University Thesis - The “Avanti!” From clandestinity to democracy.
Note: this is the final chapter of a bilingual Italian-English thesis. It’s an English synthesis of the entire work. The first 4 Italian chapters are full of citations and quotes.
This thesis shows the Italian situation between 1943 and 1945 from the point of view of the Italian Socialist Party. The structure of this thesis is as follow: a short introduction about this work; a quick history of the Italian newspaper “Avanti!” (Forward!); two articles in which the Socialist Party proposes a new Party with the Communists; eight articles, put in a chronological order, showing the political progression of Italy; a final article in which the Communist Party replies to the proposal and the Socialists comment; an English synthesis.
This work is a Languages and Communication graduation thesis, born from a personal and patriotic curiosity to know Italian mentality versus a caused, but unwanted war, fighting between other Nations' mistrust and the difficulty recovery of a lost internal freedom. It was possible thanks to my supervisor, professor Luca Lecis, and to libraries of my University, where I found the articles and the books mentioned in the bibliography.
The Italian newspaper “Avanti!” was first published on the 25th December of 1896, as the daily newspaper of the Italian Socialist Party, created by Italian Marxists after the constitution of the German Social Democratic Party; it was placed in Rome, thanks to its political and geographical strategic position in the peninsula. During their XII National Congress, ISP’s members divided the Party in pro and anti-war. In the next Congress, the anti-war side won the dispute thanks to the speech of the new secretary of the Forlì’s federation, Benito Mussolini. In a few months, Mussolini became the new chief editor of the newspaper, until two years later, he published a pro- war article to fight in WWI.
Discharged and then expelled from the Socialist Party for publishing his own pro-war newspaper, Mussolini became a fascist dictator in 1926, when all the Italian political parties became illegal, meanwhile “Avanti!” reopened under Paris. After another dispute in the ISP, the newspaper opened a sister location in ground in Zürich, supposedly more loyal to the original ISP, on March 1930. The sister location moved to Paris in 1934, and it had to take the name of “Nuovo Avanti” (New Forward). On July 26th, 1943, the “Avanti!” reappeared in Rome, still underground, the day after Mussolini's dismissal from the Italian government. It will stay underground until the Italian Liberation of April 1945.
On August 1st of 1943, another underground sister location of the newspaper opened in Milan. We will focus on the articles published from this location. On that first day, two articles entitled “Proletarian Unity” and “Program of the Movement of Proletarian Unity for the Socialist Republic” asked and encouraged Italian Communists to join the Socialists in a new Party. It was supposed to “feel free from the weight of their traditions, be the expression of the Proletarian conscience, be democratic, be school of autonomy for the workers, fight for the socialist solution against the fascism, be prepared for the complete conquest of the political power and consider itself a member of the next International”.
The program was based on eight points: foundation of a Socialist Republic where the power would go to the workers and it would be used from the organs that they would find more fitting; promotion of the creation of a pacific and socialist European community; socialization of every mean of production and trade; socialization of agriculture and abolition of every profit and every capitalistic parasitism; creation of socialized corporations of distribution and suppression of every speculation; elimination of every capitalistic form of property; full freedom of thought and worship, and equality of religion and race; strengthening of spiritual and cultural values.
On October 11th of 1943, a month after the armistice and the beginning of the Nazis occupation, the article “Fighting” urged Italian population to be prepared to fight for its freedom, to not be a passive spectator of the sad events, and to organize themselves and their Socialist Party to fight against the Nazi occupier and the fascist traitor. Four months later, the article "The hour is drawing near" exposed the increasing unemployment and misery which involved even the highest class, except for the collaborators and the fascist traitors. The Nazis' program was filled with hateful persecutions, despicable blackmails, arbitrary arrests, bestial tortures, horrifying murders. The Italian population was forming committees of action for defense and offense and organizing secret cells of unrest. The partisans were still proudly fighting the occupiers. The next month, the article "Balance sheet of six months of republican-fascist government" noticed the four promises made after the armistice: tidy the economic chaos up; restore the balance proceeds-prices; reconstitute the military forces; guarantee tranquility to every citizen no matter the opinion. The balance sheet compared them with the results: the production was completely unorganized; proceeds were two measures and a half distant from the prices; the reconstituted military forces were the fascist ones from the last decades; no guarantees for the population, with high peaks of arrests, murders, tortures and thefts. At the end of June 1944, in the article "Conclusive trial", we get to know that the new government Bonomi didn't swear loyalty to the king. This humiliation was the announcement of an inexorable and definitive conviction. The monarchy didn't let Mussolini rule unchecked, but it supported him underground. As the article suggested, the problem was not the ruling dynasty, but the entire monarchic system. A problem of the monarchy and the middle class, which as soon as it abandoned its arbitration practice, it let Fascism take the power. For the writer, the next republic had to be Socialist. The next month, in the peninsula sounded an "Alarm bell". From Genoa, the Nazis started to flee, but with the intention of bringing men, machines, food and clothes to Germany, and destroy or burn all the rest. The proletarians were prepared and ready to fight, guided by the Socialist and Communists Parties. At the end of 1944, the article "Socialist rectitude" commemorated the dismissal of the government Bonomi as the disintegration of the anti-fascist unity, and announced the passage of the Socialist Party to the opposition. The false accusations moved to Bonomi were of operate against the interests of the Italian population, revere the monarchy, not prepare a plan to reconstruct the economy after WWII and Fascism, not be energetic enough in his political career, not be brave enough in internal and international politics, and be too flexible in finding solutions. The Socialist newspaper defended Bonomi, encouraging the population and the reactionary movements without pretending the revolution. The dismissal of Bonomi symbolized a democracy's humiliation and a new monarchy's victory, which led the Socialist Party to guide the proletarians and the workers from the opposition. On March 10th of 1945, the article "Our duty" was hopeful about the upcoming end of the war. The article instigated the Italian population to be more active in the fight against the enemy, because History already chose the winners, the other nations were still suspicious and mistrustful and the final judgment was very close. The Italian population had many resources, like passive and active resistance and sabotage. The Nazi-fascists were at their last ammunition, and Italians needed to help reach the same results, even with different methods.
Finally, on April 10th of 1945, the article "The trial by fire of the unity of action" presented itself as the Milan version of an article signed by Pietro Nenni, secretary of the Socialist Party and chief editor of the roman location of the newspaper, who comments an article of “Rinascita” (Rebirth) signed by Palmiro Togliatti, secretary of the Communist Party, about the proposal to join the Socialists in a new Party. Togliatti declared that the merging political currents would bring their numerical, political and organizational forces together, but also different problems and different ways of thinking. He admitted the errors made by the Communists, like “ideological schematism" and "political sectarianism", solved by surrendering to the spontaneity of the workers' movement. In Togliatti's opinion, the new Party would need to find its ideological guide in Marxism and Leninism, understand that the working class is more important, be guarantee of peace and free development for the international politics and be sponsor of a new, combative and anti-imperialistic democracy for the internal politics. Nenni replied that the best moment for the two Parties to merge maybe is not when the unity of action has a crisis, but talking about it is useful to solve any possible disagreement and treat them as internal facts of the working class, so that when the other Parties would use them as weapons against Socialists and Communists, they can react and never talk ill about each other.
Video of the Discussion: https://youtu.be/4xEegAp-UUU
