Italy: Back to Basics
Party of Communist Refoundation
International Viewpoint #264 MARCH 1995
By Livio Maitan
The 'official' ex-Communist Party of Democratic Socialism has continued to move to the centre in response to the growing political crisis in Italy, and the threat of a new authoritarianism. In contrast, the Party of Communist Refoundation, formed by a number of left currents including a minority from the Italian Communist Party, has kept its anti-capitalist orientation, and renewed its determination to defend the rights of Italian workers. But as Livio Maitan explains, "Refoundation" now has to wrestle with classic' questions like the relationship of a workers' party and its parliamentary representatives, and the right of a minority to criticise the party in public.
The failure of the Progressive Pole in the 1994 general election persuaded its leading component, the former Communist Democratic Left Party (PDS) to reorient towards the centre-ground of Italian politics. In the subsequent municipal elections, the PDS formed an alliance with the Popular Party (PPI - the former Christian Democratic Party) wherever possible.
The Party of Communist Refoundation (PRC) also addapted its orientation after last year's general election; redefining its programme which more clearly responded to the needs of the workers and exploited, and more clearly opposed the austerity measures of recent governments.
The growing division between the two former wings of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) is illustrated by the municipal election in Brescia. The PDS mayor did not stand for re-election, and the PDS refused repeated offers of a coalition with the PRC and instead supported Mino Martinazzoli, the last national secretary of the Christain Democratic party, and now a leading PPI member.
This divergence is all the sadder since the militants of both left parties had come together in the wave of mobilisations during the autumn of 1994. But it seems clear that the PDS leadership tolerated their members participation mainly to punish the Berlusconi government for its intransigence 28 than to build a movement from below. Statements from PDS Secretary Massimo D'Alema in early December 1994 confirmed that his party want to participate in a coalition of the centre parties, and demarkate from "Refoundation."
difficulties in forming government to replace Silvio Berlusconi obliged all the left parties, including the Party of Communist Refoundation, to state their possible partners. "Refoundation" president Armando Cossuta and a majority of the secretariat indicated that they would have supported only a "guarantee government" limitting itself to the preparation of new elections, and committed to respecting all existing agreements with the trades unions, including those on old age pensions, which have come under attack by the right. Other "Refoundation" leaders would have gone as far as supporting a government of the PDS, PPI and the Northern League under Romano Prodi, former Christian Democratic manager of nationalised industries.
These endless public debates and speculations seemed to be a matter of party tactics. But in fact, they reveal problems and divisions for the workers' movement in the relationship a workers' party should take towards a government dominated by bourgois forces. What alliances should we propose, or accept, if we are faced with the installation of an authoritarian, if not fascist regime ? Do our elected represenatives have the right to ignore party discipline or invoke their conscience ? Can a minority publically oppose decisions taken by a majority of the elected party leadership?
All tendencies in the PRC argued that the situation was not only bad, but deteriorating, and that it was essential to block the advance of the right by vigorously defending the right of the citizens to decide on the future government,condeming the centre parties' preferance of party negotiations over snap elections, and preparing to oppose the attacks on the masses sure to follow the establishment of any imaginable variety of centre or centre left government, given the past behavour of the main candidates.
For the minority currents in the PRC, opposing an authoritarian development obliged the party to participate in, and support a possible centre-left coalition government. Minority leader Serio Garavini, former Party secretary, exhorted the majority not to repeat the sectarian errors of the Komintern at the time of Hitler's rise to power. For Garavini, unity with the PDS was a top priority, and he provlaimed himself willing to vote for the Dini 'technocrat' government. He also argued that the parliamentary fraction should not be bound by decisions of the Party leadership.
It is striking that the lines of this division within the Party cannot be traced to any single division between the various currents and components that make up the new organisation. It seems instead that the PRC is reliving some of the classic moments of the workers' movement.
The perenial debate about whether elected representatives should make their own decision, or follow party discipline was regularly discussed at the socialist congresses of the late 19th century. Its reemergence today is a symptom of a deeper process. The parliamentary fraction is bound to feel most strongly the perverse effects of a systematic integration into the institutions of bourgois society, without deep roots in the social base of society. They are the most exposed to it. Some are bound to slide towards more moderate behaviour. The pronounced gap between our parliamentary representation and our social implantation, and our lack of a clear anti-capitalist programme, makes it hardly surprising that in the case of the PRC, a large part of our parliamentary caucus should slide towards the centre.
These same structural and programatic weaknesses of the left, coupled with the deteriorating situatin in the country, the attacks of the right, the risks of an authoritarian initiative, lead some sections of the party to advocate left unity at any price, democratic unity at any price, and even unity with the 'constitutional' right. This analysis is defensive and, in the final analysis, an illusion. These comrades propose an orientation which would mute, if not obliterate, the autonomy of our party, and reduce it to a kind of pressure group within a centre-left coalition.
Unfortunately, reflection on the political and strategic background to our everyday activities has ground to a halt in "Refoundation" since the period of preparation of the last congress. But there is no other way out of our current troubles, and no other way to make the PRC an effective lever in the reconstruction of the Italian workers' movement. *