What Has Happened in Italy, After All? – Folha de S. Paulo, May 14, 1972
by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira
Both the elections in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, and the referendum in France produced indisputably disastrous results for the influence of international communism. This is what I highlighted in a recent article.
Can the same be said of the Italian elections?
Brazilian public opinion, which I consider among the world’s most agile, curious, and perceptive, is well aware of the international importance of what is happening in Italy. It is therefore natural that it would appreciate a concise answer to this question.
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This raises another question: What is the fundamental tendency of the Italian electorate? Is it pro-communist or anticommunist?
I would argue that the elections marked a clear advance in anticommunist sentiment among both right-wing and centrist groups. Therefore, the majority of public opinion will be deeply dissatisfied if, during the new legislature, the Christian Democrats again maneuver to bring Italy closer to communism. For a Christian Democratic government, this could eventually produce setbacks as bitter as, or even more bitter than, those suffered by Frei (the “Chilean Kerensky”) and Allende in Chile.
Of course, in this commentary, I refuse to accept that the Christian Democratic Party (CDP) is purely centrist. While its electorate is centrist, most of its leadership plays into the hands of communism.
That said, the CDP’s much-touted “victory” is not far from being a warning from the centrist base to its leftist leadership.
Incidentally, what did this “victory” consist of? A loss of 0.2% of votes in the Senate and 0.3% in the Chamber of Deputies (even though the result was one more deputy for the CD). It takes a lot of goodwill to think that losing votes — however few — is winning voters!
Let us move on to the other parties. For the Senate, the Italian Communist Party (ICP) formed a single ticket with its minor affiliate, the PSIUP (Italian Socialist Party of Proletarian Unity). This coalition won 27.6% of the vote. In the 1968 election, the two parties also ran together and won 30% of the vote. There was, therefore, a decline of 2.4%.
For the Chamber of Deputies, each of the parties—ICP and PSIUP—registered its own ticket in 1972. In 1968, the ICP obtained 27.2% of the votes, up from 26.9% in 1968. This represents an insignificant increase of 0.3%. As for the PSIUP branch, it received 1.9%, down from 4.5% in 1968. A decline, then. The tiny increase for the ICP was probably at the expense of the PSIUP, but the latter lost more than the ICP gained. Overall, the ICP plus branch bloc declined.
Did this loss, albeit small, go to another left-wing party, the Socialist Party (a separate organization, perhaps less radical than the PSIUP)? It does not seem so.
In 1968, the Socialist Party (SP) ran in coalition with the Social Democratic Party (SDP). The coalition ticket received 15.2% in the Senate elections. In 1972, the parties each presented their own ticket: the Socialists obtained 10.7% of the vote for the Senate, and the Social Democrats 5.4%. Total: 16.1%. This represents a meager 0.9% increase for the bloc. In the Chamber of Deputies, the Socialist ticket obtained 9.6% in 1972, and the Social Democratic Party obtained 5.1%. This totals 14.7%. In 1968, the same bloc had obtained 14.5%. In other words, an even more modest increase of 0.2%.
This means that the modest gains of the ICP, SP, and SDP do not fully offset the PSIUP’s loss of 2.6%.
For better or worse, the vote totals among the three left-wing parties differ so little that, broadly speaking, we can disregard them and conclude that everything remained the same. For the entire leftist or collaborationist camp, ranging from the Communist Party to the Christian Democratic Party, this is quite different from winning.
On the contrary, the Monarchist Party and the neo-fascist party (MSI), whose slogans the Italian electorate regards as symbols of the most outspoken anti-leftism, made undeniable progress. In 1968, each party ran its own ticket. Together, their vote totaled 4.6% in the Senate and 5.8% in the Chamber of Deputies. In 1972, the two parties ran a single ticket, achieving 9.2% in the Senate and 8.7% in the Chamber of Deputies. This means the monarchist-fascist bloc increased by 2.9% in the Chamber of Deputies and by 4.6% in the Senate. The Senate increase is notable, especially given that the bloc’s vote grew by 100%. No Italian party, large or small, recorded an increase of equal magnitude.
But there is more.
The monarchists and fascists, as well as some small centrist groups, presented themselves openly and played their cards openly with the electorate. By contrast, the CDP and ICP felt they had to engage in a colossal cover-up to avoid collapse. They had walked arm in arm throughout the previous legislature. For many Italians, the danger of an “Allendeization” of their country seemed to loom large. Terrified of a potential backlash from public opinion against such a prospect, the Christian Democrats cast aside their pro-leftist leadership team and presented themselves to the electorate, led by their right-wing or center-right wing. The party’s election slogans were against right-wing and left-wing extremism, even though the Christian Democrats had excellent relations with the socialists and communists! In other words, the CDP pretended to be right-wing in order not to be defeated. Unfortunately, the electorate was naive enough to believe in its sincerity. This explains, to a large extent, why clearly centrist or right-wing tickets did not receive a significantly higher number of votes.
In addition, through unofficial organs such as the Osservatore Romano and the Osservatore della Domenica, as well as through speeches, including one delivered on the day of the election itself, Paul VI intervened with unusual energy in favor of the CDP. Now, the electorate that Paul VI’s attitude undoubtedly influenced is that of the center and the right. Thus, had it not been for this highly influential and unexpected intervention, the votes of the other parties, both center and right, would have been higher.
In short, the CDP avoided losing face in the elections only by pretending to be right-wing and by receiving votes from the center and the right. Therefore, it would be a manifest error to imagine that the votes it obtained were an endorsement of the sad “Kerenskyian” policy it pursued in the last legislature. On the contrary, its humiliating “mea culpa” is an admission that it had to beg for centrist and right-wing votes to avoid being defeated outright.
The importance of the center- and right-wing electorate was so great in this election that even the ICP had to back down in the face of it. In fact, in a clever maneuver (or deception?) designed to give it an air of moderation—we would almost say centrism—the ICP ran its entire election campaign with slogans opposing “both extremes,” the right and the left. As if it were not viscerally, institutionally, indelibly, and extremely left-wing! It too would have lost votes if it weren’t for this camouflage (so similar to that of the Christian Democrats).
This indicates that the Italian electorate in 1972 was more hostile to a policy of convergence with communism than it had been in 1968. That is the conclusion.
