succeSSful,
Vas “bivalel

when the “105'

 

.._.._..._“_

 

 

 

22

quests."18

The Bologna Congress represented a major revision of the
old "Program of the Socialist Party," promulgated in 1892. But
the Congress was not as brash as its new committment to violent
revolution might suggest, for the declaration was qualified to
allow participation of the party in the upcoming election; this was
done in order to utilize "the organs of the bourgeois state in
order to carry out the most intensive prepaganda for Communist
principles and to effect the overthrow of bourgeois domination."19

The old reformist Socialist Fillips Turati, who had been
chiefly responsible for the revisionary tone of the 1892 declara-
tion, personified the professional parliamentary Socialist reformer
‘with much prestige and pOpularity among the professionals, but
little among the masses. But, was Turati any more out of step
with realities in 1892 when the working ClaSS‘VaIS far from camp
pletely enfranchised than the Socialist party of 1919, which had
the support of an enfranchised working class, but also social
conditions ripe for revolution? The point is that Turati's posi-
tion in 1892 was impractical from the viewpoint of gaining votes;
on the other hand, the party's stand in 1919 was impractical both
from the viewpoint of gaining votes and from that of undertaking a
successful, violent revolution. Thus the party's position in 1919
was ambivalent, indecisive, contradictory and wavering at a time

when the most steadfast policy was demanded, be it violent or

 

13Ibid.
19IBIH

electoral.

T‘ni
Socialist
volutionai
also beta]
were ascr:
whose sup;

Th1
convinced
in matte;
resist re'
served as

strategy

 

 

 

23

electoral.

This ambivalence proved to be permanently damaging to the
Socialist movement, not only because it forestalled decisive re-
volutionary action at the critical moment when it was needed, but
also because, by advocating violent revolution, the Socialists
were ascribing their electoral appeal to the working classes alone,
whose support they were assured in any event.

The dominant faction of the Socialist party in 1919 was not
convinced that the movement would prevail at the time, at any rate,
in slattempt to challenge the power of the bourgeois state to
resist revolution. Needless to say, the events in Russia in 1917
served as an impetus for the reorientation of Socialist party
strategy in Italy. However, as G. D. H. Cole points out:

There was, of course, no real analogy
between the conditions which had existed
in Russia up to 1917 and those which
existed in Italy in 19193 for in Italy
the bourgeois revolution, or at any rate,
the bourgeois system of government, for
which the Russians had to fight in 1917,
was already in being . . . 0

An evaluation of the development of the Marxist movement in
Italy must take into account the different conditions that existed
there vis-a-vis the Russian situation. The events in Russia in
1917 conferred on the Socialist party in Italy an urgency which
had not been characteristic of the majority point of view in the
movement since 1892. G. D. H. Cole says:

Nevertheless, the spell cast by the events
events in Russia was so strong that it seemed

 

zolbide, p0 3370

To the
that existed
parison to Ru
ists to win 5
the possible
Italy). The
POpulari Part
Nd soon enox
8L1ppm-t that
”er - t‘r
head“! with
agricultural
1°aical ecom

From 1
which is an 1
a particular
Socialist Pa]
Closely the l

than did the

2h

necessary to follow out the same broad course
in Italy; and this strategy fitted in with the
unreadiness of the Italian Socialists to pro-
ceed at once to attempt a complete proletarian
revolution.21

To the (essentially) higher level of political development
that existed in the form of the Italian bourgeois state in comp
pariSOn to Russia, must be added inability of the Italian Social-
ists to win support of any consequence in the countryside (with
the possible exception of Emilia, Tuscany and Umbria in central
Italy). The late arrival of Don Luigi Sturzo and his Catholic
Populari Party on the Italian political scene apparently occur-
red soon enough to deprive the Socialists of a source of mass
support that was essential in a still-predominantly agricultural
country - the peasantry. The Socialists had never made much
headway with a program of social reform in a baSically traditional
agricultural papulation unassimilated into an emerging_techno-
logical economy.

From the point of view of a high level of participation
which is an important criterion in measuring the effectiveness of
a particular government, the behavior of the members of the
Socialist Party in the period under discussion approximated.more
closely the behavior of voters in our own country as participants,

than did the peasants in their support for the Populari Party. In

discussing the behavior of contemporary Communists in Italy,

 

21Ibid.,

Almond and '

Almc

1 later era
°f Politics
0f the no:
“31‘ I era.
Peasants “'2
Very aetivq
parochial8

As 1
Cease being

‘0 Dover, g
”eminent
Vhich the l
Speaks for

Marxist, m 01

25

Almond and Verba state:
Italian Communists, by our definition, may be
viewed as participants: they are aware of and
involved in politics, and they have an active
sense of their own political competence -- de-
spite the fact that they would cease being par-
ticipants in the same sense if their party
came into power. This is also true of the
supporters of the Fascist right, insofar as
they take an active part in public affairs. It
is paradoxical that the majority of politically
involved and informed Italians are opposed to
the contemporary constitutional and democratic
regime and that the bulk of the support for this
regime comes from Italians who are oriented as
subjects or as parochials.22

Almond and Verba's observation is based on data drawn from
a later era; what is important for our purposes is the high level
of political participation found among members of a major segment
of the Italian Socialist movement of the early part of the werld
War I era. Also, it is easily substantiated that the bulk of the
peasants who supported the Popular Party of 1919 - 1922 were not
very active participants, and were oriented either as subjects or
parochials or both.23

As for Almond and Verba's view that the Communists would
cease being active participants in the same sense if they came in-
to power, Socialist insistence on participation in the bourgeois
government (at least of a majority in 1919 - 1920, a period in
which the prospects for successful revolution were very high)
speaks for itself. The importance of all this is that the Italian

Marxist movement which was on record from 1892 on as favoring a

 

22A1mond and Verbs, 32. 313., p. 310.
231bid., p. 309-310.

more refornis
as after the
tion, but, wl
never took t]
The process I
had split of
mill). Agai
revolutionar
SOVEMnent.

The r
Soviet state
the Italian
role in arm
emibited d1
1933?: part .
89018 state

became Togl
taken.

But

26

more reformist approach to Socialism, officially changed its dog-
ma after the Bolshevik Revolution in favor of violent revolu-
tion, but, when confronted with several golden opportunities
never took the essential crucial step to implement this dogma.
The process continued after‘World'War II when the Communists who
had split off at Leghorn in 1921 became the dominant Marxist
group. Again there is contradiction between professions of a
revolutionary nature and exhortations to participate in the
government.

The requirements of the Soviet Communist Party and the
Soviet State were very decisive in aggravating the conflict within
the Italian Marxist»movement, but more important was the C. P. S.U.'s
role in arresting the development of a Marxist movement that had
exhibited definite tendencies in the direction of acceptance of at
least part of the institutional framework of the evolving bour-
geois state in Italy. It was in 1919 - 1920 that what later
became Togliatti's "Italian road to socialism," should have been

taken. But it was the road not taken, as will be indicated.

B. The Split of the Italian Marxist Movement

The period between the armistice of 1919 and the Fascist
seizure of power in 1922 was a very complicated one, politically.
Italy, as we have seen, was embarking upon a new era. Complete
enfranchisement of her'masses seemed to point to the prospects of
an extensive program of social reform. However, the war, the
Russian revolution, the "mutilated victory" and consequent social
and economic problems had created an atmosphere of general in-
stability.

In this atmosphere occurred the "sit-down" strikes of
September, 1920, which represented the high point of revolution-
ary energy in Italy after World War I. These strikes eventually
grew into the more radical and revolutionary "occupation of the
factories." An atmosphere of semi-anarchy prevailed. The wor-
kers ran wild, committed acts of violence at will and were not
imprisoned for them. Violence had become the order of the day.
Confronted with an atmosphere of mob rule, the government felt
helpless to stop the workers.2h

Giolitti, one of the old trasformismo, had returned of-

 

ficially to active politics in June of 1920, when in this period
of crises, he assumed the office of Prime Minister. The more

established elements in Italian society hOped that Giolitti would

 

‘Efiaene Albrecht-Carrie, Italy from Napoleon to Mussolini, (New
'York: Columbia University Press,gl950), p:—1hI. .

27

28

perform one of his old balancing acts, thus bringing order and
stability out of confusion and instability.25

Instead of suppressing the sit down strikes, Giolitti
looked the other way when the workers began occupying the fac-
tories at will. This tactic proved to be the true measure of the
Socialist's revolutionary fervor. Suppression by the government
may have been the necessary spark for a working class movement
that was not too certain what course to take. An unquestionably
revolutionary movement would have considered the helplessness of
the government and the factory owners sufficient reason to light
the tinder box. Apparent acquiesence on the part of Giolitti,
who personified the forces of privilege and reaction, would hardly
appear to be sufficient assurance, to a revolutionary movement,
that its goal had been accomplished. That Giolitti's inaction
took the sting out of the workers' seizure of the factories
merely serves to indicate that the so-called revolutionary van-
guard, the Socialist Party, was not very revolutionary at all.
The "sit-downs" were initiated by the workers themselves. Suc-
cess of the action was dependent upon direction from the Social-
ist leadership. Any delay in the imposition of the direction
from above would work to the advantage of Giolitti and the pro-
jperty owners, who were confident that the workers would discredit
'themselves by their inability to manage the factories.

The confusion and the inability on the part of the Social-
:ists to provide leadership for the workers in the 1920 crisis,

‘mere to crystallize the lack of unity that had always been endemic

 

5SHughes, 92. g_i_t_.., p. 61;.

29

in the Socialist leadership. As a result of the debacle of 1920,
permanent division of the Socialists into three major groups oc-
curred. These groups were: Revisionist (Social Democratic -
PSDI); Maximilist or revolutionary (Socialist - PSI) 3 and Com-
munist (PCI). This division, which took place at the Congress of
Leghorn in 1921, has persisted to this day.

In short, the marriage of parliamentary and revolutionary
tactics proved a failure for the Socialists. Simultaneously, the
ruling classes were given an accurate estimate not only of the
lack of a unified revolutionary spirit and ideology among Social-
ists, but also of a basic lack of organizational cohesiveness.

The announcement by Lenin of the famous "TwentybOne Pointe," which
defined the qualifications that a party must satisfy in order to
take part in the Third International, dealt the final death blow
to any semblance of organizational unity among Italian Socialists.
The TwentybOne POints augmented Socialist problems because they
were published at the very time that the "sit-down" strike was in
progress. The inopportune timing of the TwentybOne Points for
Italian political conditions is discussed by G. D. H. Cole:

At the very moment when the Socialists and the

Trade Unions were shrinking back from actual re-

volution, the Bolsheviks delivered to the Socialist

Party the bombshell of the TwentybOne POints' agreed

to at its second congress. The Moscow ultimatum.. .

was published in Avanti on September 21, 1920, ac-

companied by an editorial strongly criticising

its terms and saying that whoever had drafted them

could have known, singularly little about Italy

or its Socialists. The issue that counted for

most in the reception of the 'Twenty-One Points'

arose, not out of the policy of the Socialist

Party but out of the specific demand that it

should expel the leaders of its right wing, inclu-
ding the deeply respected Turati, its outstanding

30

international figure. . . To expel him and his
fellow reformists would mean a split that would
by no means stop short at the eviction of the
reformist wing. It would involve, at the least,
a considerable pr0portion of the Socialist depu-
ties, and a large part of the Trade Union fol-
lowing of the Party, and would divide the whole
working class movement at a moment when, in the
face of developing aggression of the Fascists, it
seemed more necessary than ever to close the

ranks.2
Immediately after being confronted with the TwentyeOne Points,
the Socialist Party Directing Committee met and voted seven to five
in favor of accepting them. This action did not reflect-the feel-
ing of the majority of the party, which did not meet in a body
until January of 1921, at Leghorn, at which time the party was
primarily preoccupied with drafting a response to Moscow in full
Congress. The Leghorn Congress became, as we have already seen,
the symbol of affirmation of the Socialist Party split. The oc-
currence of the Fascist rise to power, confronted with only a
weak and disunited Opposition, is again underscored by the fact that
the Congress was called at a time when unity was of the essence.27
While the Socialists debated compliance or noncompliance,
the Fascists were carrying on a systematic campaign of violence
and destruction which was to reduce the Socialist Party and the
Trade Union.movement to mere shadows of their past strength. Cole
recounts:
Thereafter, the debate within the party took
place to the accompaniment of a series of vio-

lent clashes with the Fascist black shirts, who
in one town after another, set to work to raid

 

260019, 9-2. 9-23., p. 6b.
27Hilton-Young, $0 2-1-20, p. 381'.

.‘.
u

9
1
-
y
C

L“!

