The european dimension of political discourse in Italy. A ... - CIRCaP

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N. CONTI / L. VERZICHELLI very respected but somehow “peripheral” leader like Giorgio Amendola 13 , and the task was reached at the end of an arduous internal debate (Walker 1976, Pasquinucci 2000). TABLE 4 ABOUT HERE The several shocks provoked by the outcomes of Soviet imperialism pushed the party to a real metamorphosis, moving from its long-established internationalism, acknowledging to the Soviet Union the mission to lead the way to Socialism, to critical positions towards USSR and search for alternative strategies. The first outcome of such a change was not support for European integration, or a preference for the West European space. On the contrary, the party focused on the peculiarity of the Italian political situation 14 , confirming and even deepening its opposition to any sort of non-domestic constraint (Galante 1989), now also including the Soviet one. The party developed a new perspective based on multi-polarity in the international order, aiming at the end of Superpower bipolarity. At the same time, multipolarity should apply to intra-communist relations, with the end of PCUS hegemony. Therefore, it can be said that until the end of the sixties the party ideology was still focused on two pillars: the nation and the world. The fact that at the end of the sixties for the first time a small group of Italian Communists joined the EP did not produce a rapid impact on the attitudes of the Pci. Socialization with European institutions and with specific EEC problems was a gradual process that did not push the party to abandon its perspectives in the short run. Yet, the focus on the national dimension that followed the crisis of the traditional internationalism of the party proved very problematic after the events taking place in Chile. In fact, the party perceived two events as proof for the inappropriateness of the national way to socialism: Prague was the example from the East, while Santiago was the one from the West. With both internationalism and the national way to socialism over, the party shifted into new positions on European integration. Western Europe started to be seen as the political space where the party could develop fruitful relations with left-wing parties and work to drive itself to a less isolated position. As a consequence, the process of European integration started to be given an unprecedented attention in the party documents. Moreover, acceptance of European integration and a general Atlantic loyalty were considered necessary steps to achieve the party strategy in the domestic arena - the “historical compromise” with Christian democrats. As it was one decade before with the Psi, 13 In fact, the “famous” speech of Enrico Berlinguer at the XIII party congress (March 1972) was mainly centred on the themes of domestic politics, while it was Giorgio Amendola, the same day, to face for the first time in the story of the Pci the question of a sincere acceptance of the EEC. 14 Where the Pci was the largest Western Communist party. 22
THE EUROPEAN DIMENSION OF POLITICAL DISCOURSE IN ITALY. acceptance of the very idea of the integration of Western Europe played a legitimising role for the party to become a potential government partner. Starting from the seventies, the party preference for the role of Western Europe in the world order fluctuated between an idea of Europe as an independent entity, equally distant from USA and USSR, to an idea of peace promotion with the specific mission of facilitating peaceful relationships between the two Superpowers. At the beginning of the seventies, the party was still very critical towards the role of the United States as a driving force of European integration and claimed autonomy from the American influence as a necessary step. But by the mid-seventies, the strong relationship linking Western Europe to the United States started to be rather accepted, leading the party to talk about …historical ties linking Italians to Americans” 15 . Consequently, the criticism on the outcomes of European integration came to be much more articulate than in the past. According to the Pci, one of the main problems of EEC was its non-democratic nature. This became a recurrent feature in party documents throughout the seventies and, according to the Pci, solutions to this problem should include the direct election and the strengthening of the powers of the EP (at the expenses of the Commission and of the Council), a larger control of domestic parliaments on European politics and a larger involvement of the working class in the decision-making processes. A crystal-clear evidence of the necessity to keep two different discourses together, i.e. an articulate and deep criticism on the trajectory of EEC and the support to a potential new Europe, politically autonomous and built on basis of social cooperation, can be found when carefully reading the several articles on European integration published by the partymagazine Rinascita, between the late sixties and 1979. Here, an increasingly relevant sector of the communist elite could address the new themes of the Eurocommunist doctrine (namely the necessity to democratise the EC and the importance of policy harmonisation), without receding from the most typical Pci’s criticisms to the EEC (its capitalist nature and the negative impact of EMS and PAC). In this way, a precise communication discourse (specially oriented to activists and voters) traced the roots of a new pattern of attitudes towards European integration, without producing a disruptive or divisive internal discourse within the leading party elite. In sum, European policies were still found to have a negative impact on a number of domestic interests. Among the negative effects that were mentioned, a great emphasis was placed on the strengthening of capitalism with related phenomena such as monopoly growth, 15 From the Pci platform of 1976. 23
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The european dimension of political discourse in Italy. A ... - CIRCaP

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