'My name is Vittoria, Im a away our right to demonstrate... Comrades, it's sad to admit it, but it's how it is: they 're smashing us, we're not going to win.
Vittoria, Messina school student 'So what do we say to our workmates who now more than ever see us as the only people capable of opposing the Christian Democrat/Communist Party government, the only people capable of giving a lead....It's convenient to dissolve the party into the movement, but it doesn't help the movement to grow, it becomes suffocated. I believe we should look to the movement to try and develop a political project which would return to the movement and be tested there.
Claudio C, Turin factory worker and Phil Hearse THESE two remarks, taken from letters that appear in Dear Comrades, are not just the individual responses of two comrades. They reflect the crisis that contronted the whole Italian far left in 1976 and 1977.
The general election of June 1976 resulted the right-wing Democrats, the ruling party since holding on to power. far left had been based on the expectation ol á victory tor tuc iell ana a govelncne of the Socialist Party, the Radical Party and the Communists. The orcanusadon: nad Proletaria joint electoral bloc, holding enough sway in the new ment to push it fartner to tne lelt.
The revolutionary left won nine seats, but that was lu compensation for overall cerere. Tune multarls disoriented and demoralised.
After the Chilean coup Italian Communist Party (PCI) pursued a policy of seeking collaboration with the cinsual Deuucias, lc promise'. Alter the 19/o elecuons ialy vas ruled by a cabinet composed entirely of Christian Democrats but with the tacit support ('non-opposition') of the Communist Party.
The bicycle On Saturday 14 March, while I was.
following the demonstration along via Torina on my push bike, a comrade marching behind the LC banner asked to borrow my bike to get up to the front quickly. I lent it to him, but I haven't seen it since.
hope it's all a mix-up ask this comrade to return the bike to me at the central branch office as soon as possible. Otherwise I'll have to think I'm the biggest fool in lUWI.
Marco The total bankruptcy of the Com MUnISI ralLy s approach many militants to take titude to the PCI and other established WOrKCIS ol salsalvis, nence mne use o latoasi groups like the Red Brigades and sponlancisi PLOUUS like themselves tne metroponlan Iulans.
mood was also reflected in Lotta ConUnda.
At the Rimini conference, when Lotta Continua dissolved, a leading comrade called the CP an 'instrument for the promoo or luan doc lasa 10,000, the Rimini. ( Christian 1947, The strategy of the far left Democratzia Democracv.
the aim of governWCIC 'historic com- so 1 trade unions capitalist state'.
The economic across une caoltalist rose steeply encouraged Ciresual Democra an acil support, including the ana demonstraululs calling challenged 1 lc in Lotta Continua . Sofri, the IN 1976 Lotta Continua, the Italian revolutionary organisation, had a membership of and its newspaper of the same name had a circulation of 30,000. It seemed set to go from strength to strength.
But in that same year a lively discussion organisation turned unresolvable conflict at its conference in The conference ended with the secretary of Lotta Continua, called the arcuiations began crisis that appeared world in the earls which 1970s struck Italy badly. Unemployment and inflation galloped. The guveilillcil. imnosed austera.
workers responded with a wave of strikes vul nulic • 01 these reached critical proportions, the PCI and trade union leaderships were not seriously and the government was by and large able to impose its policies situation required of the and revolutionary left a new perspective, and a lively pre-conference discussion opened Documents reflecting the discussions held in national assemblies of the various sectors of the organisation into were produced. But the Rimini conference on 31 October with no clear posiCons lor voune.
This situation threatened to leave Lotta Continua political line face huge political economic crisis. But then there burst upon the conference another explosive issue.
The far left in Europe faced a common probiem: now to meel Ine culalienge both in general politics within their organisations. In the Italian far left this problem exploded with par ticular intensity.
Italian culture and the repressive divorce abortion laws, produce. repressed sexuality, greater StrOn'C! •ICllldit SLei CuLy madonna or whore. Sexism pervades the revolutionary movements more pronounced destruction of Lotta Continue as organisation, although its paper continued to appear and retained its popularity.