31

and destroy Socialist Trade Union and coopera-
tive buildings and equipment, to beat up working
class militants, or dose them with castor oil,
and to commit all these outrages practically
without interference from the police and often
with their connivance.28
What evidence is there to substantiate the hypothesis that
Soviet Communist interests superseded domestic Italian Socialist
interests? Can it be said that Moscow, which had the most to
lose by Fascism's accession to power, did, by its Comintern de-
mands, render the major impediment to Fascist power (i. e. the
Socialist Party) helpless? And further, were the Turin Com-
‘ munists, particularly Gramsci and Togliatti, and Bordiga, the
abstentionist who became major spokesman of the Comintern in
Italy after the Leghorn schism, ever in a position to push the
Italian working class over the brink into violent revolution?
To be sure, the Italian Federation of Metal Workers
(F. I. O. M.) constituted the hard core of a definite minority
trade union settlement in favor of revolution. Gramsci and
Togliatti had built up quite a following among the metal workers
of Turin. But the General Confederation of Labor (C. G. L.),
the largest and most powerful labor organization with which the
F. I. 0. M. was affiliated, was more moderate than the majority
of Socialists, although more radical than the parliamentary .
£Socialist party. The Socialist left wing of which Gramschi and
'rogliatti were a part, and the F. I. O. M. were fairly much in

agreement that the proper course should be revolution. However,

 

280019, 22. 9120, p. 3820

32

the majority of the C. G. I. and of the parliamentary Socialist
Party, mostly followers of Turati, were not in agreement as to
‘what non-revolutionary course to take.29

The C. G. L. program called for a major reorganization of
the Italian state, which included demands for a republic, aboli-
tion of the Senate, prOportional representation, full control of
foreign policy in the Chamber of Deputies, abolition of the poli-
tical police, the introduction of certain Swiss-type direct demo-
cracy popular initiative and referendum measures, and the convo-
cation of a Constituent Assembly which would revise the tradi—
tional conceptions of property and introduce land reform. The
C. G. L. never explicitly defined how the Constituent Assembly
should be elected, what its composition should be, or how it
would implement the prOposed reforms. The majority of the re-
formist Socialists, being advocates of pragmatic parliamentary
politics, therefore were highly skepital of a plan that appeared
to them nothing more than an idealistic general statement of
philosophy rather than a practical, realistic and feasible pro-
gram of action.30

Although, as has been indicated, the C. G. L. was to the
left of the parliamentary Socialist group, in a sense it was to
the right of the official position taken by the Socialist party
as a whole at the Bologna Congress (which came out in favor of
‘the revolution). A major reason for this was the manner in

'which it was organized. Rather than a closely-knit national

 

Enid” Pa 37110
30513., p. 3713-3750

33 ‘

federation of large industryawide units with strong control at
the center (the F. I. O. M. was an important exception), control
remained for the most part in local Chambers of Labor which united
workers in various crafts and industries in a specific local com-
munity. Power in the C. G. L. then was quite dispersed, which
has hardly been a characteristic of trade unions organized in the
"Leninesque" tradition.31

In addition to its organization, another aspect of the
C. G. L. which was not apt to lend itself to revolutionary brinks-
manship was its main emphasis on strikes as a mechanism for im-
proving workers' conditions; and on demands for reform legisla-
tion and government fiscal policy to ensure prices beneficial to
labor. Conversely, an important revolutionary prong in the
C. G. L. was its call for worker participation in the management
of industry, a basically syndicalist strain in this essentially
Marxist workers' organization.32 It was this exposure of the
C. G. L. that proved to be particularly vulnerable to Fascist
assaults on the labor movement, armed as the Fascists were with
a labor doctrine that included strong strains of syndicalimm that
had earlier been incorporated as part of D'Annunzio's romantic
nationalist movement. .

This was the prevailing attitude of the C. G. L. that the
Trurin Communists had to contend with if they were ever to wield
‘the Italian movement as an effective instrument of revolution.

131d they succeed? If we jump ahead at this point to the conse-

 

31Ib1d., p. 375.
32m.’ PO 375.

3h

quences of the Socialist split at Leghorn on the trade union move-
ment, we find that less than one-third of the C. G. L. seceded

to Communism (h33,000 out of 1,h36,000).33 Hardly a large

enough percentage when we take into account that Marxist influence
among the peasants was almost nonexistent. Such a lack of support
would have been compensated for at least partially by the support
of a unified labor movement. At any rate, the Communists lacked
this control. Apparently Moscow was prepared to sacrifice two-
thirds.of the trade union movement and almost that same percent-
age of the Socialist Party in order to get an unquestionably loyal
revolutionary party.

Leon Trotsky, in a speech before the Third Congress of the
Communist International on June 29, 1921, illustrated the sensi-
tivity of the Bolshevik leadership to charges that the Comintern
was simply an instrument of Soviet national policy.

. . . Today our perfidious and wily enemies are
spreading a legend - one of those most fervent
disseminators is your Turati - a legend to the
effect that to bolster our domestic situation,
we are demanding of all our parties that they
engage in revolutionary actions which have no con-
nection whatsoever with the political and social
development of the respective countries. If we
permit people who propagandize such ideas to
remain much longer in our International, we can
very well create a very difficult situation for
the International.3

Trotsky also points to certain inconsistencies between Italian

Socialist’theory and actions: -

 

33113111., p. 385.
.BDLEon Trotsky, The First Five Years of the Communist Interna-
‘tional (New York: Pioneer Press, 1§D§).

 

1"”

'r'

35

. . . Were one to judge the party from the political
standpoint, one would have to conclude - for this
is the only possible explanation - that the ISP
[P83 verbally conducted a revolutionary policy,
without ever taking into account any of its con-
sequences. Everybody knows that during the Sep-
tember events the sit-down strikea no other
organization so lost its head and became so para-
lyzed by fear as the ISP which had itself paved

the way for these events. Now these facts are
proof that the Italian organization -- and we should
not forget that the party is not only ideas; a goal
and a program, but also an apparatus, an organiza-
tion - this Italian organization could have se-
cured victory by unswerving activity.35

What is important as Trotsky's words are scrutinized in the
light of this study is the question of whether Gramsci and Tog-
liatti, eventual spokesman for the Comintern, were themselves
consistent in thought and action with Leninist theory? The answer
should be prefaced with a review of the ideological and organiza-
tional dialogue that culminated in the formation of the Communist
Party and eventually, as Mussolini came to power, the ffoundering‘of

the entire Marxist movement in Italy.

351b1d., p. 262.

”N

C. The Formation of the Communist Party of Italy

The announcement of Lenin's "Twenty-One Points" coincided
with the crisis of September, 1920. The Leghorn Congress of
January, 1921, was the arena in which the different factions in
the Socialist Party locked horns over the question or rejection
of Moscow's conditions.

Based on the analysis of the problems of the fall of 1920,
we are aware that the division in the Socialist Party focuses on
the conflict between those who were wary of Socialist adherence to
parliamentary methods and the reformist element within the party
, which had prevailed prior to 1917. The latter group's influence
and control had been vastly decreased by the Bolshevik revolution.
This cleavage gave rise to the "Maximilistflwing which essentially
encompassed those who wished to pursue the maximum program of the
party and who desired to abandon the reformist and gradualist
program that had been pursued by the Socialist leadership until
1919. This group, which wa8oto be in the majority between 1919
and 1922, adhered to a strict policy of Italian Socialist autono-
my from.Moscow. This stand led to a split in its (the Maximilist)
ranks. Thus there emerged the "pure" Communist or Moscow-oriented
group, which became the major force within the Italian Socialist
:movement for acceptance of Lenin's "TwentyeOne Points."

At Leghorn, there were again three factions and each pre-

sented a major resolution:

36

O.

37

l. The "Communist" resolution -- which called for the com-

plete and unquestioned acceptance of Lenin's "TwentybOne

Points." This resolution was introduced and supported by

the young Turin Communist intellectuals Antonio Gramsci

(1891 - 1937) and Palmiro Togliatti (1893 - 1961:), as well

as Amedeo Bordiga, the so-called abstentionist who had been _ A

against electoral participation all along.

2. The Unitarian resolution which proposed adherence to the
Third International, but did not wish to split the party

as the price for remaining in the Comintern, which the party
had joined in 1919.

Those who introduced and supported this resolution in-
cluded most of the older leftdwing leaders of the Social-
ist Party, including Serrati (1872 - 1926), Pietro Lazzari
(1857 - 1927), and the rising young Pietro Nenni (1891 - ).
They refused to be dictated to by Moscow as to what members
should be expelled and when expulsion should take place.
They agreed with the principles of the Comintern, but did not

wish to be organizationally subservient to it.

3.. The Reformist or "Concentrationist" resolution -- which
stated that the Italian Socialist Party could not, under
any circumstances, be dictated to by Moscow; that party
policy should be formulated in Italy; that no one should be
expelled from the party; and that continued unity of the
party should be its primary objective.

This resolution was introduced and supported by the

D.

r»

38

group headed by Turati and most of the C. G. L. leaders.
These men, for all intents and purposes, were unqualifiedp
ly against the "Twenty-One Points." They rejected them in

principle as well as organizationally.36

The center or "Unitarians" led by Serrati, received the lar-
gest number of votes - 98,000. The left, or Communists, received
57,000. The right, or "Reformist" group tallied 1h,000 votes.3z
These results were a direct rebuff to the Comintern. .Bordiga,
who had been in favor of abstention from parliamentary electoral
activity at the Bologna Congress of 1919, but who had nevertheless
formally remained in the PSI, addressed the Congress and declared
his intention to lead the left out of the PSI and to form the
Communist party. Bordiga next announced the expulsion of the PSI
(now comprised only of the "Unitarians" and the "Reformists") from
the Comintern, whereupon the Communists adjourned to another meet-
ing hall in Leghorn and organized the Italian Communist Party as
a section of the Third International. What is significant here is
the inability of Moscow to influence the choice of leadership in the
new PCI. Bordiga had not been the fair-haired boy of Moscow for
two reasons: first of all, he had been an abstentionist, that is,
he had been uncompromising in his attitude toward electoral parti-

cipation at a time when Moscow had favored such a course as a

 

36Hilton-Young, op. cit., p. 121.

37Mario Einaudi, Jeanéharie Domenach, Aldo Garosci, ed.,
(Communism in Western Europe, Part III, "The Italian Communist
TFarty,"Iby'AIdo Garosci, (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University
Emess, 1951), p. 157.

 

 

39

means of broadening the organizational base of the extreme left.
Secondly, he had advocated secession from the PSI when it became
obvious that most of its leaders were not uncompromising revolu—
tionaries and able to act so in a crisis. Moscow had originally
endeavored to convert Serrati, the PSI leader, to its point of
view, and only after having failed in this, had Moscow decided to
split the Socialist movement by backing the extreme left. Having
decided this, the Kremlin tended to favor the Gramsci - Togliatti

Turin group centered around the publication, Ordine Nuovo, which

 

it viewed as more amenable to Soviet policy.

Bordiga had expressed the view that the energies of Social-
ists, rather than being utilized in futile parliamentary activity,
should be directed toward such revolutionary activities as the
organization of Soviets and military groups which would be primed
for the inevitable revolution.38 Here, implicitly, is a Communist
theory of "continuing" or "international" revolution, which has
the flavor of a later Trotskyism that became focused in the
Fourth International. In fact, Bordiga's heris in Italy, now
merely a splinter group, differ from the Revolutionary Communist
Groups (Trotskyists £33 ) only to the extent that the Bordiga
group regards the USSR as a regime of State capitalism, while the
Trotskyists consider it in the words of Trotsky himself "a de-
generate working class State"39 governed by‘a bureaucracy.

Bordiga appears to have been the chief beneficiary of the

38Ibid., p. 159
39Leo Labedz, ed., Revisionism: Essays on the history;9f
Iiarxist Ideas (New Yark: Frederick Praeger, Inc” 1955}, P3257

 

hO

formation of the Communist Party. Despite lack of Moscow sup-
port, and at times against its outright opposition, Bordiga was
emerging as the first leader of the new Communist party, over the

Ordine Nuovo group, which had Moscow's blessing. The abstention-

 

ist was delayed, at the most, by Moscow, in his plans to force
secession of the extreme left wing from the PSI. By delaying
his separation until the Leghorn Congress, Bordiga was in fact
able not only to realize his longesought goal of separation, but
also to abscond with a broader base for his extreme left faction.
Between 1921 and 1926, the party became a chief exponent of ab-
stentionism despite the Opposition of the Comintern. Bordiga had
obtained Moscow's support without completely subverting himself to
its control. One of the chief frictionsin the new Communist group
between the Bordiga faction and the Turin group became the question
of the degree of Comintern control. Bordiga saw this international:
revolutionary organization more as a means of acquiring prestige,
status, and legitimacy, rather than as a directing hand. Ideologi-
cal controversy over this question, between the two groups, inevita-
bly became manifest in a more substantive manner over the Comin-
tern requirement that the cell unit of organization should be the
basis for local organization. Up to the time of the formation of
.the PCI, the section unit of local organization had prevailed.ho
Bordiga's successful intransigence within the Comintern

continued at the Second Congress of the PCI in 1922, where his

——_

hoCharles F. Delzell, "The Italian Anti-Fascist Emigration,
1922 - l9h3," Journal of Central European Affairs, XII (April, 1952),
p0 20 "' 559 P0 380 . .

 

 

bl

demands for a reasonable degree of autonomy of Bolshevik control
were met by the Congress' decision to retain the section system
whereby all members of a given locality were included as members of
a unit. In other words, the geographical unit of party organiza-

‘ tion (section) which had to be swept away by all parties to the
"Twenty-One Points" was retained.

Gramsci eventually triumphed on the organizational issue
in 1925 when the cell system was finally accepted by the party.
This action denoted the triumph of the Turin group in establishing
the organizational principles laid down by the Comintern directing
the "bolshevization" of the party. Gramsci had managed to prevail
over Bordiga by the tactic of having a larger executive committee
pass a resolution condemning the "Trotskyite" views of Bordiga and
his faction. The 1926 Congress which had to be held in Lyons,
France, because of the consummation of the Fascist takeover, ex-
pelled Bordiga from the executive committee. Gramsci was recog-
nized as leader and Moscow for the first time presumably had an
unquestionably obedient party in ItalyJ‘l But the victory was
now somewhat hollow, as all political opposition to the Fascist
regime had, by this time, been driven underground, imprisoned
or forced out of the country.

The new Communist party had to endure these internal growing
pains simultaneously with its assault on the PSI while it was also
systematically being whittled down to a mere shadow by the Fascists.'
The task of the Communists as the newlyainitiated representatives

Of world revolution in Italy was apparent. (One of the enormous

 

hllbid.

 

 

w

 

112

objectives that lay before them was the infiltration of the working

class movement which remained for the most part in the Socialist

camp. The PCI, which had been born in order to dothe job that the

PSI had failed to do, apparently was unwilling or unable to accom- ~
plish this task. The PCI, which, by its very nature as a revolu-

tionary party, should have had both the determination and the l

ability to function as a highly disciplined underground army to then

successfully take the initiative against the Fascists. 'What then

 

prevented the PCI from doing this?

The fundamental division within the PCI, between the Bor-
diga wing and the Turin group, almost from the very start of the
party, rendered it an ineffective instrument in the struggle
against Mussolini. The Fascist threat was treated within the con-
text of historical determinism by Bordiga. This encouraged poor
estimstes of Fascist strength. Dismissing the Fascist movement as;
simply another bourgeois force that could not run contrary to the
normal development of history, the Bordiga group convinced itself
that it was impossible for the Fascists to "turn back the clock of
time." Gramsci, on the other hand, saw pragmatic value in what
he called "mechanistic" determinism, even though he considered it
"vulgarization" of Marxism that should not be allowed to lull the
leaders of the revolution into any illusions:

. . . the class struggle seems to be a series of
defeats for the working class. Mechanistic deter-
minism is then a formidable morale builder making
for cohesion, perseverance, patience and stubborn-
ness. The worker says to himself, 'I have been
defeated for the moment, but the logic of history

‘works for me in the long run, etc.‘ What seems to
be an act of individual will is actually an act of

\ I

1‘

r.

