Here is the abstract of my Thesis. For those who are interested, (though I certainly do not expect you to be), the full document can be found here: http://www.scribd.com/davidloverme
The PCI to the Government, It Costs What It Costs-Abstract
By 1976, the Italian Communist Party had transformed itself from a small oppositional force, closely tied to the Soviet Union, into a powerful autonomous political party, carrying the banner of the Italian left, and perched on the doorstep of government. Its experience as a weak semi-participant in the new Christian Democrat government, however, ultimately led to the Party’s electoral decline in 1979 and beyond. In examining this period, historians have overemphasized the importance of the kidnapping and assassination of Aldo Moro by the Red Brigades as well as the role of the United States and the Soviet Union. Consequently, they have generally overlooked the primacy of the PCI’s loss of oppositional flare, both politically and culturally, as the foremost cause of the PCI’s failures. Furthermore, historians have failed to delve deeply enough into the logic of the Party’s decision to coalesce to the weak Christian Democrat government and a much closer examination is required.
Holding the kidnapping and murder of Christian Democratic President Aldo Moro as the primary cause for the PCI’s decline assumes a loss of support from a sector of the electorate that the Party never enjoyed, and a will to include the Communists that Moro never possessed. Likewise, to attribute the PCI’s decline to the unfavorable manner in which the United States and USSR viewed the Party’s entry into majority government places too much emphasis on international conditions without recognizing the prime importance of domestic politics on voting trends. Therefore, the decline of the PCI derived first and foremost from its failure to maintain its oppositional character, both politically and culturally, in the eyes of voters. By attempting to toe the line between radical and conservative, and occupy the terrain between government and opposition, the Party doomed itself. The PCI isolated its traditional supporters by becoming too moderate, but its relatively weak position frustrated any efforts to gain support from the more moderate elements of society. Finally, the Party found itself unable and unwilling to connect with the new oppositional culture of the youth. Thus, as a result of this loss of oppositional character, the PCI dropped 4% in 1979, beginning a continual decline that would follow it to the end of the Cold War Era.
As a party so historically animated by opposition, the PCI’s choice to risk this attribute on such a weak offer from the Christian Democrats is peculiar. Ultimately, it was the result of the Party’s perceived need for a gradual slide into government through alliance, inspired by the lessons of the Allende coup in Chile; the PCI’s desire to be seen as the party of unity, willing to sacrifice its ego and work in coalition to reinvigorate the nation; and of its concern that the reshuffling of the Socialist Party might lead to a renewed alliance that threatened to negate the forward progress of the Communists.
Ultimately, it is necessary to correct the historical record in recognizing the primacy of the PCI’s loss of oppositional character and to understand the rationale behind the decision, in order to understand the current plight of the Italian Left. Only then can one begin to comprehend the political system that views a center-right government, tainted by corruption, as the inevitable norm. Likewise, it is necessary for the Left to realistically confront its past and recognize the errors of the PCI in order to cease looking backwards and invoking nostalgia, and to begin challenging the political order with something new and innovative.
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