Proletarian Unity Party
Encyclopedia
The Proletarian Unity Party (Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

: Partito di Unità Proletaria, PdUP) was a political party
Political party
A political party is a political organization that typically seeks to influence government policy, usually by nominating their own candidates and trying to seat them in political office. Parties participate in electoral campaigns, educational outreach or protest actions...

 in Italy
Politics of Italy
The politics of Italy is conducted through a parliamentary, democratic republic with a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised collectively by the Council of Ministers, which is led by the President of the Council of Ministers, referred to as "Presidente del Consiglio" in Italian...

.

Origins

The PdUP was founded in the November 1972 by minority factions of two parties, the socialist
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

 Italian Socialist Party of Proletarian Unity
Italian Socialist Party of Proletarian Unity
The Italian Socialist Party of Proletarian Unity , was a political party in Italy from 1964 to 1972.-History:...

 (PSIUP), led by Vittorio Foa
Vittorio Foa
Vittorio Foa was an Italian politician, trade unionist, journalist and writer.-Biography:Foa was born in Turin in 1910 into a middle-class Jewish family....

, and Silvano Miniati, and the Catholic left Political Movement of Labourers (MPL), led by Giovanni Russo Spena and Domenico Jervolino, who had opposed the merge into the Italian Socialist Party
Italian Socialist Party
The Italian Socialist Party was a socialist and later social-democratic political party in Italy founded in Genoa in 1892.Once the dominant leftist party in Italy, it was eclipsed in status by the Italian Communist Party following World War II...

 (PSI). Its symbol was the hammer and sickle
Hammer and sickle
The hammer and sickle is a part of communist symbolism and its usage indicates an association with Communism, a Communist party, or a Communist state. It features a hammer and a sickle overlapping each other. The two tools are symbols of the industrial proletariat and the peasantry; placing them...

 over the world.

In 1974 these members were joined by the group of Il Manifesto
Il Manifesto
il manifesto is an Italian newspaper. While it calls itself communist, it is not connected to any political party. It was founded as a monthly review in 1969 by a collective of left-wing journalists engaged in the wave of critical thought and activity on the Italian left in that period. Prominent...

and by the Autonomist Student Movemenet led by Mario Capanna
Mario Capanna
Mario Capanna is an Italian politician and writer.-Biography:Born in Città di Castello, he studied Philosophy at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan, and was the leader of the Italian students' movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s...

, forming the Proletarian Unity Party for Communism (in Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

 called Partito di Unità Popolare per il Comunismo). The founding congress was held on January 29, 1976. Main leaders of the various currents were Miniati, Foa, Capanna (far left
Far left
Far left, also known as the revolutionary left, radical left and extreme left are terms which refer to the highest degree of leftist positions among left-wing politics...

-oriented), Rossana Rossanda
Rossana Rossanda
-Biography:Rossanda was born in Pula, then part of Italy. She studied in Milan and was a pupil of philosopher Antonio Banfi. At a very young age, she took part in the Italian resistance and, after the end of World War II, she entered the Italian Communist Party . After a short period, secretary ...

 and Lucio Magri
Lucio Magri
Lucio Magri was an Italian journalist and politician.-Biography:Magri was born in Ferrara and was one of the founders of the far-left newspaper il manifesto....

 - leaning for collaboration with the Italian Communist Party
Italian Communist Party
The Italian Communist Party was a communist political party in Italy.The PCI was founded as Communist Party of Italy on 21 January 1921 in Livorno, by seceding from the Italian Socialist Party . Amadeo Bordiga and Antonio Gramsci led the split. Outlawed during the Fascist regime, the party played...

 (PCI) and Italian General Confederation of Labour
Italian General Confederation of Labour
-External links:**...

) - and Luigi Pintor. Magri was elected as the group's first national secretary.

During the 1976 general elections, PdUP ran together with Proletarian Democracy
Proletarian Democracy
Proletarian Democracy was a political party in Italy.-1970s:DP was founded in 1975 as a joint electoral front of the Proletarian Unity Party , Workers Vanguard and the Workers Movement for Socialism...

, gaining 3 seats in the Italian Chamber of Deputies
Italian Chamber of Deputies
The Italian Chamber of Deputies is the lower house of the Parliament of Italy. It has 630 seats, a plurality of which is controlled presently by liberal-conservative party People of Freedom. Twelve deputies represent Italian citizens outside of Italy. Deputies meet in the Palazzo Montecitorio. A...

 (Magri, Eliseo Milani and Luciana Castellina) elected out of the coalition's 9.

Splinter group

In January of 1977, the Manifesto and former-PSIUP affiliates left the party due to the failure in creating an all-left government. On February 20, 1977 the left-wing minority tendency broke away to join Proletarian Democracy in its founding process as organized party.

The Magri's majority absorbed for a while the Avanguardia Operaia movement, which, however, separated in the Congress held at Viareggio
Viareggio
Viareggio is a city and comune located in northern Tuscany, Italy, on the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea. With a population of over 64,000 it is the main centre of the northern Tuscan Riviera known as Versilia, and the second largest city within the Province of Lucca.It is known as a seaside resort...

 the following year. During its third congress (Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

, 1981), the party was joined by the Movimento Lavoratori per il Socialismo, led by Luca Cafiero.