(‘i

h3

faith, a travesty . . . But when the Oppressed class
becomes the ruling class, responsible for the eco-
nomic activity of the masses, then mechanistic de-
terminism becomes a clear and present danger.

Furthermore, Gramsci, unlike the Bordiga wing, was fully a-
ware Of the danger of the potential reaction that was to gain the

upper hand in 1922. He wrote, in 1920:

The actual phase of the class struggle in Italy is 4'
the phase which precedes one Of two alternatives:

wither the working class conquers political power,
Opening the way to new modes of production and dis- 4,
tribution that will permit a renewal Of productivity; ‘
or an enormous reactionary victory Of the prOpertied

class will take place, NO violence will be over-

looked tO subdue the industrial and agricultural

workers and to subject them to servile labor: they

will try to smash inexorably and irretrievably the

organs of political struggle of the working class

(the Socialist party) and they will seek to incor-

porate the organs Of economic struggle, the unions

and the cOOperatives, in the machine of the bour-

geOis state.’43

As the strength of Fascism and D'Annunzio-type militant
nationalism began to increase, Gramsci was aware that the new con-
ditions required strategy designed to preserve civil liberties.
This meant united-popular front tactics. Prior to the Worker's
Front, initiated in 1922, the party had followed Bordiga's policy
of non-collaboration with other parties. The shift to united
front tactics was in keeping with Lenin's initiation of the "united
front" but unfortunately it came too late for Italian conditions.Ml

In March, l92h, Gramsci founded a new organ, L'Unita, to replace

 

hQCarl Marzani, The Open Marxism of Antonio Gramsci (New
York: Cameron Associates, Inc., 1957), p. 8-9.
h31bid., p. 11-12.
31‘0801, 22. E20, P0162.

 

hh

Ordine Nuovo, which had ceased publication in 1922, due to con-

 

stant acts of terror on the part of the Fascists.h5 The very title
of the new publication suggests an even greater emphasis on united
front tactics and the demise of the Bordiga faction. The success
of Gramsci in the dispute over tactics is further indicated by
Gramsci's election as secretary of the party in l92h. :3

Between 1921 and 192D, the PCI had been rent by the con-

 

stant friction between the "Bordiga faction" and Gramsci's Qrdigg ; é
Nugzg group. Bordiga was able to prevail at least until 1922, 7
when his first setback came, as was indicated above; the PCI
participated in the WOrker's Front. Between 1922 and 192h, the two
wings remained constantly divided on this issue, which is largely
responsible for the Party's ineffectiveness during this period.
Setback after setback was suffered by the PCI in this dis-
unified period. The Party's attempts to increase its influence
over the working class by trying to infiltrate the CGL ended in
failure. The Chamber Of Labor in Turin, which was one of the
strongholds DI’Communist trade union strength, was burned twice in
1922. In March, 1923, ten thousand Communists were arrested.
Bordiga, Gramsci, Tasca and other prominent Communists were tried;
but because civil liberties had not been completely suppressed by
then, they were released by the regular judiciary.
The relentlessness and severity of the stepped-up attacks
of violence on the part of the Fascist "Squadristi" ("storm

trOOpers") was encouraged by the basic inherent disunity and weak»

 

ILSAntonio Gramsci, The Modern Prince and Other writings,
trans. Louis Marks (London: Lawrence and Wishart, Ltd., 1957: p. 17.
h61bid., p. 16h.

115

ness that the Fascist leadership had surmised to be present in the

Marxist movement. Actually, about the time of the sit-down strikes
and the Comintern debate, Mussolini was considering a deceleration

of his campaign of violence. He had thought of forming a coali-

tion with the Popular Party, the right wing of the trade unions,

 

n
and even with the right of the Socialist Party, with himself at la»
the head of the government. Such a move was Opposed by certain ‘
militant nationalist elements in the Fascist movement, which E *
joined Mussolini after the twilight of D'Annunzio's Nationalist '

movement. This merger came about when the D'Annunzio faction had
been dislodged at Fiume by Italian troops.h7 In fact, Mussolini
actually signed an accord with the Socialists, agreeing to end
his campaign of terror; however, this militant-nationalist fac-
tion was in favor of an all-out campaign to stamp out all Social-
ists' influence in the political arena and in the working class
movement. The faction was large enough and influential enough to
induce a large percentage of the Fascist movement to repudiate
the pact, whereupon Mussolini resigned his leadership of the move-
ment. A short time later, he repudiated the agreement he had made
with the Socialists and resumed his leadership role in the Fas-
cist movement; however, now he faced restraints on the execution of
the plan to liquidate Socialist and trade union sovreigntye118
After the "march on Rome," which culminated in Mussolini's
accession to the Prime Ministership, he did not suppress the

h7COle, op. cit., p. 383.
h81bid.,‘p‘. 3'8'6.

ho

Opposition immediately. "Legal'political freedom existed until

late 1925, although "de facto" freedom was increasingly constricted.
Coercion by the Fascist militia in the form of physical violence
was the major method of sweeping away the vestiges of political
freedom that remained after Mussolini's unconstitutional rise to
power.

In l92h, the Fascists managed to acquire a majority

 

through a new election law (which was passed with the help of the

Popular Party, which had become increasingly conservative mainly

 

because of the prodding of Pius XI and certain parochial elements
who feared Socialist revolution) under which the party or coali-
tion receiving the largest plurality would get two-thirds of the
total number of seats, even if it were a minority of the totalJ‘9
On May 30, l92h, Giacomo Matteotti, a rising young Reformist
Socialist stood in the Chamber and proceeded to deliver a condemp
nation of unconstitutional Fascist tactics that singled out, par-
ticularly, Mussolini's conduct of the recent election. Matteotti
was hooted down by the Fascist deputies. Ten-days later he was
kidnapped by five Fascist thugs, murdered and thrown into a ditch
where his body lay undiscovered for two months. Public wrath as
a result of this action was uncontrollable, forcing Mussolini
to make a public display of punishing the five suspects who had
been identified by witnesses who saw them commit the act. The
five men were tried and given prison terms. Fascist control was

then relaxed for about six months.50

h9Ibid., p. 388.
EOYOImg, Op. Cit., p. 1390

U

{a

h?

During these six months no effort was made by the Socialist
and Communist deputies to regain a meaningful foothold in the par-
liament. Instead, they sought to make a last-ditch effort to shake‘

the Fascist stranglehold on Italian society by withdrawing from the

Chamber in protest. The withdrawal became known as the "Aventine,"

which was a reference to Caius Gracchus and his supporters who
gathered around the Temple of Diana on the Aventine Hill.

Gramsci, having prevailed in his intra-party struggle to
establish the pOpular front idea, led the Communist deputies out Of
the Chamber along with other members of the Opposition (150 in
all). This secession was precisely what the Comintern had been
Opposed to all along; in fact it was the very'abstentionism" that
Bordiga had advocated. Nevertheless, it was true to the principle
of united front collaboration. It is interesting to note that
abstentionism, to which Moscow was opposed, and united front, which
MOscow supported, happened to be one and the same in this case.
Gramsci's decision to place the united front idea above parlia—
mentary participation (the antithesis Of abstentionism) proved
to be a disasterous action for the PCI. Later, the party, reali—
zing its mistake, left the Aventine and returned to the Chamber.
Needless to say, the Aventine Secession proved to be a disaster
for the entire left.

Had Gramsci been as astute in l92h as he had been in 1920
'when he recognized that Fascism was not an ordinary bourgeois
Inovement, he would have immediately’ realized the futility of for-

cing Mussolini to resign at the eighth of a mere protest of

 

h8

Opposition deputies. The "Aventine" in fact, served to underline
the lack of potency of the anti-Fascist Opposition. It simply
met periodically to reaffirm its Opposition to Fascist unconsti-
tutionality. It had no particular action program based on a posi-

tion of strength to use as a means of dislodging the Fascists.

J

I."

At any rate, Gramsci belatedly realized the futility of i;

getting the Aventine to agree to decisive action. Then he de- ]

 

oided to lead the Communist deputies back into the Chamber where ' I *-
he continued to condemn the Fascists. Gramsci's return was well ' I
timed in the sense that it preceded Mussolini's permanent exclusion
of the Aventine members from the Chamber on the ground that they
"had forfeited their seats by absenting themselves for six months."51
His decisive action contrasted with the obvious impotence of the
Socialists and other opposition parties. Heretofore the PCI's
prestige was considerably enhanced as one of the directors in
the fight against Fascisms2

Mussolini's speech in January, 1925, informing the Aventine
of its exclusion was accompanied by'a statement denying any re-
aponsibility for Matteotti's murder. Shortly after, the anti-Fas-
cist Opposition was further suppressed through press censorship,
special political courts and the granting of exclusive bargaining
rights to the newlybformed Fascist Labor Unions.53

On November 9, 1926, Mussolini launched a series of ar-

rests of Opposition party leaders. Most of the PCI's executive

 

 

51001., o . cit., p. 389.
520ramsci§ loc. cit. ‘-
530018 , 220—21203. 3900

149

committee was arrested, including Gramsci, Terracini and Bordiga.
Togliatti escaped arrest only because he was in Moscow attend-
ing the Plenum of the Comintern Executive Committee, to which he
was the Italian delegate.5h The less fortunate ones were given
stiffer prison terms, from which they never emerged alive (with
the exception of Gramsci, who was released in 1937, only to die
a month later). From that time to 19h3, the PCI functioned as an
underground organization, with the top leadership spending most

of its time in exile.

__1

shR.‘W., "Togliatti: Master of Maneuver," Communist Affairs

 

I (Nov,-Dec), p. 21.

'4 r..- J.-
". i I
i - .—

 

CHAPTER III

TOGLIATTI LEADS ITALIAN COMMUNISM BACK TO THE
ITALIAN STYLE OF POLITICS

 

Introduction 54
In addition to silencing the revolutionary left, suppres-

sion Of the non-Fascist parliamentary Opposition by Mussolini also I,,_

symbolized the bankruptcy of all non-totalitarian political '

groupings, whether Giolittian or liberal democratic. The mass
media of communication, the educational system, the courts and the
police were firmly drawn under Fascist control between 1925 and
1930. By 1930 the church, the crown and the armed forces had been
thoroughly neutralized.

So ended Italy's experience with parliamentary forms, and
with it the retardation of Italian Marxist evolution into a full-
fledged participant in the political struggle Italian style (la
lotta politica italiana). The PCI, which came into existence
through foreign (Bolshevik) inspiration, began the arduous task
of accumulating a broad mass following through their appeals, de-
signed to exploit the peculiar circumstances Of the Fascist regime.
Superior Communist organization and financing by weak Socialist
party organization and poor financing radically reduced competi-
tion from the other major Marxist parties. While the program of

radical reconstruction of society was distilled from international

50

51

Communism on the one hand, appeals to Italian nationalism, culture
and temperament gave to Italian Communism what later became known

as its polycentric character. Palmiro Togliatti perfected this

 

technique.

In pre-Fascist Italy, the Marxist movement had taken a
road that led it away from proper understanding of the Italian
political style. The PCI, in the twilight of the Fascist regime,
was determined that the error of too rigid an ideological posi-
tion on the part of the radical left would not be committed a
second time. Hence the vacuum left by the fall of the Fascist
regime was at least partially filled by'a Marxist movement that
did not disdain political participation within the framework of
'the bourgeois state.

From the very beginning of the renewal of Constitutional
government in postdwar Italy, the Communist party was in the cen-
ter of the stage, and thus was forced to become a skillful prac-

titioner of'a modern trasformismo.

 

 

A. Italian Marxism Reaches Its Low Point

The imprisonment of most of the PCI executive committee

 

and conSolidation of Fascist totalitarian control led to a tem— r1
porary collapse of the Communist underground. Suppression of i
all anti-Fascist Opposition brought about emigration of those L
Communist leaders who managed to elude capture in the initial t .:
wave of arrests. Most PCI leaders fled to France where they set ' 9

up a line of communication with the mere outline of a party that
remained in Italy. The Communist "emigre" press in Paris pub-

lished Stato Operaio (Workers' State) until 1939. Vita Operaia

 

(Workers' Life) was another Communist "emigre" publication. The
Communist press also printed various pamphlets plus other forms
of mass printed matter.55

These activities were not very spectacular, and attracted
little attention in Italy. The Comintern expressed dissatisfaction
with the PCI's tactics as an underground organization. It hOped
that the party would make greater efforts to infiltrate Fascist
mass organizations. The Comintern's lack of appreciation of the
futility of such actions in a totalitarian state is further shown
by its insistence on organized strikes, factory meetings of work-
ers, and so on. Such tactics had been employed with little suc-
cess, even before complete totalitarian suppression.

Between 1926 and 1928 the PCI, following the direction Of

55De1ze11, pp. 933., p. 39.

53

the Comintern, pursued a united front policy. Fascism was the
major target of Communist agitation. Non-Communist anti-Fascist
groups were ordinarily not attacked; when they were, it was only
on the charge of being complacent in the struggle. After the
Sixth Congress of the Comintern, Stalinist policy dictated a shift
in emphasis from the Fascist target alone to all non~Communists.
Social democracy was now considered nothing less than Fascism and
labeled "social fascism." The PCI was now required, according to
Comintern dictates, to attack all nr>n-Communist Socialists.56
Such indiscriminate grouping together of Fascists and
Socialists caused a significant amount of turmoil within the party.
Not only were the Communists handicapped in their subversive acti-
vities by this new directive, but certain important key leaders
Openly expressed their disapproval. Among the dissidents were
'such.men as Angelo Tasca and Ignazio Silone. In September of
1929, Tasca was expelled from the party as a Bukharinite; in July,
1931, Silone, who had been disenchanted with the Stalin movement
long before that time, was also Officially expelled for the same
reason.57 These two men had desired a broad anti-Fascist alliance,
the absence of which, throughout most of the period between 1919
and 1926, had been largely responsible for Mussolini's success.
Ever since the formation Of the party, this had been an issue be-

tween the Bordiga faction and the Ordine Nuovo group. Togliatti

 

ihad, from the very start, been second only to Gramsci in the latter

group. What then was his reaction to Moscow's liquidation of the

 

56Garosci, Op. cit., p. 39.
57R. w., 3137313.? p. 170.

