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The Cold War country trends Italy: Communist Party post-war era
Italian Communist Party: Post-World War II Era (1945-60)
Figure 1.--This photograph was taken in 1951 in front of a local seat of the Communist Party in Livorno, Tuscany. The boys are giving vthe raised fist Communist salute. Tuscany is in northern Italy where Italian industry was centered. And because of labor union support was where the Communist Party was most popular. Stalin had real expectations that the Italian people might democratically vote in a Communist Government--something that had never happened anywhere else. The Party was dominated by Moscow-imposed Stalinists. Notice Stalin's name emblazoned over the front door.
The rapid development of the Italian economy after World War II was a major success story--the Italian Economic Miracle. Italy like other European countries, except Britain and the Communist East, experienced economic miracles. Economic prosperity probably saved Italy from turning to the Communists and following Eastern Europe into the Soviet Empire. Even after NATO was formed and America made a military commitment to Western Europe, Stalin was still hopeful of cracking the Western alliance. He pinned his hopes on the Communist parties in the West, especially the large French and Italian Communist parties. The Communists had gained considerable prestige during the last 2-years of World War II. They were the only effective Italian resistance to the Germans and Fascists as the Allies drove up the Peninsula. They proved to be the backbone of the the Partisan movement. The Communists had a real opportunity to seize power in an open democratic election. Something that had never happaned. The first important post-War election resulted in the Communists (ICP) polling nearly 20 percent of the vote (1946). Even though the Italian left (Communists and Socialists) polled about 40 percent of the vote, the Democrazia Cristiana (Christian Democrats - DCP) who polled only 35 percent of the vote formed the government. The Communists were given the Justice Ministry. The Communists exploited public disatisfaction with economic conditions and the May Crisis durng 1947 with strikes and disorders designed to bring down the Government, but failed. The Italiamn left decided to form a United Front (FDP) for the next election. This would be a crucial election because it was before the Economic Miracle had kicked in. And it would be vital to Italy's economic future. Italian industrialists and even small businessmen were not going to make investments in a country run by a Socialist-Communist Government. Democrazia Cristiana (Christian Democrats-DCP) led by Alcide De Gasperi won a resounding victory with 48 percent of the vote, an astonishing victory in multi-party parlimentary system (1948). This would prove to be their best result ever, never repeated. The FDP only received only slightly over 30 percent of the votes, less than the combined Socialist-Communist vote in 1946. The ICP subtanially outpolled the more moderate Socialists within the FDP. The 1948 election would set the mold for subsequent Italian elections. For nearly four decades, Italian elections would be won by the DCP. Italian industrial workers were the backbone of the ICP believing that Communism would lead to higher wages and prosperity. In fact, Communism where adopted was so inefficent, that workers were paid very low wages. This became apparent early on. The Eastern European revolts against the Communists which began in East Germany (1953), primarily centered on worker disatisfaction with low wages and poor work conditions and living standards.
The PCI was led by Palmiro Togliatti who like many other European Communists spent most of the inter-War era in the Soviet Union. There they were carefully vetted by the NKVD to be sure that they werecommitted Staminists. Many who failed the test disappeared into the Gulag. Togliatti survived. He led the PCI in post-War Italy to become the second largest political party in Italy, and the largest non-ruling communist party in Europe. The success of the Italian Economic Miracle ultimately prevented the PCI from winning national elections during Togliatti's life. The PCI did win many municipal elections and governed quite a number of cities and and regions, most Naples and the industrial north. Not only economic conditions were at play, bur even Eiropean Communists and other leftists werebecoming increasingly aware of the true nature of Soviet Communism. This became all too apparent with the
the Soviet's brutal suppression of the Hungarian Revolution (1956). No amount of propaganda could cover it up. And it split Italian Communists. The party leadership was dpminated by Stalinists like Togliatti and Giorgio Napolitano (who would decades kater become President of the Italian Republic). They dutifully supported the Moscow view that the Hungarian insurgents were dangerous counter-revolutionaries. This is what l'Unità, the official PCI newspaper, reported. Other important PCI members rejected this view. Giuseppe Di Vittorio, leader of the Communist trade union Italian General Confederation of Labour (CGIL), challenged Togliatti and other PCI Stalinists.
Notably the CGIL was the heart of the PCI support. Other challengers to the PCI Stalinists was Antonio Giolitti and Italian Socialist Party national secretary Pietro Nenni-- an important PCI ally. All of this was complicated by Soviet Premier Mikita Khrushchev's Destalinization effort initiated at the 20th Party Congress. Aprocess that helped set the Hungarian Revolution in motion and weakened the grip of the Stalinists that Moscow had imposed on Western European Communist parties. Before the War, the NKVD effectively controlled the news flow from the Soviet Union such as Stalin's Ukranian genocide. This proved much more difficult in Eastern Europe.