Absorption into the PCI and later events

After the elections of 1983 PdUP associated its lists to PCI, to which it had become closer after the PCI secretary Enrico Berlinguer
Enrico Berlinguer
Enrico Berlinguer was an Italian politician; he was national secretary of the Italian Communist Party from 1972 until his death.-Early career:...

 had abandoned of the Historic Compromise
Historic Compromise
In Italian history, the Historic Compromise was an accommodation between the Christian Democrats and the Italian Communist Party in the 1970s, after the latter embraced eurocommunism under Enrico Berlinguer. The 1978 assassination of DC leader Aldo Moro put an end to the Compromesso storico...

(a project for a PCI-Christian Democracy
Christian Democracy (Italy)
Christian Democracy was a Christian democratic party in Italy. It was founded in 1943 as the ideological successor of the historical Italian People's Party, which had the same symbol, a crossed shield ....

 alliance).

On November 25, 1984 the Proletarian Unity Party merged into PCI. When, in 1991, Achille Occhetto
Achille Occhetto
Achille Occhetto , nicknamed Akel, is an Italian political figure.-Biography:Occhetto was born in Turin. He served as the secretary-general of the Italian Communist Party between 1988 and 1994 Achille Occhetto (born 3 March 1936), nicknamed Akel, is an Italian political figure.-Biography:Occhetto...

 started the process of transformation of PCI into the Social-Democratic
Social democracy
Social democracy is a political ideology of the center-left on the political spectrum. Social democracy is officially a form of evolutionary reformist socialism. It supports class collaboration as the course to achieve socialism...

 oriented Democratic Party of the Left
Democratic Party of the Left
The Democratic Party of the Left was a post-communist, democratic socialist political party in Italy.-History:...

 (PDS), some ex-PdUP members declared their opposition to the move, and subsequently adhered to Communist Refoundation Party
Communist Refoundation Party
The Communist Refoundation Party is a communist Italian political party. Its current secretary is Paolo Ferrero....

. After the latter abandoned support to the Italian Centre-left
Centre-left
Centre-left is a political term that describes individuals, political parties or organisations such as think tanks whose ideology lies between the centre and the left on the left-right spectrum...

 Lamberto Dini government in 1995, much of the ex-PdUP members left the party to create the Movement of United Communists
Movement of United Communists
The Movement of Unitarian Communists was a communist political party in Italy.It was founded in June 1995 as a split of the Communist Refoundation Party by those Communist MPs who had voted the vote of confidence to the government of Lamberto Dini The Movement of Unitarian Communists (Movimento...

, which later was absorbed into PDS' heir, the Democrats of the Left
Democrats of the Left
The Democrats of the Left was a social-democratic Italian political party and part of the Olive Tree electoral coalition, which merged with a number of centrist and leftist groups to form the Democratic Party on 14 October 2007...

.

Notable member

  • Vittorio Agnoletto
    Vittorio Agnoletto
    Vittorio Emanuele Agnoletto is an Italian politician and Member of the European Parliament for the Southern Italy constituency. He was first elected in the 2004 European Parliament elections on the Communist Refoundation Party list, part of the European Left...

  • Luca Cafiero
  • Mario Capanna
    Mario Capanna
    Mario Capanna is an Italian politician and writer.-Biography:Born in Città di Castello, he studied Philosophy at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan, and was the leader of the Italian students' movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s...

  • Massimo Caprara
  • Luciana Castellina
  • Mario Catalano
  • Famiano Crucianelli
  • Ivano Di Cerbo
  • Davide Ferrari
  • Vittorio Foa
    Vittorio Foa
    Vittorio Foa was an Italian politician, trade unionist, journalist and writer.-Biography:Foa was born in Turin in 1910 into a middle-class Jewish family....

  • Paolo Gentiloni
    Paolo Gentiloni
    Paolo Gentiloni is an Italian politician, member of the Daisy—Democracy is Freedom party and currently the Italian Minister of Communications.-Biography:He is a professional journalist and has a degree in political sciences....

  • Alfonso Gianni
  • Franco Grillini
    Franco Grillini
    Franco Grillini is an Italian politician and Italy's most prominent gay rights activist.-Career:He was born in Pianoro, Province of Bologna. During the 1970s, he took part in student political movements. He attended the University of Bologna, graduating in 1979 with a degree in education, and...

  • Lucio Magri
    Lucio Magri
    Lucio Magri was an Italian journalist and politician.-Biography:Magri was born in Ferrara and was one of the founders of the far-left newspaper il manifesto....

  • Ramon Mantovani
  • Lidia Menapace
  • Eliseo Milani
  • Silvano Miniati
  • Roberto Musacchio
    Roberto Musacchio
    Roberto Musacchio is an Italian politician and Member of the European Parliament for the North-East with the Partito della Rifondazione Comunista , Member of the Bureau of the European United Left - Nordic Green Left, and sits on the European Parliament's Committee on the Environment, Public...

  • Aldo Natoli
  • Valentino Parlato
  • Luciano Pettinari
  • Luigi Pintor
  • Rossana Rossanda
    Rossana Rossanda
    -Biography:Rossanda was born in Pula, then part of Italy. She studied in Milan and was a pupil of philosopher Antonio Banfi. At a very young age, she took part in the Italian resistance and, after the end of World War II, she entered the Italian Communist Party . After a short period, secretary ...

  • Giovanni Russo Spena
  • Massimo Serafini
  • Vincenzo Vita
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