 

Sh

Right Opposition in Russia and its subsequent demands, through

the Comintern, that all local Communist parties follow suit in de-
nouncing Bukharin and all Communists everywhere who could be iden-
tified with his orientation?

Togliatti had advanced between l92h and 1927 mainly because
the Turin Communists had been Opposed to Bordiga's internationalism
and "continuing revolution" from the very beginning Of the PCI and
even before. Therefore when Bordiga had been identified with
Trotsky, justly ot'unjustly, Togliatti had been one of the chief
beneficiaries, along with Gramsci, particularly in terms of Mos-
cow support. However, in 1928 and 1929, Togliatti was not very
enthusiastic in his denunciation Of Bukharinism, and in fact was
actually accused by Moscow of "Bukharin-like vacillation." He la-
mented the new Comintern tactics of "class against class" because
it presaged the isolation of the PCI from the rest of the anti-Fas-
cist bloc. This was apparently the juncture at which Togliatti
made the decision which all Communists who survived the purges of
the 1930's had to make eventually; that is, the decision to be
on Stalin's "side" regardless Of how frequently and crassly the
Stalinist position changed.58 Was it abeyance of conscience, am-
bition, the will to survive, or unscrupulousness? It could have
been any of these or a combination. Togliatti was an immensely
complex personality; his motivations are no doubt beyond our com-
petency to determine. In any event, Togliatti.made the decision
to submit himself to Stalin's whims on the occasion of the elimi-

nation of the Bukharin Right Opposition. He did not raise an
’ 53mm.

 

 

 

\l

55

open word against Stalin from about 1930 to 1956.59 Word and
action differ, however, and from 19hh, when he returned to Italy,
until 1956, after the 20th Party Congress when he joined the cho-
rus of denunciation of Stalin, many of his actions did not reflect
Stalinist views.

we do know one thing: Togliatti's faithful recantation of
Stalinist slogans between 1930 and l9hh, did not cost Togliatti and
Italian Communism very much. Mussolini had such a tight control
over all political activity in Italy that these slogans had little
effect one way or the other on the Italian working class.

Silone tells us that Togliatti was impatient with Moscow's
apparent lack of insight into the specifically local problems of
the PCI, particularly vis-a-vis the Fascists. Specifically, Silone
says that the International, as it was constituted, left a lot to
be desired, but it was the result of Objective historical factors
and it was necessary to wait until these changed.60

During the period between 1929 and l93h, Togliatti faith-
fully executed the new policy of the Comintern. He proceeded to
attack Fascism as the "militant organization Of the bourgeoisie
based on the active support of social democracy," which was Stalin's
new definition. He served notice that the PCI would not participate
in any "emigreT anti-Fascist combinations, be they sponsored by
Socialists, Republicans or non-Communist trade unions. Togliatti
picked at any patriotic democratic Socialist groups, even if their

sole reason for existence was to combat Fascism. An example was

 

59Ibid.
60Ib‘Td.

 

 

56

the Roselli brothers' Justice and Liberty organization. He at-
tacked Nenni and Saragat, the newly-emerging leader of the Reform-
ist, rightdwing Socialists.61

Following Hitler's rise to power in Germany, the Comintern
reversed its policy and sanctioned the new popular front strategy.
It was now officially correct to collaborate with the Socialists

and other demoCratic anti-Fascist groups. In keeping with the

 

new policy and in the aftermath of an.attempted Rightdwing coup

 

against the Third French Republic, Togliatti, who was in France
at the time, emulated the French Communist Party and made a pact
with the leftawing Socialist (Nenni) which opened the way for a
broad pOpular front with all democratic parties.

The PCI pursued pOpular front tactics from l93h through
the Ethiopian Crisis and the Spanish Civil War. The party sup-
ported League sanctions against Mussolini for his invasion of
EthiOpia. The other pOpular front groups were persuaded to join
the PCI in this action, which proved to be quite a feat; national
resentment was at a fever pitch, even among rabidly anti-Fascist
groups, as Italy was cast in the role of international villain by
world Opinion and the League.

The PCI helped to organize the Garibaldi Battalion of
the International Brigade during the Spanish Civil'War. Togliatti
emphasized the "international" nature of the struggle, but was
always careful ggto subordinate questions of democracy, anti-Fas-

cism and national liberation, to the interests of the Soviet state.

 

élibid.

57

It is believed that Togliatti played his part in the physical elimi-
nation of those participants on the Republican side whose poli-
cies and philosophies weue inimical to Stalin -- particularly

Trotskyists and Anarchists.62

The measure of the success of Communist POpular Front tac- léi
' I
tics in the Garibaldi battalion in Spain lies in the fact that the . i

party was so conscientious in hiding its domination. "Justice

 

and Liberty" was the only anti-Fascist group that refused to "30in"

this military unit even though it (J and L) was a member of the '
POpular Front; it participated in Spain as a separate unit.63
Luigi Longo, later leader of the Italian Partisan resistance, nump
ber two man in the postdwar PCI, and finally successor to Togliatti
as leader, upon his death, was the political comissar of the Gari-
baldi Battalion. This unit proved to be one of the more effi-
cient ones in the Brigade. Communist political direction of other
political groups seemed to be neither resented nor a handicap to
efficient, cohesive functioning. The same smooth direction was
later to be applied by the PCI in the Italian anti-Fascist - Nazi
resistance toward the end of World War II. Again, the Communists
' played a major role in leadership and organization, and it was
neither resented nor rejected by the other political groups.

After the fall of Barcelona, Togliatti made his way back to
France and from there to Belgium, and finally to the USSR where he
remained until the allies invaded southern Italy.

The signing of the Nazi-Soviet Pact caused another reversal

 

621bido, p. Zhe.
6313812811,. 220 22-20, p. M.

58

in Popular Front policy. Approximately at the time of the pact,
the PCI, which was then temporarily an appendage of the French
party, was attending the conference of that party which was to
decide policy in the event of war. Togliatti designated himself
as in favor of continuing the anti-Fascist Popular Front. On 49
August 23, 1939, when the Nazi-Soviet Pact was announced, Togliatti f?

obediently and immediately reversed his decision and the PCI du-

 

tifully but reluctantly refrained from attacking the Fascists.6h l,
Popular Front tactics were quickly resumed with the German inva- '
sion of the USSR.

; The conquest of France caused most of the Italian Communists
who had emigrated there, and who did not become politically inac-

tive by going into hiding, to be arrested by the Germans and

turned over to the Fascist authorities. Most of the major lea-
ders were confined on a prison island close to Naples. Included

in this group were Longo, Roveda, Secchia and DiVittorio. This

island served as a sort of command post for the Italian resist-
ance.65 The incarcerated PCI leaders maintained liason with out-
side functionaries who laid the groundwork in the reconstitution
of the Italian underground, which had been reduced to a mere sha-
dow of its former existence.

Therefore, when Mussolini fell in l9h3, the Communists

merely had to finish the work of meditaticm )f their appara-

tus in the north which had already begun; the Fascist regime was

 

éhGarosci, op. cit., p. 172-
6SDelzell, 22. Erie, po 1750

59

in the last throes of its independent (i. e. of the Germans') exist-
ence. Such activity still had to be carried out underground as the
Germans were in control of the north until 19h5. However there
was now a foreign occupation, a fact that made it an easy'matter

to recruit underground workers and resistance fighters. What's
more, Mussolini's new northern Italian Social Republic was so ob-
viously a quisling regime of the Germans, with little or no aute-
nomy, that what little polular support the Fascists had had in

the difficult years between l9h0 and 19h3, as military defeat
mounted upon defeat, practically disappeared between 19h3 and

19h5.

Herein lies an important and crucial period in the evo-
lution of the PCI to rank as the major mass party'of‘post war
Italy, The organizational preparedness of the PCI to swing into
vigbrous action has already been cited. Analysis of the back-
ground of the Italian Marxist movement has indicated that origin-
ally the PCI had little mass support in comparison to other mass.
parties, particularly the Socialist and Popular parties. In the
underground period between 1926 and l9h3, actual PCI membership
has been estimated at between fifteen-hundred and three thousand
. members. Yet after l9h3, the party returned to active political
life as the great mass party of Italy, holding the support, if not
the allegiance, of a majority of the working class. Possibly more
important in evaluating the PCI's new status as the chief mass
party was its ability to obtain control over the major mass econo-

mic and social organizations, particularly the trade unions, a

 

60

control which it had never possessed before; Consequently, it is
pertinent to investigate how and why the PCI was able to set itself

up as the genuine mass party of Italy.

 

B. Launching of the "Italian Road to Socialism" -- the PCI
Becomes a Truly'Mass Party

When Togliatti shed the ill-cut Soviet-made suit that he
wore when he arrived in Naples from.Moscow in l9hh, he also shed, E}
for the most part, the Stalinist role he had played since the '~h

anti—Bukharin campaign. To be sure he was to continue to pay lip

 

service to the demands of Soviet foreign policy, but only on a 9 **
few occasions (the Trieste crisis, in the opinion of the author, '
being most prominent) was his ideological subjugation to Stalin
in the area of cold war politics to weaken the position of the
PCI in the Italian political arena.
Togliatti's lieutenants had played a major role in launch-
ing the great strikes of March, l9h3. (Some had taken place as
early as December, l9h2). The March strikes demonstrated the lack
of control that the Fascist regime exercised over the masses by
this time. The success of Communists in the popular front and their
underground and resistance tactics made it possible for them to
exercise a high degree of influence in the strikes. After the
fall of Mussolini and the release of the imprisoned Communist
leaders, another hm portant step in consolidating control over the
trade unions was the appointment of the Communist Giovanni Roveda
as one of the three commissioners of the workers' confederations.
The monarchist government that had succeeded Mussolini in the

south, incorporated the former Fascist trade union organization

61

62

under the control of the commission. This fact and the appointment

of Roveda created fertile ground for future Communist control of
a substantial portion of the trade union movement. ‘With the re-
vival of the old G. G. L. and the centralization under it of many
workers' groups which, before Fascism, had been independent, the
PCI was in the position to subvert the working class movement to
its own interests.66 Communist organizational skill, coupled with
the new popular front and the resistance made it possible to strap
newly-revived local unions to the side of centralized authority.
The resistance itself combined labor, political and military acti-
vities under a highly centralized, though multi-lateral, organi-
zation.

Immediately after the fall of Fascism, King Victor Immanuel
appointed Marshal Pietro Badoglio as Prime Minister at the head
of a ministry composed of non-Fascist ultra-Conservatives and
Monarchists. Hastily, a loose alliance of six democratic parties
was formed in which the PCI participated. This alliance, however,
was not legally recognized by the Badoglio government and con-
stituted a sort of "shadow" opposition whose first objective was
to influence the royal government to sign an immediate armistice
with the Allies. Badoglio delayed in hopes of bargaining for
better terms. The delay gave the Germans the needed time to as-
semble enough troops along the Brenner and then, in one quick

action, to occupy all of northern Italy.57

 

66Gramsci, op. cit., p. 180.
67Hughes, 313: 315?, p. 131.

,‘j'

 

4 4

63

As the Germans advanced on Rome, the Badoglio government
fled to Brindisi in Apulia (in the heelIOf the boot) where it con-
tinued to function under allied protection. From that time on
it was to follow the allied advance until it reached Rome.

After failing to influence the royal government to sign a

a3

speedy armistice, the shadow Opposition demanded the abdication of

the king and the establishment of true party government. Fur-

 

ther, only when these conditions were met, would they participate ‘ 1*“
in the government. The PCI, continuing its popular front policy '
went along with the opposition six. However, in the spring of
19hh, Togliatti arrived upon the scene, reassumed directly the
reins of the PCJ and immediately announced that the Communists
would participate in the government under any conditions, in-
cluding the continued presence of the king on the throne, at least
for the time being. Also, he had no objections to collaborating
in the same government with the former Fascist, Badoglio.68

Consequently, a six-party cabinet was formed on April 20,
l9hh, with Badoglio as Prime Minister, and Benedetto Croce (the
noted Italian philOSOpher), Count Carlo Sforza and Togliatti as
ministers without portfolio.69

The PCI had gone full circle from the 1920's when it had
condemned reformist Socialist participation in governments that
were actually more oriented in the working class direction than was

Badoglio's. But it is only accurate to point out that Togliatti's

 

, ' 63R. w., loo. cit.,
69Hilt0H'Y—fingT—5po Cite, p. 167.

 

6b

and Gramsci's views regarding parliamentary participation in
the early 1920's did not prevail over Bordiga's.

The concept of the struggle for political power had been a‘
major element of Gramsci's thought. Power should come first, so
that the economic condition of the working class could thus be
improved later.7O Togliatti's eagerness to participate in a
government composed of Monarchists, 19th century Liberals and

even former Fascists goes even further than Gramsci's. Whereas

 

Gramsci (and Togliatti) in the.l920’s had believed that participa-
tion in parliament should be an Opposition force in coalition
with other working class and reformist parties, Togliatti, in
l9hb, went even further and sanctioned actual participation in a

government, which included reactionary and even bourgeois parties.

 

A trip to the king's palace by Turati, merely to discuss the pos-
sibility of participation in a coalition that would have included
the Popular Party and a few other liberal republican groups, led
to his expulsion in 1922 by the Socialist party.71 The contrast
between the Reformist Turati's action in 1922 and the supposed
revolutionary Togliatti's collaboration in l9bh, and the conse-
quences of each respective case suggests not only a significant
evolution in the orientation of Togliatti's ideology and stra-
tegy, but also a basic change in the political climate of
post-Fascist Italy.