Dear Comrades, recently published by Pluto Press, is a collection of readers' letters taken from Lotta Continua in the year after the Rimini fiasco. Here we reprint some of the letters and poems and examine the background to the book.
way than in the Protestant countries of Northern Europe. challenge of the new women's movement. Lulld Continua A struggle erupted at the conference between feminists and workerists. and The controntation expressea ltscll a. 'workers centrality vs feminist centrality' The leading group that had called the con ference disappeared altogether and played Ca ne no roie in the debale. No one realirmcu that revolutionary strategy must take up June DrObICHl posed movement, or that the mass movement ol must have dependence. emtypeis mo, more The idea that apitalisn will eliminate all form:
Catholic overthrowing capitalism at all. Stress was an tinua means the problems that at the Congress.
Led their discontent.
Led.
A CV violent cashes Continua and feminists Later, unoe (Workers' muntents LUCO. risoner. screws, the solitary confinement.
Genoa. lines, Pina Marozzellli moving will to struggle, to disorientation were organisations, Crete Flame, period of nore noncol ll tionary had not the Today The tionship to the by the women's specific the overthrow of failed to provide. no of women's oppresContinua' has an argument againsi and benaviour as an alternative to antlconac reponded badly aggressively exhibiting their male chauvinism, or indulging in lengthy self-criticism on ine conicrence noor . The upconfusion votes were taken, except to elect a national committee, and the conference ended on the note "The conference continues' • CLOE: COI 'the struggle continues')
Lotta Continu: was tinisnea; out tae leucis orra lsalivl page of its newspaper became the arena for debating had raised their heads , Comrades described theit confusion and demoralisation, discussed personal problems, wrote poetry, express.
Meanwhile, the crisis in Italy deepenstudent radicalisation led to on une surcels But the militants grew more confused. perspectives, in despair, they poured ou their hearts in the letters page ol Lola police, friends and comradesiedio to the students killed by • in moving words. dune workensk continued their debate pressure from groups like the Red Brigades and Autonomia. Operaia Autonomy), more and more Young people wrote of their aDUl the problem • O their families their schools. wrote about nte in jail, the psychological effects Everyone wrote to the paper: the letters page of Lotta ConI'm a pensioner from the heart of Comrades, I'm tired and disgusted, but I have faith in you young people who are carrying on our struggle. I'm sure that if we are all united, like so many years ago, we'll manage to crush them. As for us old comrades, we'll make an eifort to be with you in the front and it must be a great joy to comrades who have been in the struggle for over thirty years.
Greetings with a clenched fist from your comrade, The letters collected in Dear Comrades make, a fascinating document, at times humourous, seek a better life, is rarely absent from the letters Dear Comrades is also a pro foundly tragic document, expressing the To une ltallal far left.
Despite the huge numbers of people workers, students, women, youth - who aroul , these organisations could the revolutionary not. rise to the challenge , distorts the failure of Lotta Con- AMOCISUl militant of Big tinua in his introduction to the collection He would have us believe that since 1976 the Italian far left has OCCI through a "reassessment'. twoule thousands of comrades have been say JOSL IO lIC revolumovement. Many have drifted back to the PCI, despite its role in supporting the government: the far left presented them with no alternative. Others turned to terrorism and the Red Brigades measurably weaker than it was in 1976. _itne left is imThere is nothing positive in that. It is a greater tragedy than all the little tragedies described in the letters.
letters page of Lotta Continua was more lively and reflected a fuller rela! véve àn find on the British revolutionary left. But however important that may be, political answers are necessary. Otherwise the let ters pesinay anseers het the s nanswers spontaneism of Lotta Continua consistently Dear Comrades: Readers' letters to 'Lort just been publisher Pluto Press, £1.95 paperbacl
Socialist Challenge No.153 26 June1980 20p
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comrade from Messina. At 16 I'm already tired of struggle, resigned, especially now when 1 see how they kill us, taking
tinua reflected the ferment of the Italian Two generations