Francesco Barbagallo

Di Vittorio, the CGIL, and the Communist Party between Labour Plan and «Cassa per il Mezzogiorno»

This essay reconstructs the attitudes of CGIL leader Giuseppe Di Vittorio in favour of the institution and politics of the Cassa per il Mezzogiorno. In particular, it analyses Di Vittorios support for the industrialisation plan for Southern Italy produced by Pasquale Saraceno and SVIMEZ in the Congress organized by the Cassa per il Mezzogiorno in late 1953. These statements by the CGIL leader were criticized and condemned by PCI leadership, and by Giorgio Amendola and Mario Alicata in particular. Giuseppe Di Vittorio was thus forced to issue dramatic self-criticism.

Enrico Berlinguer. Il Pci come partito della democrazia socialista

The text revisits a speech made in the Italian Chamber of Deputies, marking the first circumstances, in 1974 and in 1976, when Enrico Berlinguer defined the moral question as the main political question to be resolved at once in order to put an end to Italys crisis and decline. The essay then reconstructs the politics of independence from the Ussr, which increased from 1968 to 1981-82, and the evolution of the model of Italian Communism, which Berlinguer identified with a party of Socialist Democracy.