TOgliatti's l9hh announcement, which marked the beginning

 

7OGramsci, gp. cit., p. 12
71001e, 92. 932., p. 87.

f‘

65

of the postdwar growth of the PCI as more a revisionary party and
less a revolutionary one, cannot be dismissed as a shift of tactics
on the part of Stalin. He reiterated incessantly between l9hh and
l9h8 his determination to c00perate indefinitely with the Social-
ists and Christian Democrats for the creation of a democratic
republic.72

Togliatti's endeavors to create a truly "national" rather

than a "class" party is further illustrated by his attitude toward

 

the problem of the Italian south. The Communist party "would.ap-

 

peal to all groups including Catholics, peasants, and members of
the bourgeoisie -- no matter what they believed. . .673

Recognition by Togliatti of the necessity to acquire the
support of peasants, Catholics and traditionalists resembled the
national Communism that is to be found in much of the underdevelOped
world. Southern Italy's problems, to a great extent, called for
solutions that might well be applied in the Middle East and
North Africa.

Again, the Gramsci influence on Togliatti is evident. Just
before he was arrested in 1926, Gramsci had become preoccupied with
the problem Of the South. .In his writing on the South, he tries
to show that decisive changes in Italian political, social and eco-
nomic structure could come about only through the unified action
of the workers of the industrial North and the peasantsof the

agrarian South. Gramsci states:

 

72R.‘W., op. cit., p. 2h-2S.
731hid., 5‘: 2757'

 

 

w‘
p

 

66

The proletariat will destroy the southern agrarian
bloc to the extent to which through its Party, it
succeeds in organizing even larger masses of peasants . .
but it will succeed in a more or less large extent
in this obligatory task according to its capacity
to break up the intellectual bloc which forms the
flexible but very resistant armour of the agrarian
bloc. . . This work is gigantic and difficult, but
precisely because of this it is worthy of every
sacrifice . . .on the part of those intellectuals
of the North and the South (and they are many more
than one thinks), who have understood that only two
social forces are essentially national and the
bearers of the future: the proletariat and the
peasants. . .7h

 

Togliatti's adherence to Gramsci's ideas on the South is

 

manifest in activities in the area of land reforms.‘ The PCI was . -
extremely critical of the Chrisitan Democratic land reforms which
involved certain spectacular, highly-publicized projects which did
not begin to solve the problem. The official PCI program for land
reform called for the sweeping transfer to peasants of all land-
holdings more than 250 acres large. This was unrealistic as a pro-
posal in itself and nothing more than a show of theoritical display
of faith with Leninist theory. But the more moderate and pragmatic
tone of theepostdwar‘PCI is illustrated by its preoccupation with
the more technical problems of administering what inadequate land
reform legislation the Christian Democrats did pass. The Com-
munists were dissatisfied with the administrative units used by

the government to redistribute exprOpriated land, and suggested

the use of co-Operatives instead. The Communists also attacked

the quality of the land marked for distribution. Government ad-

ministrators were also accused of favoritism in the distribution

 

7hGramsci, gp.‘git., p. 57.

67

of the richer plots.75

Collaboration by the PCI in the government continued through
the duration of the war. The party received the strategic Ministry
of Justice in the Bonomi government (left of center) but failed to
get the other two key ministeries, interior and defense. This 1
hardly proved to be a tragedy to the Italian Communists, in view ’i
of the presence of the British and American forces that would have

made a Communist seizure impossible anyway. We know from Togliatti's

 

writings that he considered the balance of internal and external i
forces disadvantageous to a Communist take-over. Under such con-
ditions, he felt the best policy was for the PCI to identify with
.the democratization of Italy in the process with/the support and
loyalty of the majOrity of the working class.76

This more moderate policy was continued even after Stalin
announced the end of the wartime "Grand Alliance" in February,
l9h6, and with it, the suspension of the popular front and'the re-
imposition of the class struggle. The events in Greece vindica-
ted Togliatti's policy. In 19h7, he is reputed to have told his
representatives, departing for the first Cominform meetings, that
if Italian Communists were criticized for not being successful
revolutionary tacticians, to reply that "we could not transform

Italy into a second Greece, and that is in the interest not only

of ourselves but also of the Soviets."77

 

75"Progress in Italian Land Reform," werld Today,VIII

(January, 1952), p. th-lll.
76R. We, Op. Cite, p. 250
77Ihid. "' —’

 

 

68

Despite Stalin's rejection of popular front tactics, Tog-
liatti renewed the 1930's pact that he had promulgated with
Nenni. The pinnacle of his policy of collaboration could very
well have been his support of the Lateran pacts, a direct contra-
diction of Communist anti-clericalism.78

The crossroads at which Togliatti had to finally make a |

I

stand on his moderate-democratic policy came in l9h8 when the

 

presence of the cold war finally became impressed upon men's
minds. Would Togliatti call forth his proven resiliency and ,
abruptly shift to more revolutionary tactics of class'struggle?

He chose to continue in the tradition of Gramsci and heed the bal-

ance of social and economic forces, both internal and external.

Despite fierce condemnation in the Cominform and in the Soviet

press, Togliatti continued to vie for a broad base for his party.

The attack on Togliatti's life gave the more "sectarian" elements

in the party the pretext for which they had been searching in

order to launch a major campaign of violence, strikes and riots

that for a day or two seemed to portend revolution. The up-

rising was quelled. Togliatti lived and when he returned to take

charge of the party again, the "sectarians" were removed from

positions of authority and rcsponsibility.79 The defeat of the

Communist-Socialist list in April, l9h8, and the crisis stemming

from the assasination attempt of July of that same year, turned

the PCI into an Opposition party. But the future course of the

party as a reforming force in Italian society had been permanently

 

781hid.
791m.

7O

charted. The PCI had driven firm roots into Italian society; it
had grown from a splinter group into the largerst mass party in
Italy, and it had constructed a highly efficient electoral machine
which it had all intentions of using as the best way or the

"Italian road" to socialism.

 

C. Italianization of an Alien Ideology -- Gramsci and Togliatti:
The Polycentrists '

. . . diversities between one country and the other
are rather great. That is why every party must know
how to act in an autonomous manner, The autonomy
of parties of which we are decisive champions is
not just an internal necessity for our movement but
an essential condition for our development under
present conditions.

' Therefore we would be against any proposal
to create once again a centralized international
organization. We are firm supporters of the unity
of our movement and of the international workers
movement, but this unity must be achieved in the
diversity of our political positions, conforming
to the degree of development in each Country.80

The above words of Palmiro Togliatti, from his testament,
were written expressly for Khrushchev, but because of Togliatti's
untimely death, became the prOperty of his heirs within the PCI
and were subsequently published. The quote is typical of the
"polycentrist" Togliatti at the latest stage of his ideological
deveIOpment.

The memorandum which represents the very antithesis of
statements made by Togliatti in his days as a Stalinist (par-
ticularly during the 1930's) may very well have its roots deep
in the early intellectual molding of Togliatti's political per-
sonality, as well as in the processes of social and economic

change in Italy.

 

80Palmiro Togliatti, "Text of Memorandum on World Communist
‘ Topics," New York Times (September 5, l96h), Po 2.

 

71

 

72

Togliatti faced many challenges in his lifetime as a Com-
munist. Most of them required a well-developed adaptative me-
chanism to which Togliatti's legacy is ample testimony.

Togliatti first coined the term "polycentric" in an inter-

view with Nuovi Argomenti in 1956:

 

The Soviet model should no longer be obligatory. . .
The complex of the system is becoming polycentric,
and in the Communist movement itself one can no
longer speak of a single guide. 81

We were witnessing at the time of the Nuovi Argomenti interview,

 

a Togliatti who was inaugurating a process of major readjustment
of Italian Communist theory in line with strategies that had been
employed since l9hh. This process was not to be entirely completed
by the time of Togliatti's death in 196b. However, the memoran-
dum laid the groundwork for whetheraifinal disposition of the pro-
cess which would permit the PCI to remain a continuing force in
shaping the course of Italian social and economic life, or a de-
generation into an ideological debate that would split the move-
ment in two. If the latter transpires, the party would no doubt
become more isolated from the mainstream of Italian politics than
it has ever been since l9hh. Togliatti's flexibility has caused
ideological flux in the past, as has the sensitivity of all Com-
munist parties to any local pressure, particularly in Western

EurOpe, and more recently in Eastern Europe. But ideological

strain within the PCI has never taken the form of a major
schism since its founding. Possibly because of Togliatti's lea-

dership, even the turmoil caused by de-Stalinization after 1956

 

81Labedz, 22. 0—120, p0 3270 I

73

did not become the occasion for a major split; hence the decline
of the PCI as a major pressure group in Italy was avoided.

Certain "revisionist" groupings within the party did deve-
lop which saw a contradiction between Togliatti's renewed emphasis
on parliamentary democracy, with a new ideological vigor after
1956, and his acquiesence in the repressiveness of Stalinism,
not only in the USSR, but in the satellites (particularly Hungary).
These factions claim. that it was impossible for the PCI to
present itself as an advocate of liberal democracy in the light of
this contradiction. At any rate, those who identified with this
position began to view the PCI as having embraced the outlook of
orthodox reformist Marxism, which accepted the political trappings
of bourgeois society (such as democratic liberties) as permanent
inheritances of social and cultural change. Moreover, having per-
manently acquired democratic libertarian institutions from bour-
geois society, mankind would have the Opportunity to develop and
perfect them further, not only in the gradual march to socialism,
but also after socialism had been achieved.82

Transplanted to this time-honored gradualist Marxist tra-
dition by these deviant factions within the PCI, was "the influ-
ence of modern sociology, of neo-positivism, of Gramsci in his
factory council period, and of the idea of the '1eadership of
the proletariat' in antithesis to the more rigid conception of
dictatorship."83

New publications sprang up which have expression to the

821bid., p. 328.
8 1 ,

 

7h

various shades of color among these right-leaning segments. £322}
Moderni, edited by Fabrizio Onofori, a former PCI central committee
member, and Passato 3 Presente, dominated by Giovanni Giolitti, a
former Under-secretary for Foreign.Affairs, are two of these or-
gans. Eugenio Heals, a former Communist Senator, inspired the

weekly Corrispondenza Socialists. Reale led his faction out of

 

the PCI and into the PSDI (Social Democratic Party of Italy).
Giolitti. eventually became a PSI deputy in the Chamber .814
Another persuasion that manifest an aberrant reaction with-
in the PCI. to Khrushchev's secret speech at the 20th Party Con-
gress, was found in the internationalist-Trotskyist groups. This
trend included the survivors of the Bordiga faction, who were
‘ gathered in the International Communist Party, and the Revolution-
ary Communist Groupsp(Trotskyists). These splinter groups, lack-
ing a popular following, criticized the PCI principles, in domes-
tic as well as the international realm, and its complicity with
Stalinism. These leftdwing groups adOpted an "I told you so"
attitude in reaction to the 20th Congress disclosures. The Trot-
skyists emphasized Khrushchev's attacks on Stalinist bureaucracy,
whereas the Bordiga "internationalists" singled out Khrushchev's
reforms as a means to-illustrate the tendency away from socialism
that was progressing in the Soviet socio-economic system.85
‘Within the PCI, 3 group whose views approximated the
"leftdwing internationalists" outside the party, gained impetus

as the events of 1956 unfolded. The group centered around the

 

8thid., p. 329.
85Ibid., p 329.

7S

organ, Letters 33 Compagni, and was known as the "Azione Communis-
ta." This faction focused on criticism of the PCI parliamentary
approach pursued since l9hh, and repudiated the party leadership's
view that working class power could be achieved without violent
revolution. As this group's ideological position began to resem-
ble more the leftdwing international groups outside the party,
particularly in its insistence upon the Leninist postulate of ’
violent revolution, it too was expelled from the party.86

The basic Leninist structure of the PCI which did not per-
mit ideological deviation from the leadership's point of view is
ample testimony of the continuing adherence to the principle of
"democratic centralism." Giolitti and Realewnlthe right, and
other divergent opinions on the left could not co-exist in the
same party with Togliatti and the official position of the leader-
ship, given the continuing Leninist structure of the party. In
other words, in internal organization, the PCI remained Leninist-
centrist although autonomy of Moscow was successfully established.
Spiritual accord with the C. P. S. U. was retained, particularly
to the extent that it enabled the PCI to ratiOnalize its long
identification with.Moscow. Complete renunciation of approxi-
mately forty years of conjugal, if not passionate, union with the
Moscow party, would have loomed as so unabashed a "svolta" (turna-
_ bout) that the PCI's already proven ability to organize and retain
significant portions of the electorate would have been severely im-

paired. WOrse still, future obstacles to expanding electoral sup-

\

86Ihid., p. 328.

76

port, on which is contingent the success of the "Italian road to
socialism" would become insurmountable. Basic understanding of
this dilemma of the PCI is demonstrated by K. S. Karol, when, in
discussing the legacy of Togliatti , he says ". . . for a man who
has given the best years of his life to creating such a valuable
prize as the Italian CP, the risk of smashing it must seem
equally unacceptable."87

It was evident that up to a few months before his death,
Togliatti had not buried the ghost of Leninist-centrism. Even as
apocalyptic a figure.as Gramsci, in Togliatti's eyes is not allowed
to become a wedge for abandoning monolithic control and organiza-
tion of the PCI. It seems that Gramsci, in 1926, had written a
letter to Moscow, as Spokesman for the PCI, protesting the unfor-
tunate treatment of Trotsky and the left-opposition. This was a
story that had been circulated by Italian Trotskyists ever since
Trotsky; elimination from the Soviet political scene. Some of
' these Trotskyites had been close friends of Gramsci when they
were still in the PCI. They claimed that Gramsci had addressed
the letter to Togliatti, who was then Italian Comintern delegate
in Moscow. TOgliatti had always avoided acknowledgement of the '
incident and the letter. However, in the summer of l96h (two
months before his death) Togliatti not only confessed to having
received a letter, but also published his version of its contents
in Rinascita, the principal weekly of the PCI. A copy of the

letter was not to be found in the PCI archives because Togliatti

 

‘87K. 8. Karol, "The Legacy of Togliatti," New Statesman
(August 21, 196h), p. 2&2.

