Historic Compromise (Italy)
역사적 타협 (이탈리아)
The line of cooperation with the Christian Democrats proposed in 1973 by Enrico Berlinguer, general secretary of the Italian Communist Party. Drawing the lesson of the coup that overthrew Allende in Chile, he concluded that the Marxist left could not govern in Western democracies without alliances with moderate forces. When the PCI reached its peak in the 1976 election it led to the "government of non no-confidence" and the "national solidarity" governments of the Christian Democrat Andreotti, but the PCI never entered the cabinet. It lost momentum after the kidnapping and murder of Aldo Moro in 1978, and in 1980 Berlinguer declared it over.
In depth
The proposal
In 1973 Berlinguer published three articles in the communist magazine Rinascita proposing a "democratic alliance" with the Christian Democrats. The Chilean coup was the trigger, and the oil crisis of the same year raised fears for Western welfare states and for fragile liberal democracy itself. The proposal also meant the final abandonment of the "left alternative" strategy of an alliance between the PCI and the Socialists. From the PCI side it could be seen as continuing the post-war coalition governments that followed Togliatti's Salerno Turn in 1944.
Practice and end
Aldo Moro of the Christian Democrats embraced the idea, but for him the "third phase" meant drawing in all the political forces of the Republic, not only the Communists. After the 1976 election the PCI entered the majority by not voting no-confidence in Andreotti's government; in 1978 the government resigned to allow a more organic PCI entry into the majority, but there were never Communist ministers. With Moro's kidnapping and murder and discontent in both parties, the PCI returned to opposition in 1979. In the same years the PCI distanced itself from the Soviet Union with Eurocommunism, together with the Spanish and French parties.