Communist Party of Italy
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The Communist Party of Italy, or Partito Comunista Italiano (PCI) in Italian, was formed in 1921. It was created during the congress of the Italian Socialist Party on January 21, 1921 at Livorno. The left wing of the Socialist Party, including Amedeo Bordiga and Antonio Gramsci, broke off and formed the PCI.
In 1926 PCI was outlawed by the Fascist government of Benito Mussolini. It was reestablished in 1944 by Palmiro Togliatti.
The party took part in every government during the national liberation and constitutional periods, from June 1944 to May 1947. In the first general elections of 1948 it joined the Socialist Party in the Democratic Popular Front but was defeated by the Christian Democracy party.
The party gained considerable electoral success during the following years and occasionally supplied external support to center-left governments, never joining directly.
In 1991 the PCI disbanded to form the Partito Democratico della Sinistra (PDS) or Democratic Party of the Left, with membership in the Socialist International. The communist tendency, led by Armando Cossutta, left the party to form the Partito della Rifondazione Comunista (PRC) or Communist Refoundation Party.
In 1998 the PDS, with several smaller parties, the Laburisti (liberal socialists), the Cristiano Sociali (christian socialists), the Comunisti Unitari (right-wing split of the PRC), the Sinistra Repubblicana (left republicans) and the Riformatori per l'Europa (social democratic syndicalists), co-founded the "Democratici di Sinistra" (DS) or Democrats of the Left party. Later in the same year the Armando Cossutta tendency left the PRC to form the Partito dei Comunisti Italiani (PdCI) or Italian Communists Party.
Party Secretaries (in chronological order):
- Amedeo Bordiga (1921-1924)
- Antonio Gramsci (1924-1926)
- Palmiro Togliatti (1927-1964)
- Luigi Longo (1964-1972)
- Enrico Berlinguer (1972-1984)
- Alessandro Natta (1984-1988)
- Achille Occhetto (1988-1991)
This page is part of the Field Guide to the Left.