 

77

claimed to have given it to Bukharin. Nonetheless, having taken
notes upon receipt of the letter, Togliatti claims to have been
able to recreate its text fairly accurately. In addition,
Togliatti published his reply to Gramsci.88

Togliatti published Gramsci's letter, in the Opinion of
Karol, as a PCI counter in the Sino-Soviet dispute. What is ims
portant in this correspondence for the present analysis of Lenin-
ist-centrism in the Italian party, is not Gramsci's call for
mercy in regard to Trotsky and his friends, but Togliatti ex-
pressingdismay and disapproval that Gramsci should be critical
of Stalin and his clique, particularly that he should infer that
Stalinists."were capable of taking unreasonable measures" against
the minority.89

Togliatti is so concerned that the world understand the cm-
tinuing Leninist nature of the party that he is willing to use
the "founding father" and "patron saint" of Italian Communism to
illustrate that no one, no matter how high or revered, can violate
party discipline after a decision has been taken by the leader-
ship...It is possible to interpret Togliatti's motives in di-
vulging his long-kept secret, as a means of suggesting a possible
rehabilitation of Trotsky through the back door. In that case,
it is interesting that he should use the same vehicle, both to
"resurrect Trotsky" and to posit a stern reminder of unquestioned

party centralism. The former would be directed toward widening

—__

88K. S. Karol, "Togliatti Resurrects Trotsky," New States-
man, Vol. 67 (June 19, 196u), p. 938- 9uo.
89lbid., p. 9&0.

 

78

t

the base of the party, the latter to ensure continued function-
ing of democratic centralism within the party.

That the PCI will be at cross purposes by seeking a con-
sensus on one hand and maintaining monolithic control on the other
is again explicitly suggested by Karol:

Togliatti had abandoned with a good deal of finesse
the greater part of his Stalinist dogma, but not
that part of it which postulated monolithic dis-
cipline inside each party and the unchallengeable
authority of its leadership. On this he has been
fighting a losing battle. He is too clearheaded not
to know that unanimity at the apex of the party
can never be permanent, and that in the last re-
sort the base has to be called in to arbitrate

on the divergencies of the leadership. He al-
ways foresaw that the novel experience of public
disputation between Italian Communists would begin
when he had gone.90

Gramsci's 1926 protest letter to Moscow exposes the anti-Sta-
linist flank in the PCI from its early history. An earlier chap-
ter of this study referred to Togliatti's basic distaste with the
Stalin camp at the time of the anti-Bukharin onslaught. Togliatti
then made the decision to survive as a directing force in the PCI
and compromised himself with the most obvious victor. Gramsci,
on the other hand, never had to make that choice as he was im-
prisoned by Mussolini, never to emerge again as an active poli-
tician. It has also been indicated that Gramsci was undergoing
an ideological transformation about the time of his capture. This
evolution in the Italian theorist's thought has been mentioned

particularly in reference to the southern question. Gramsci's

thought contains three major stages: the first was his factory

90Karol, "The Legacy of Togliatti," p. 2&2.

79

council period (1919-20); secondly, in 1920-21, he allotted an
important role to the primary function of the party; and lastly,
attached great significance to the party in enacting the role of
leading a revolution in an underdeveloped country (192h-26).91
Togliatti emphasized any one of these stages of Gramsci's
thought to unify PCI actions with theory in any given situation
when it suited his purpose. In all three stages, the peculiar
character and interests of Italian conditions are manifest.
Only in the second stage is the Bolshevik influence prominent. The
first stage was strongly shaped by the American.Marxist, de Leon,
who was strongly imbued with syndicalist ideas. Throughout all
three of these stages runs a thread of Crocean idealism in
which Gramsci's thought was spawned before he became.a Marxist.
During any one of these three intellectual intervals can
be found a Gramsci who by word or deed made clear his primary
committment to specific Italian revolutionary arms over any other
(the national aspirations of the Soviet state, for example). Re-
liance on Gramsci as a unique ideological guide for Italian Com-
munism is conveyed by Togliatti in the PCI daily, Units, of March
15, 1956:
The search for an Italian road towards socialism
has been our constant preoccupation. I believe I
can say that it was also a preoccupation with.An-
tonio Gramsci, who in all his political action, and
particularly in the last period of his life, was
concerned to provide an Italian version of the

lessons of the Russian revolution.92

Togliatti again credits Gramsci with the origination of a

91Labedz, 32. cit., p. 327.
921bid., p. 3232‘

80

specifically Italian outlook toward Marxism to which the contem-
porary PCI is heir. In his June 2h, 1956, report to the Central
Committee of the PCI, the Italian Communist leader states:

. . . our party had the good fortune to have been
founded by Antonio Gramsci, the thinker who, I be-
lieve, in Western Europe, contributed greatly, in
the last 50 years, to the thorough examination and
to the development of Marxist doctrine on the basis
of intellectual developments in the entire West
and of a profound knowledge of our country. It is
necessary to refer to Gramsci and our entire doc-
trine. It is necessary to remember that this doc-
trine is the most advanced and effective among
doctrines which help to understand the economic,
political and social world, and correctly evalu- _
ate the currents of thought and action which move
through history, to face and solve the questions
of national and international life. we must know
how to draw from this doctrine. . .93

Any attempt to unite the theory of Marxism-Leninism.with
PCI action within the modern bourgeois state cannot avoid a con-
frontation with Marx's "dictatorship of the proletariat" and
Lenin's conception of the state. TOgliatti leaves little doubt
in treating the concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat,
that it is not applicable to contemporary Italian conditions:
Is this position still entirely valid today? Here
is a subject for discussion. When, in fact, we
state that it is possible to proceed toward so-
cialism not only through democracy but also try
using parliamentary forms, it is evident that we
are correcting something in this position, taking
into consideration tfle changes which have taken
place in the world.9
Confession by Togliatti to having accepted Stalin's posi-

tion of "the exacerbation of the class struggle along with the pro-

 

. “Russian Institute, Columbia University, ed., The Anti-Sta-
lin Campaign and International Communism, "Palmiro Togliatti's Re-
port to the Central Committee—6f the PCI" (June 2h, 1956), p. 202-3.

9thido, p. 23h. -

 

81

gress of socialist society. . ."95 leads to further dismantling of
the "dictatorship of the proletariat" concept. Support for such a
changed position is found not Only in Lenin,

Lenin said clearly in the beginning, that the or-
ganizational fOrms which the doctatorship of the
proletariat took in Rusgia would not be compul-
sory in all countries.9 -

but also in Gramsci:

In the formation of leaders the premise is funda-
mental: does one wish there to be always rulers
and ruled, or does one wish to create the conditions
.where the necessity for the existence of this divi-
sion disappears? In other words, does:one start
from the premise of the perpetual division of the
human race, or does one believe that his is only
an historical fact, answering to certain condi-
tions? Nevertheless it needs to be understood
that the division of rulers and ruled, though in
the last analysis it goes back to divisions be-
tween social groups, does in fact exist, given
things as they are, even inside the bosom of each
separate group, even a socially homogeneous
one.97

Gramsci's view in analyzing the role played by elites in}
fomenting and leading revolutions is at first glance consistent
with Stalin's, except that the Italian is concerned that the "dic-
tatorship of the proletariat" should be "self-liquidating."

Gramsci would never have countenanced the transformation of the
"dictatorship" into a permanent hierarchy insulated from the mass
and using the Marxist doctrine as camouflage.98

To Gramsci goes the distinction of being the first Communist
to draw the parallel between the totalitarianism of the right (Fasr

cism) and that of the left (Stalinism), however inadvertently. The

 

9SIbide, p. 2310
9615:30, p. 2350

935ramsci, 220‘2120, pe lhBO

lib-lips“.

82

implication is that Soviet totalitarianism is a product of the
Stalin era. Prominent scholars in the area of Soviet studies
and of totalitarianism.in general, such as Hannah.Arendt, Ber-
tram Wolfe and Karl Friedrich, analyze Stalinism as the transfor-
mation of Lenin's revolutionary dictatorship into complete totaliL
tarian rule.99 Togliatti is living testimony that ex-Stalinists
did not take the lead in defining their former allegiances as
totalitarian. Gramsci, however, developed a theory of totali-
tarianism based on his observation of the Fascist state. From
his prison cell Gramsci wrote:
The modern prince, the myth-prince, cannot be a
real person, a concrete individual; it can only be
an organism; a complex element of society in which
the cementing of the collective will, recognized
and partially asserted in action, has already be-
gun. This organism is already provided by his-
torical development, and it is the political
party: the first cell containing the germs of
collective will which are striving to become uni-
versal and total.100
Such.words were directed against Fascism under which Gramsci
had struggled for survival. Thus, we have what George Lichtheim
calls "a Marxist critique of totalitarianism." Gramsci's criti-
cism of Mussolini's Fascism can be applied almost verbatim to
Stalin's regime. Mussolini himself defined the Fascist state as
totalitarian in 1932:
The Fascist conception of the state is all-embraeing;
outside of it no human or spiritual values may exist,
much less have any value. Thus understood, Fascism

is totalitarian, and the Fascist state, as a syn-
thesis and as a unit which includes all values, in-

 

99Robert C. Tucker, The Soviet Political Mind: Studies in
Stalinism and Post—Stalin Change (New York: Random House, Inc.,

I960): . 5.
1 ichtheim, 23. 513., p. 368.

 

83
terprets, develops, and lends additional power to
the whole life of a people.101
Contrast Gramsci's writing in the days before the Fascist

regime, the "Factory Committee" or early Ordine Nuovo phase (1919-

 

1920). In an article written for Ordine Nuovo, Gramsci bares the

 

de Leon-syndicalist element in his theory. In answer to the ques-
tion 'Why is it that no congress of Factory Committees has ever

been held in Italy?‘ Gramsci answers:

Yes, there is in Italy, in Turin, the germ of a
workers' government, the germ of a Soviet. It is
the Factory Committee. Let us study this workers'
institution, investigate it. Let us also study
the capitalist factory, but not as an organiza-
tion for material production which would require
specialized knowledge we do not possess. Let us
study the capitalist framework for the working
class, as a political organism, as the 'national
territory' of worlers' self-government.102

The scheme of "factory councils" is inherently more democra-
tic in the representative sense than the later two phases of
Gramsci's work. He sees them as a peculiar historical develop-
ment independent of the party and the trade union which con-
trasts with the pre-eminent role that he later ascribes to the
party:

. . . in the Party and trade unions the worker plays
his role voluntarily, signing a written pledge -

a contract which he can tear up at any moment. The

Party and the trade unions, because of this 'volun—

tary ' character, because of their 'contractual' na-
ture, are not to be confused with the councils

which are representative institutions. . .and do
not develop mathematidally, but morphologically, and

 

IOITUCkeI', EBe Cite, p. he
102Gramsci, 22.j§§£., p. 23.

8b

in their higher forms tend to give a proletarian
meaning to the apparatus, created by the capitalist
for the purpose of extracting profit, of production,
and exchange. . .

There emerges from the "factory council" days a strong anti
bureaucratic bias and adherence to a syndicalist concept of repre-
sentative democracy:

. . . the factory councils . . . are assumed to be
a form of 'historical' association only comparable
to that of the present-day bourgeois state . . .
the factory council is an institution of a 'public'
character while the Party and the trade unions are
associations of a 'private' nature.10h

This theme of the Factory Councils is also found in the
Workers' Councils in Russia, Hungary and Bavaria, after‘World'War
I; in English Guild Socialism, and later in the anti-Stalin work-
ing class movements in the Hungarian and Polish revolts of 1956.
Gramsci does not intend to entirely dispense with political govern-
ment in the manner of Proudhon's anarchism. Marx's comment on
the "industrial character of the Communist society of producers"
in analyzing the Paris Commune is given by Gramsci as the inepira-

tion for the syndicalism blended with Lenin and de Leon, which is

the basis for the Ordine Nuovo - Factory Council movement.105

 

Caution in drawing a distinction between the voluntary nature of
the party as an association and the FactOry Council as an involun-
tary association, similar to the state, accentuates the necessarily
limited character of the party's activity in the peculiar circum-

stances of Italy which Togliatti revives soon' after World War II.

 

lOBIbid. Pe 25e .
lohIB-iHe: "p. 214-25e
1051513., Do 27.

85

The dichotomy that Gramsci makes between the FactOry Council and
the party and the voluntary nature of membership in the party
leaves Open the question of internal organization of the party
which later becomes Leninist and remains so within the framework
of an Open society containing many voluntary associations. In—
voluntary association of the worker in his role as industrial pro-
ducer with other workers later has its counterpart in Togliatti's
definition of the involuntary nature of the worker's membership and
participation in the bourgeois democratic state after 19hh. It
becomes palatable to tolerate this condition as long as the party
has its autonomy to continue its role in changing Italian society
to the benefit of the working class.

Concern, after 1956, among the PCI leaders, that the bur-
eaucratic centralism typical of Communist parties might hinder
effective communication between the party and the masses is indi-
cated by Togliatti in his June 2h, 1956, report to the PCI Cen-
tral Committee:

. . . for a party which is shut up in itself, which
has become bureaucratic, in which prevails the ten-
dency not to think but only to command and obey,

is not in a position to establish a broad connection
with the masses, that connection which we have al-
ways wanted the party to establish and which ought
to be the essential characteristic of our party.
Hence, a continual struggle for internal democracy
within the party, for strong activity and internal
alertness on thelart of our organizations, which
cannot and should not interfere with political and
work discipline or with the method of democratic

centralism.10

Gramsci's interpretation of bureaucracy, written while he

106"Palmiro Togliatti's Report . . .", p. 2&1.

86

was imprisoned by the "bureaucratic centralist" Fascist state,
seems to have guided Togliatti's words in the preceding quotation.
Gramsci said, in part:

'Organicness' sic (organicita) can only come from
democratic centralism which is centralism.in move-
ment, so to speak, that is, a continued adjustment
of the organization to the real movement, a temper-
ing of the thrusts from below with the command from
above, a continuOus intrusion of elements which
emerge from the depths of the masses into the

solid frame of the apparatus of rule . . . it

is 'organic' because it takes account of the move-
ment, which is the organic means for the reveal-
ing of historical reality and does not become
mechanically stiffened in the bureaucracy.10

The recognition by Gramsci that some measure of equilibrium
between the leadership and the mass must be maintained is obvious
in the statement "a tempering of the thrusts from below with the
command from above. . ." Moreover, Gramsci considers this equi-
librium not only a means of conflict resolution within the party,
but also within the wider context of the state:

The prevalence of bureaucratic centralism.in the
State indicates that the ruling group is saturated,
becoming a narrow clique which strives to perpetu-
ate its selfish privileges by regulating or even
suffocating the birth of these forces that are
homogeneous to the fundamental ruling interests.108

Again, Togliatti imitates his mentor in analyzing the role
of the party organization vis-a-vis the wider society:

Let us remember what Lenin said, that organization
is the 'sole' weapon which the working class has
in its hands with which to strike the adversary.
However, it is impossible for a practical program
of organization to take the place of a policy.

