Italy's left

[Colonello Buendia]

As you may have heard, Berlusconi and the far right have one the Italian elections. The Communist party lost all their seats and are now powerless. In my humble opinion their attempt at playing king makers by selling themselves and their worker base to the social democrats destroyed the left, they squabbled and generally attempted to use reformism to achieve their aims while also protesting about wages in the street thus weakening their government. I blame the rise of the far right and Berlusconi entirely on the stupid factional bickering left. your thoughts?

[Dimentio]

My thought right now is that the socialist and communist parties in much of western Europe has been on the path of self-destruction since the 1990;s at least. I think the political parties are losing their relevance, and that we need new, mainly supranational organisations which does'nt necessarily structure themselves as political parties.

As for Berlusconi, I have actually heard that Prodi was the bigger neoliberal in terms of deregulations. But given that not all regulations are good, he might in fact have been more progressive in that context during that particular time.

What did Berlusconi accomplish in 2001-2006?

[Colonello Buendia]

Berlusconi didn't accomplish much but he's the first prime minister of Italy to have held power for his entire term. Prodi was center left but a neo liberal, however compared to Berlusconi who was a right wing prat he was ok.

[Wanted Man]

It's a very difficult situation. They even decided to support extending the mission in Afghanistan. The reason: "It's either that, or Berlusconi." However, it apparently doesn't matter, as now we have Berlusconi anyway. His competitor decided not to work with the communists for a change. As a result, the communists lost heavily, because the voters who wanted "anything but Berlusconi" simply went for Ventroni.

End balance: we now have a Berlusconi government, including whole and half Fascists. The Left lost all their seats. Great. :(

[Colonello Buendia]

tragic aint it? however if even the communist party extended the afghanistan stuff then one must wonder as to their true political motives, I think they're a bit reformist.

[AGITprop]

I don't think this is reflective of rise of popularity of the right wing, but only a loss of popularity among the reformist left wing. It's a classic case of people looking for solutions, and I would not be worried too much about Berlusconi and his fascist thugs, as we will see that they will not be able to resolve anything either. This is just another card in the game being played out, but what needs to happen is a rise of the grassroots radical left, and we have seen a lot of growth in our Italian branch at the IMT, so I guess that counts for something!

[Colonello Buendia]

yeah, the problem was they way the left conducted itself. fascism hasn't risen, disagreement with the left has

[Herman]

Berlusconi is an inconsiderate, arrogant asshole.

Italian politics in general have been fucked up.

[razboz]

Yes i think the Communist Party are (by definition) on the reformist side :rolleyes:

the clue's in the name, see?

itialian politics in general are very theatrical and very unstable. Overall, italy froma political point of view is in a mess with coalitions based entirely on power play, rather than actual ideals. i doubt anyone in italian politics is exempt from delusions of grandeur.

[Herman]

They're eurocommunist, like most of the main communist parties in Western Europe.

[cyu]

Berlusconi controls more media outlets than anyone else in Italy, so I would say any election victories on his part is more due to the lack of a diversity of political ideas than anything else. The more media he controls, the less of a real democracy it is.