In the last analysis, if one is reduced to an
Organizational program detached from ever new and
substantial political undertakings, one is faced

 

“i07Gramsci, 22. cit., p. 17’4-
08Ibid. _

 

ua'h... v. 1.. «an

87

with deficiencies and failures, and it is im-

possible to achieve the advances which objective

conditions would render possible.10

In essence, Gramsci's (and subsequently, Togliatti's)
acceptance of the existence of competing forces within hierar-
chies has been crucial in shaping the contemporary Communist
ideology, which views the PCI as an important instrument of
social change without recourse to violent revolution. Social
groups in periods of "organic crisis" (or during crises of
authority) desert their traditional parties. In other words, the
traditional party no longer represents the interests of a particu-
larsocial group or class which consequently seeks its agent of re-
presentation elsewhere. Such crises of authority, Gramsci feels,’
are dangerous because it is in these periods of instability that
demagogic appeals to emotion by "men of destiny" are most suc-
cessful.110
Yet sometimes the traditional ruling class which already

has a large trained bureaucracy is able to retain control by making
a few concessions and minor changes in policy. Gramsci calls
this an "organic" solution to the problem of an aspiring pro-
gressive force or class exerting itself against the conservative
traditional force. But when the demagogue (apparently Mussolini)
or”divine leader," as Gramsci labels him, is catapulted to power,
this is a sign that the traditional force was not able to adapt

itself to the new conditions. At the same time, the aspiring

"Progressive" force is not deve10ped enough to prevail over the

i

 

 

109"Palmiro Togliatti's Report . . .", p. 2h2-hh
lloGramsci, EEe 9.2.2., Pe l7he

 

88

weak and inflexible, but more experienced conservative group.
Thus, Gramsci says, a condition of "static equilibrium" (totali-
tarianism) reigns. Gramsci feels that this situation unveils
an important deficiency in any political party, that is "the
capacity of the party for reacting against the spirit of habit,
against the tendency to become mummified and anachronistic."111
The problem of bureaucratic anachronism is the most acute
cause of rigidity and lack of flexibility. In the words of

Gramsci:

 

In analyzing this party develOpment it is necessary

to distinguish:: the social group; the mass of the

party; the bureaucracy and High Command of the party.
‘ The bureaucracy is the most dangerously habitual

and conservative force; if it ends up by consti-

tuting a solid body, standing by itself and feel-

ing independent from the masses, the party ends

by becoming anachronistic and in moments of crisis

becomes emptied of all its social content, like an

empty shell.112

Togliatti again echoes the founding father of Italian Com-
munism.when he expresses his abhorrence of party bureaucratic ob-
duracy in organization:

The struggle for a proper internal administration
was not connected to a debate on present and urgent
political questions. From this came the limited
effectiveness of this struggle, the limitations

on internal democracy of the party, the tendency

to restrict this democracy, corporal's pettiness,
and lastly the failure to develop our political
action.113

Further blame for party ineffectiveness in dealing with con-
temporary problems is again ascribed to hierarchical inelasticity
‘within the party, particularly with reference to the question of

.free exchange of ideas. In his June.2h, 1956, speech to the Cen-

l Ibide’ Pe 175.
1 01 .
113"Palmiro Togliatti's Report . . .", p. 1&5

 

89

~tral Committee, he speaks very favorably in alluding to a meeting
of Communist intellectuals in Rome. He refers to "an atmosphere
of outlet" here and there as being a departure from orderly dis-
cussion, but nevertheless hails the open and free interaction of
ideas as a way of drawing more members into increasingly active
participation in the party "as this is the only way in which it is
possible to contribute to increasing democratic life in the

party, to combating bureaucracy, corporal's pettiness and stag-

nationu11h

 

 

llhlbide, Pe 263e

CHAPTER IV
THE PCI OF THE FUTURE: CONTINUATION OF
A PARADOXICAL ROLE?
It has already been mentioned that Gramsci had become quite 3
aware of Leninism as the theory and practice of a revolution in an

underdeveloped country. His writings at all stages of his in- .

 

tellectual growth are fraught with an awareness of the role that "
the vanguard of the proletariat should play as leader of the mas-
ses that are precipitously thrust upon the political scene.

Adam Ulam's premise, in the Unfinished Revolution, that Marxism

 

replaces more "radical forms of socialism, in particular, anar-.
chism and syndicalism, does parallel, with some modification, the
Italian Marxist experience. In replacing these two "isms" as the
major anti-state and anti-industrial protest movement, Marxism is
not only able to assimilate elements of, but also'to become the
organizational expression of, other forms of socialism. . ."115
Ulam says that syndicalism and anarchism become obsolete
ideologies as a rallying call to the working class at that stage
of the society's development when the pattern of industrialization
is permanently' embossed on the society. However, no sooner does

the realization of the permanence of industrial-urbanism manifest

In

 

_ 115Adam Ulam, The Unfinished Revolution (New York: Random
House, IDCe, 1960), pe lSBe

 

91

itself than "the same forces that had made the worker abandon
the mere spirit of Opposition to the state and industry, the
mere principle of the workers' association as a substitute for
any more comprehensive philosophy of politics and society, make
him chafe under doctrinaire Marxism and push him.toward a more
pragmatic and evolutionary type of socialism." 116 ;
After the failure of Mazzinian idealism.to turn the Ital-

ian national awakening in the direction of a republic and the

 

establishment of the Savoy'Monarchy, the Bakuninite Anarchists I
became major socialist and revolutionary influence in Italy.
Mazzini's thought had always been uncompromisingly anti-material-
ist. Furthermore his rejection of class warfare brought him

into direct confrontation with both Marxism and Anarchism. The
failure of republicanism precluded any possibility that the
Mazzinians would play a major role in the social and economic
transformation of Italian society. Mazzini's ideas were so close-
1y tied to the Italian struggle for independence from foreign
domination that when that act was accomplished with Cavour and
Victor Immanuel at the helm, his lure as a social revolutionary
was lost. In the rush to assume the mantle of social revolution
that followed Mazzini's demise, Bakunin's victory over the
Marxists is symbolized by the July 28, 1869 announcement by the
London General Council, that Bakunin's Geneva-based group (The

International Alliance of Socialist Democracy) had been accepted

 

116Ibid., p. 106.

92

into the First International. Thus, Bakunin, who had been active

as a revolutionary in Italy since 186b, had been given the "nod"

by Marx and his London friends to pursue the anarchist cause under

the aegis

of the organized international socialist movement.117

The impact of Bakunin's triumph on the subsequent evo-

lution of
tetter in

Socialist

on

Italian socialism is best summarized by Richard Hos- r
his monumental work on the origins of the Italian -

movement:

 

.From the Italian point of view, the identification '
of Bakunin and his group with the First Interna->
tional was of cardinal importance, for it meant
that the international socialist movement was to
penetrate the peninsula under the sponsorship

of a small clique of agitators and organizers
closely bound by personal ties to the Russian
revolutionary and sharing with him a body of
socialist doctrine deriving not from the Com-
munist Manifesto or Das Kapital, but from Proud-
hon and—Pisacane, as edited and revised by
Bakunin. In delaying the debut of 'scientific
socialism' in Italy by more than a decade, this,
from the Marxists' point of view, was a calam-

 

 

the basis of Hostetter's statement alone, anarchism's

precedence over Marxism might well appear to have been the result

of clever

Bakunin's

intrigue on the part of Bakunin. However, most of

success as a violent revolutionary, until his appoint-

ment to the International,, had occurred during his residence

in Italy and would continue there through the 1870's. Most

historical data point to the greater appeal of anarchism over

I

Marxism in the early stages of industrialization in Italy. The

 

117

Richard Hostetter, The Italian Socialist Movement: I.

 

Origins (1860-1882) (Princeton, New'Jersey: D. Van Nostrand Com-

 

an Inc
p y’ 118

, 19587'p. 120-121.
Ibid., p. 121e

93

syndicalists enjoyed the second place in terms of appeal to the
nascent Italian working class. In fact, even Antonio Labriola,
the great Italian Marxist theorist of the 19th century, and
Gramsci's professor and the source of his early inspiration (at
Turin University) was strongly influenced by syndicalist ideas.
The Romagna (Emilia) traditionally recognized as the cradle of
Italian revolutionary socialism and today probably the strongest

center of Communist support in Italy, was an anarchist and syn-

 

dicalist stronghold before the Marxists gained any major following
there. The Italian trade union movement as earlier pages pointed
out, has always had strong synsicalist currents running through
it, whether directly controlled by Marxists or Fascists. The
flourishing of anarchism and syndicalism in areas where the
"newness of industrialization has not killed off the peasant men-
tality"1l9 that preempts Marxism, is consistent with early anar-
chist and syndicalist appeal in such islands of urban industrial
growth as Naples and Palermo in the south and Livorno and

Bologna in central Italy. These cities are still surrounded by a
predominantly peasant culture (although the two central cities'
hinterlands have recently undergone more rapid integration into
industrial societylzo). Bologna, the capital of Emilia, remains
the most thoroughly Marxist city in all of Italy in terms of
both national electoral criteria and control of local government

electoral offices.

 

119Ulam o . cit. . l .
1201bid’. J3 -- ’ p 53

9h

The role of Marxism in modern culture has been, and will
continue to be, a highly flexible one. Ulam points out that
Eduard Bernstein, the humanitarian revisionist, and Georges Sorel
the violent irrationalist, both turn to Marxist theory in sup-
port of their quite diverging conclusions:

To Sorel, Marx is the anarchist, the.ancestor of
syndicalism and the spontaneous revolutionary
movement of the workers. To Bernstein, Marx is
primarily the social democrat and humanitarian.

If one discounts the revolutionary phraseology

of Marx's younger days, obsolete now under the
conditions of socialism in twentieth century.EurOpe,
one finds, holds Bernstein, the real scientific
socialism. If one discounts the deposit of ear-
lier socialist theories and utOpias, retorts

Sorel, one finds the real Marx: the revolutionary,
the proponent of the violent take-over by_the work-
ers. Both the democrat and the believer in vio-
lence find in Marxism what they are seeking. Both
the acceptance and rejection of industrialization
and contempt for democracy, which is syndicalism
invoke Marx.121

Similarly, Gramsci wrote of this fusion of Marxism and

‘ other social movements: "Marxism has beentapotent force in modern
culture and, to a certain extent, has determined and fertilized

a number of currents of thought within it."122 He felt that the
most important blending of Marxism occurred in certain idealist
philosophers, among whom he included Sorel, Gentile and Croce.

At the same time, Marxism was identified with what Gramsci called
"traditional materialism" by "orthodox" (positivist) Marxists.

The combination of Marxism with idealism occurred mainly among

"pure" intellectuals and the transfusion with traditional matere

 

1QZI-Ulam, Op. cit., p. 15h-155.
122 Gramsc1, Op. —cit., p. 82.

 

 

 

9S

ialism among more "practical" intellectuals who were more closely
tied to the masses. The former, who were spokesmen of the pre-
vailing ruling class, were astute enough to borrow certain as-
pects of Marxism in order to narrow the gap between their abstract
theorizing and the realities of the day. This gave the ruling
group a temporary new lease on life. The "orthodox" materialist
Marxists, on the other hand, were forced to borrow elements from

idealism in order to temper their appeal to the masses, whose

 

materialism was disguised by religious transcendentalism: " . . .
it was necessary for Marxism to ally itself with alien tendencies
in order to combat capitalist hangovers, especially in the field
of religion, among the masses Of the people."1214

The significant and continuing importance of Marxism's
linkage with other philosophies is important in weighing the
contention that Marxism has been and will continue to be an
important agent of social change in modern culture. Its influ-
ence has been diffused throughout the atmosphere of modern
culture "which modified old ways of thinking through hidden and
delayed actions and reactions."125

.DevelOpment of a pOpular culture has never been accomplished
in any social movement, according to Gramsci, by the intellectuals,
but by the peOple as a whole. The intellectuals of a previously
dominant group who were key architects of the new cultural deve—
lopments (for example: Luther and Calvin) deserted the move-

ments they had inspired under pressures from the enemy. It was

 

lthbide, pe 85.
12SGramsci, 22. 312., p. 88-89.

96

necessary to recruit a new group of intellectuals from the masses
whose loyalty to the movement would be unswerving under attack.
But this fashioning of new leaders would be a slow and gradual
process, rendering the movement sterile for a time. A process
similar to this has occurred in Marxism:

The great intellectuals formed in its soil were
few in number, not connected with people, did not
come from the people but were the expression of
the traditional middle classes to which many re-
verted during the great historical 'turning
points!& Others remained, but in order to submit
the new concept to revision and not to win an in-
dependent.development for it. The assertion that
Marxism is an independent, original concept is
the assertion of the independence and originality
of a new culture in birth which will develop with
the development of social relations. What exists
at each turn is a varying combination of the old
and the new, creating a momentary equilibrium

of cultural relationships corresponding to the
equilibrium in social relationships.12

Herein lies a key theoretical sanction for the present
Communist party of Italy, which sees itself as an adaptable car-
rier of social and cultural change, yet reluctant to admit that
its adaptability and flexibility constitute revisionism. Tog-
liatti accepts this role for the PCI, as innovator, and at the
same time repudiates the label of piecemeal reformer:

Of course, following a democratic line of develop-
ment could not mean and never was intended to
mean for us, the empty affirmation of the neces-
sity for specific reforms. It meant the struggle
of the masses, and first of all, of the working
class; it meant a great and continuous effort on

the part of the working class to make broader and
broader alliances with all those strata which can

t:-

 

 

1266’ram5Ci, BEe ESL-fie, p. 88-89.

97
and should be interested in a thorough alteration
of society.

Gramsci classifies Bernstein and other revisionists in the
same category as Luther and Calvin: as intellectual leaders who
abandoned their revolutionary movements; however he also acknow-
ledges, as we have seen, the interbreeding of Marxism and other
social philosophies. When Bernstein announced his revisionism
publicly, it is said that an "orthodox" remarked to him that most
Marxists agreed with him, but it was unfortunate that he should
feel the compulsion to say so in public places.128 Perhaps
Togliatti viewed the contemporary PCI leadership as the "new"
intellectual leadership of which Gramsci spoke, as originating
within the masses, after the retreat of the "old" group. Ad-
mittedly, this is a highly hypothetical prOposition. In any
event, it is highly doubtful that Togliatti would consciously
have gone to that extent to rationalize his actions on so spe- ‘
cific a philosophical question, and that the question hy itself
would have much significance in practical politics. But what
is of maximum political relevance in the above statement of
Togliatti is that the PCI has no intention of abandoning the
leadership of the working class movement in Italy and its role as
a major instrument of social change, however conditions change and

3

force the party into newer and wider alliances.

 

12gTogliatti, gp. g_i_t_., p. 239.
12 Ulam, op. gi3., p. 161.

 

CHXFTER V

CONCLUSION

The dilemma of the Italian Communist Party regarding the
difficulty of shedding the Leninist-Stalinist past has been posed.

The continuing impact of Marxism on modern culture in effecting

 

social and cultural change, as having defined a role for the PCI

 

of the future, have been analyzed. But, can the party adapt to
the social and economic changes that itself admits are essential
for the triumphs of the working class, and still keep its Lenin-
ist-centrist organization intact? If it fails in this, and
factional disputes split the party asunder, then the party will
either disintegrate or become a minor and impotent force in
Italian society. However, the need to hold the party together as
a centralized, disciplined force will not be a condition of

PCI survival forever. At the point where Italian society deve-
10ps that mass ideological parties of protest will be rendered
obsolete, electoral campaigns would then take the form of achiev-
ing consensus by organizing electorates regardless of ideologi-
cal loyalties. The efficient and highly organized PCI could

then function as a party of consensus containing a variety of
viewpoints without fear of disintegration as a center of politi-
cal power. This presupposes the continuing elasticity of the

party to meet changing conditions which it thus far successfully

98

99

demonstrated. i"urthermore, the party can take consolation in the
fact that the poverty of the south promises to be a problem for
many years to come. This could provide an interim period for the
party during which it could assume a dual role. On the one hand,
in the local politics of the developed north, its radicalism
might very well become obsolete, as pluralistic tendencis in—
crease. There the party can be expected to not only continue, but
expand Togliatti's policies of moderation. But the southern prob-
lem.will furnish the PCI with economic conditions of an earlier
generation in the north during which the'party's superior organi-
zation replaced more radical ideologies. Ulam's insight may very
well serve as a future model for the perpetuation of the PCI and,
a paradoxical capitalist develOpment of the south; culminating
at last in a mature economic-political integration of all of
Italy:-
A vigorous growth of capitalism helps the growth of
Marxist socialism among the workers; but, also, a
speedy extinction of Marxism of syndicalist and
anarchist feelings among the workers can be a
flourishing develOpment of capitalism!129
The important question still remains -- will the tradition-
al Italian political style allow necessary adaptation to take
place? Would it be possible for the PCI, which has learned the

lesson of the Italian style of politics, to lead an even more

schizophrenic existence? Certainly the workings of modern tras-

 

formismo on the PCI were obvious as we observed TOgliatti's

practical approach (usually followed by ideological redefinition).

 

129Ib1d., p. 163.

I‘.‘ n}. ' '0 f"-- _

 

100

The paradox of a party with a revolutionary appeal in one region
(the South) and a moderate reformist one in another (the North)
is not so outlandish that we cannot conceive of it as a possibil-
ity. The Democratic Party of the United States has often had
different appeals to voters in the north and south. But in Italy
emigration from the south to the north and from rural to urban
locales is further complicating the dilemma of the PCI.

Voting data show without question that the PCI is most
successful in attracting the support of southern migrants to
Milan, Turin and other northern industrial centers where they
find themselves living in conditions at least as depressed, if not
moreso, than those they left at home.13O Studies conducted in
the strongly leftdwing regions of central Italy, particularly
Tuscany, umbria and Emilia-Romagna (the so-called red belt)
indicate that the peasants who migrate from the surrounding
countryside of a large city to the city prOper, tend to vote
Communist in even greater numbers.131

Most observers of Italian voting behavior believe that the
Communist party benefits most,of all the parties.from the con-
tinuing movement of the population from rural to urban setting.
'Where there has been significant migration from the countryside
the Communist vote has increased. In fact it is in these areas

that the recent Communist gains have been the greatest. The

 

130Joseph LaPolambara, Interest Groups in Italian Politics
(Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1965), p. h.
lallbid., p. 90.

 

101

gains of 1963, however, were probably somewhat due to disenchant-
ment on the part of many workers and trade union members with
the "opening to the left."

we have seen that peasants, newly-initiated into the urban
culture, tend to vote for the most radical parties of the left.
The PCI no doubt attracted many of these newly-arrived migrants
because of the nature of its campaign, that is a fierce condem-
nation of its former socialist (PSI) allies. The PSI on the
other hand, managed to hold its own while the Communists gained
about one million votes. The Social Democrats made impressive
gains, while Christian Democrats incurred serious losses. The
Liberal Party (PLI) gained votes at the expense of the DC; prob-
ably because of the right of center voters who were protesting the
DC's left-leaning tendencies.

It is obvious that the PCI appeal to this disenchanted,
recently-urbanized pOpulation, will continue as long as the party
remains a protest movement. A hard core of the Communist vote is
made up of indignant, aroused intellectuals and deprived minori-
ties. However, in the traditionally left-wing areas, such as
Tuscany and Romagna, the PCI has dominated town and city govern-
ments since immediately after the war. Hence voters have feared
that extension of the Christian-Democratic-Socialist Alliance to
the local government, could mean the overturn of local Communist
regimes which have been the model of civic virtue and efficiency.
In this case, votes for the PCI may be an expression of desire to

preserve the status quo, which is actually a Conservative gesture.

 

 

102

Small industrialists, merchants, shop owners, bureaucrats in co-
Operatives, adult education institutes, nurseries, kindergartens,
recreation centers and many small enterprises owe their positions
to the policies formulated by the local Communist regimes and to
the efficient implementation and enforcement of these policies.
In these local settings, Mauro Calamandrei emphasizes, the PCI
is a "party of the local ruling groups, largely managerial in
function and fairly indifferent and independent of the central
party headquarters in Rome."132
Can the PCI exploit the new rural arrivals in the cities and
industrial centers as a source of electoral support and still re-
tain intact this stable bloc of voters who have been defined above
as "conservative"? A decidedly radical appeal seems to be essen-
tial to attract the former peasants not yet assimilated into
their new environment in the cities, Calamandrei aptly summarizes
the continuing importance of this group to Communist success
at the polls:
Once starving farm workers join a gang of miners
or enter an industrial plant . . . they quickly
acquire the democratic spirit. Their erstwhile
fatalism is transformed into anger over past
and present injustices, often making them advo-
cates of radical political positions.l3
Thus urban immigrant Communist votes registered in protest

against the government for its failure to implement rapidly enough

the progressive social goals of the "opening to the left," cannot

 

132Mauro Calamandrei, "Understanding Italy's Vote: Why the
Communists Gained Strength," The New Leader, XLVI (May 27, 1963)
p0 1’4’150 r

133Ibid.

 

 

103

be counted on by the PCI unless its program appeals to these
radicals' sentiments. To revive this protest vote the party must
structure its program on the basis of repudiation of the status
quo. In so doing, the PCI may very well capture most of it, but
what of the elements in Emilia-Romagna and Tuscany, who have
voted Communist constantly, and who view the arrival of large

numbers of southern migrants as an intrusion and threat to their

security? The cost of strapping the new urban immigrant elements
to the party could well be the loss of this long-standing support.
Another source of alarm to the PCI, despite the gains of
1963, could be the Christian Democratic losses to both the Conser-
vative parties as well as the left of center parties. The right
of center Liberal party doubled its 1958 vote, partially at the
expense of the DC, in addition to picking up some additional votes
that previously belonged to the defunct Monarchist party. Desertion
by Conservatives of the DC right wing in protest to the "opening
to the left" would not be a direct source of concern to the PCI,
in that the shift involved a source of voters that has never
been even remotely a target of the Communist appeal. However, the
ability of the Socialist party, organizationally and financially
one of the weakest parties to retain intact its mass support (only
a loss of O.h per centiJrl963) in the face of the fierce Communist
attack on its collaboration with the DC, is revealing. The Social
Democratic Party increase, from h.h in 1958 to-6.3 in 1963, is

even more significant evidence of increasing endorsement of the

 

10h

"opening to the left" by progressive-minded, though non—Commun-
ist voters.13h Voting data indicate that the left-wing of DC
made impressive gains, while the party as a whole drOpped from
h2 to 38 per cent of the vote. This is further evidence of appro-
val of the moderate left collaboration betwenn the DC, the PSI and
the PSDI.135
PSI and PCI are quite similar in that they bOth attract the
working class vote. About two~thirds of Italy's working class vote
is attracted to the three major Marxist parties. The PCI attracts
most of that vote, but it is interesting to note that it is the
most proletarian of all the parties. About fifty per cent of
the PCI vote consists of unskilled workers and their wives. Data
on the educational level of voters as well as occupational level
strongly demonstrate the proletarian character of the PCI. It is
noteworthy also that ninety per cent of Communist party supporters
have had no education or only elementary education. Merely two
per cent have had upper middle school or university education.136
The vast majority of the peasants who migrate from the
-land to the urban industrial centers have little or no education.
The Communists, as has been indicated, attract these votes and
will continue to do so. But data also indicate that the other
Marxist parties are more successful than the Communists in attract—
ing better educated and more skilled members of the working classes.

Also the PSI is much more successful (and the PSDI even more so)

 

13SLaPolambara, 22. 212., p. 191.
136Ibid., p. 9h.

 

 

105

than the PCI in attracting lower-middle and middle class sup-
port.137

This brief evaluation of Italian voting data vis-a-vis the
most recent parliamentary election indicates then, that the PCI
is the chief initial beneficiary of the process of mobility from
rural agricultural to urban-industrial environments. However, the
PSI, PSDI and DC (leftdwing) are apparently more successful in

gaining the support of workers as they experience educational/oc-

 

cupational mobility from manual occupation to skilled and white i
COIIar occupations. The process of economic development in

Italy seems to thus far effect the same changes in breakdown in
extremist ideological orientation and in moderation of political
choice as it moves forward, that we are able to observe in the
history of British political and economic development. The PCI

thus has the prospect of looking forward to a condition in which

new urban arrivals experience their first extra-familial asso-
ciational contacts (outside of the church) in the Communist

party, and so become a major bulwark of Communist support. On 7
the other hand, those who continue to live and work in the city

and consequently acquire more skills, education and income, are

more attracted to the progressive appeals of the other Marxist
parties and popularistic Catholic political organizations. 80

what is gained by the PCI through economic development and hori-

zontal mobility (for our purposes from country to city and farm to

137Ibid., p. 95.

 

 

106

factory) is eventually lost through vertical mobility.

The PCI will thus be compelled to continue the astute poli-
cies of Togliatti that fashioned the party as a haven for a wide
variety of political interests. The successors to Togliatti must
not allow themselves to be lulled into false security that may be
engendered by Communist predominance in local government in the
"red belt" and a few other selected areas. Filtration of the
DC-PSI cOOperation from the national level to the level of the
local government politics is bound to occur sooner or later. The
PSI, for example, would have much to gain from coalitions with
the Christian Democrats on a local level in "red belt" towns
and cities where they are second to the PCI in strength and
where they have had to accept a role subordinate to the PCI,
as the price of fellow-traveling, much as they previously had
accepted in the days of Nenni-Togliatti collaboration in parliament.

Transformation in ideology in respOnse to economic changes--
that is essential. The inspiration to effect this transformation
should exist; too many party leaders and workers have no pro-
fession and thus no source of income outside the party.138

The PCI of today includes a large number of bureaucrats
and politicians who have delicately and painfully constructed
and maintained the PCI through war, domestic repression and many
years as a highly successful opposition party. They have be-

come too dependent on the party to allow it to wither away for

 

1331b1d., p. 78.

 

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107

lack of sensitivity to changing realities. Inability of the
PCI to adapt to changing conditions has not been one of the de-
ficiencies of the party. In the tradition of Italian politics,
it is presently skillful as any party in the art of trasformismo..
This by itself would entitle it to a continuing role on the
Italian political scene. Is it possible that the PCI as an organi-
zation will cease to be creative in its ability to adapt to
social and economic realities? An attempt has been made in this
study to trace the evolution of the-PCI as a highly adaptive
political mechanism. Abdication of an increasingly important place
in Italian society because of unwillingness and/or inability to
adapt would represent a sharp break with past behavior for the
Italian Communist Party. The Italian political practice of turning
Oppositions into majority combinations or coalitions has been a
continuing feature of Italian political life.
The period in the early 1920's when the combination did
not materialize, in retrospect appears to have been a departure
from the Italian style before that time. Giolitti and other
"transformers" always sought to legitimize their non-democratic
actions in terms of the parliamentary model. The totalitarian
state made no such pretenses. The crisis of social, political
and economic change that came about in the wake of World war I
further fragmented an already proliferated Italian political cul-
ture. The post World war I period was an era during which frus-
trations of all segments of Italian society ran deep, leading to

highly emotional responses on the political stage. Charismatic

 

108

leadership sought to fill the gap caused by the inability of the
newlybenfranchised classes to successfully contract and stabilize
political combinations. The leaders as well as the rank and file
members of the expanded mass political organizations had not yet

become socialized to the norms of trasformismo. Immediately after

 

the catastrophe of the triumph of Fascism began the long process

of socialization to the norms of trasformismo. In the under-

 

ground, in exile, as a leader in the resistance during the war
and as the leading mass party of protest after the war, the PCI

served its apprenticeship.

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books

 

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Almond, Gabriel and Verba, Sidney, The Civic Culture: Poli-
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Cole, G. D. H., Socialist Thought: Communism and Social Demo-
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Delzell, Charles, Mussolini's Ememies: The Italian Anti-Fascist
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Hentze, Margot, Pro-Fascist Italy, London: G. Allen and Unwin,
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LaPolambara, Joseph, Interest Groups in Italian Politics,
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Marzani, Carl, The Open Marxism of Antonio Gramsci, New York:
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111

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